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I'm not your son but I'm probably old enough to be your brother and/or father. ;-) But I digress ...

> Microsoft has a track record for anti-competitive

I'm quite well aware of the DR-DOS, Stacker/DoubleSpace, etc. shenagins. Hell, even _part_ of the FCB (File Control Block) in DOS 1.x and 2.x was a blatant rip-off from CP/M.

Guess I missed the '+', as in 20+. And you're right, I should have said 30+. Is 40+ stretching it?

Microsoft has a LONG history of not-invented-here buying companies.

> They have not changed, they will never change.

I wouldn't say never but I'm extremely skeptical if they will ever change.

Considering they added telemetry into Visual Studio 2015 and even have a dedicated license webpage for it -- it is easy to see they still pull the same shit, different day nonsense. Emphasis added

2. DATA. The software may collect information about you and your use of the software, and send that to Microsoft. Microsoft may use this information to provide services and improve our products and services. You may opt-out of many of these scenarios, but not all, as described in the product documentation.

Microsoft doesn't respect your time, money, or computer.

He was referring to VS Code, Microsoft's opened-up free (MIT license) IDE that does many more things than just Visual C / C# / VB: https://code.visualstudio.com/

Use it, don't use it, whatever. I've been bouncing between different IDEs for what I do and found it to be exactly what the GP said: Atom, but better. Example: Atom absolutely gags on large files where VS Code doesn't seem to give a shit - it just opens it and lets you scroll and edit immediately on the same hardware.

and I'm sure Windows has lots of easily installed stuff.

The same tools used by professionals are now available free for the asking and have been for years now on Windows. Visual Studio Community Edition and Visual Studio code are both free to download and use. You can get them at VisualStudio.com and there's a vast wealth of programming knowledge, how to articles and countless reference materials available free of charge on Microsoft Docs. What more could you ask for if you wanted to get started with programming?

Yep. And if Tim Cook wants to make an impression, he'd let users make their own decisions about what version of iOS they want to run, and give them the ability to side-load apps. This is just simple pandering in an attempt to avoid regulation.

1. You are free to run whatever version of iOS you want to LEAVE on your Device (there actually are NO "Forced Upgrades"). But, I will CERTAINLY agree that you SHOULD be allowed to "Downgrade" to an earlier version of iOS, if you Upgrade and then decide it doesn't suit you or your Device. But, that's why I never Upgrade an older Device until I let a few months go by to see what the performance issues, if any, affect those who do Upgrade. For example, I am "avoiding" Upgrading my iPhone 6 Plus to iOS 11, because of reports of performance issues with iPhone 6 and iOS 11.

2. You have been able to Side-Load ANY App you want on an non-jailbroken iOS Device running iOS 8 or later, using a couple of different methods:

    a. If you have a Mac, you can use XCode to Compile and Install any number of "Open Source" iOS Apps written in Swift and Obj-C (and possibly other languages) sprayed all over the intarwebs (or, uh, you can WRITE your Own!). XCode is a Free Download (again, if you already have a Mac), and you only need to be a Registered Developer if you are going to submit your Glorious App to the App Store.

Slashdotters should be familiar with this distribution method, because it is PRECISELY how thousands of Open Source packages are distributed for Linux and other platforms.

Here's a list on Github:

https://github.com/dkhamsing/o...

And while you MUST use XCode, due to Code-Signing Requirements to submit to the App Store, (and also because it is probably still the best overall IDE for iOS Development), there ARE a few non-XCode iOS Development toolchains available. Caveat: I know NOTHING about these, what platforms they run on/support, etc. But here they are:

https://www.jetbrains.com/objc...

https://www.xojo.com/

https://www.visualstudio.com/v...

https://coderunnerapp.com/

    b. Using the Freeware Cydia Impactor utility, you can use a Mac or Windows (and maybe Linux?) PC to Install pre-compiled ".ipa" Files, WITHOUT needing to Jailbreak the iPhone... Then, all the User has to do is "Trust This Publisher" ONE TIME, and VOILA! The onus is on the USER (just like any good Slashdotter would want, right?) to decide whether they want to do this...

http://www.cydiaimpactor.com/

Here's a list of some sites that host free iOS .ipa Files:

https://www.gocydia.com/free-i...

BOTH of these methods have been available and officially-supported since iOS 8 was released in September, 2014.

But by all means, do keep up your mindless Apple-Hatred.

Oh, and you Apple Haters and other Slashtards can ALL STFU about "Walled Garden", FOREVER, got it?

Or download Ubuntu, which is approximately 1/20th the size of VS2017.

Okay, reasonable chance that this is the new approach where the files appear to exist locally but are only downloaded on access - because I suspect it's using the same NTFS filter as the Git Virtual File System.. Until now, it's a case of they didn't test on non-NTFS, but my hunch is they are now going to use features that only work on NTFS.

Why on earth MS aren't pushing ReFS, I have no idea. And I could be wrong.

Intellisense in Visual Studio has been hogging CPU and memory for over a decade. It's simply the cost of doing business in Visual Studio and the primary reason why I mostly use a simple editor and command line builds for WIN32 application/library development these days.

It says 2017, but that might be misleading -- it does not fully support C++x14 (release notes say "better" x14 support. I'd like to see "full x14 compliance & support"). And they're a ways from full x17 support.

You get spoiled using Clang/LLVM

Apparently it has all the stuff added in C++14, what is missing is C++11 and C++98 support :D

See VS2017 Release Notes - C++

the compiler is complete for features added in the C++14 Standard. Note that the compiler still lacks a few features from the C++11 and C++98 Standards.

And for your typical slashdotter (individual or OSS developer), Visual Studio Community is available for a fairly reasonable $0 per year. (Same technical feature set as VS Pro; but it's only licensed for small companies, schools/education, OSS, or individuals.)

(Small companies: Five developers can use it; small company means = 250 PCs and = 1e6 USD revenue per year).

I'm not sure about the MSDN library -- I think you get MSDN library if you subscribe for 12 month blocks. (Enterprise has a bunch of features that are aimed at very large teams - mostly around 'architecture' tools and layers and similar. Frankly, unless you're architecturing very large pieces of software, not worth the money.)

Unfortunately, there's no page about what Enteprise has that Pro doesn't..

Looks like the main new changes are about "Cloud Deployment", so it has pretty good Azure integration, I guess. I notice they finally added simple refactoring capabilities, like "Extract Function," so you know, they're making progress: soon they might catch up to Eclipse.

VS2017 Release Notes

The Professional version is $500 (license, not subscription):
https://www.visualstudio.com/v...

That seems very reasonable.

Enterprise is quite a bit more ($6K for new, $2.6K to renew), but it is part of the MSDN Enterprise (previously Ultimate I believe, that's what my license is called at this time), you get access to almost everything MS has ever made (want Windows 3.1 or DOS 6, it's there, want enterprise SQL Server, it's there).

Here's the link to the prices:
https://www.visualstudio.com/v...

The Professional version is $500 (license, not subscription):
https://www.visualstudio.com/v...

That seems very reasonable.

Enterprise is quite a bit more ($6K for new, $2.6K to renew), but it is part of the MSDN Enterprise (previously Ultimate I believe, that's what my license is called at this time), you get access to almost everything MS has ever made (want Windows 3.1 or DOS 6, it's there, want enterprise SQL Server, it's there).

Here's the link to the prices:
https://www.visualstudio.com/v...

He's not. While Visual Studio has git support, users are encouraged to use Microsoft's own free source code repository/management system.. With the exception of a few Mono holdouts, I'm guessing 90% of C# developers, professional or otherwise, use Visual Studio, where you're encouraged to use Team Services.

That would't make business sense. I think this move is a strategically great move of Microsoft.

The price of operating systems is steadily approaching zero. macOS updates are free and the OS comes with the hardware. ChromeOS is free. Microsoft already provides the license for free for smaller devices. PC sales are slowing and that's what moves OS licenses. People have fewer reasons to upgrade. What Microsoft realized is that hardware and services are the future, not operating system licenses. And to capitalize on that, they need their software to run everywhere. That means Visual Studio for Mac and SQL Server for Linux.

So no, I really don't believe helping the WINE project is a bad move for Microsoft at this point. Anything that increases adoption of Microsoft software and services is what matters now.

OK, let's see:

http://komodoide.com/komodo-ed...
https://www.sublimetext.com/
https://code.visualstudio.com/
https://atom.io/
https://panic.com/coda/ (nice example of low-contrast website as well)
https://www.jetbrains.com/webs...

That was pretty fucking easy.

If you want more examples then just type something like "best text editor" into google images and weep at the acres of grey-on-grey images that appear.

Here, let me do it for you seeing as how you're a bit out of the loop: https://encrypted.google.com/s...

For you maybe. Totally unusable in my case.

What an uninformative way to completely dismiss anything, equally applicable to whatever it is you use. Firstly "totally unusable" is likely hyperbole and given that it is multiplatform (Windows, OS X, Linux - with deb and rpm packages) open source and also has an interface for extensions I'm wondering what exactly the problem is here. What is your use case in which it is "totally unusable"? Or is it just because it's made by Microsoft?

If I'm doing quick edits I most often use vi (was never an emacs fan) but I've found for more extensive editing VSCode is great, maybe you prefer something like Notepad++ (which is also open source) but it seems more a matter of preference than capability.

If Microsoft ever does applications for Linux it means I've won.

Looks like he won.

VS is also free.

I had heard that MS was discontinuing their free version of VS.

I see that there is VS "Community" (f/k/a Visual Studio "Express"?), which implies it is in some way a stripped-down or "lite" version of VS.

XCode is XCode. All free. No "Lite" version. No "Community" version. The whole enchilada.

Not exactly the same thing. With VS (as with all MS products) there is a confusing array of "Levels" or "Packages". VS is NOT VS.

It is documented. When this whole windows 10 is spyware thing started, I started searching. The telemetry is exactly that. how many times an application is run. For how long? did it exit clean or with errors? etc... Microsoft has been giving speeches @ Dev conferences for a while now shopping this new feature set. Not a secret. it it a service called "Application Insights" https://www.visualstudio.com/e... Nothing secret, an apparently an advertised service. Another way to make money for Microsoft, not spyware for nefarious purposes.

You can just target Unity on Universal Windows Platform (UWP) today using Visual Studio Community to target PC. All of this is free, at least for small scale personal use (read the licensing yourself to be sure.)

Porting to the Xbox One using this dev environment should be extremely straightforward - the whole idea is the UWP is the same on Xbox, desktop PC and Phone, and doing exactly this (running a Unity/UWP game) is what is demonstrated in this article. The hard part should, in theory, be adding gamepad support rather than just mouse and/or touch!

Both are free.

https://projecteuler.net/archives
https://www.visualstudio.com/en-us/products/visual-studio-express-vs.aspx

Improvements for non US standard keyboard layouts
VS Code dispatches key bindings based on [keyboard codes](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/dd375731(v=vs.85). In keybindings.json and in all the UI, we used to render the key codes with the produced characters under the US standard keyboard layout. We received feedback that this was very confusing, therefore, we created a new Node.js module native-keymap that is used in VS Code to render the key bindings using the system's current keyboard layout.

Come to the Dark Side.
C# is one of the easiest to use languages with the best tooling.

It already runs on Linux.

Indeed it does.

Color me bemused. I didn't know.

This is why Linux will NEVER WIN

Hmmm...I think the world begs to differ since Linux is on the vast majority of hardware out there - everything from watches to super computers (far more breadth than *any* other operating system or operating system kernel out there). And then there's also:

"If Microsoft ever does applications for Linux it means I've won." - Linus Torvalds

Which since Microsoft is now making a version fo Visual Studios for Linux, is using its own custom Linux Distro in its data center....

well, I'll just leave it to you, but it seems that Linux has indeed won.

Visual Studio for Linux (kind of): https://code.visualstudio.com/...

.NET is also supported on Linux, now. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/dotnet...

This is the smaller "Code" version, but still - https://code.visualstudio.com/...

Professional retail without MSDN is now gone

Wrong. Read bullet-point "5" at the bottom of this page:

https://www.visualstudio.com/en-us/products/vs-2015-product-editions.aspx

Visual Studio 2015 development environment supports https://www.visualstudio.com/v...

Windows 7 Service Pack 1
Windows 8.1
Windows 8
Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1
Windows Server 2012
Windows Server 2012 R2
Windows 10

But can compile for a target as old as WinXP.

Ugh. Visual Studio 2015 requires Windows 8.1. No thanks.

* https://www.visualstudio.com/e...

Here is the list of bugs fixed in

* GCC 5.2 compiler issues
* MSVC 2015 compiler issues

Additional MSVC 2015 bug fixes ...

* MSVC 2015 Features
* MSVC 2015 (C++11/14/17)
* MSVC 2015 STL part 1
* MSVC 2015 STL part 2

That's not surprising. It costs thousands of dollars for an MSDN subscription to get the IDE for the Microsoft platform. How many young girls have that kind of cash laying around?

But you dont need an MSDN subscription to get the IDE.

Visual Studio Community 2013
A full-featured IDE – Free for students, open source contributors, and small teams. Start coding the app of your dreams for Windows, Android, and iOS.
https://www.visualstudio.com/en-us/products/visual-studio-community-vs.aspx

Since you asked...
https://www.visualstudio.com/e...

reliance on a single expensive, proprietary, vendor-driven tool. Whether it's the predominance of Adobe in design programs, of Visual Studio in many computer science programs, ...

Visual Studio is free for students, OSS contributors, and small teams. It's only larger enterprises that have to pay for it.

The problem is, schools are letting themselves be used as the sales department for expensive, proprietary, vendor-driven tools. That is a role they should not want to take on. They should act in the interest of the students, not the software vendor.

As the vendor, of course you don't make students pay for the tool just yet. They are effectively participants in a sales pitch for your product. Throw in some nice 'annual events' or goodies for the university staff, so that they like you as a vendor and they will keep students away from any free alternatives. Profit! It makes sense for the company, but sucks for the students.

My university's engineering faculties recently switched from Matlab to Python for much of the courses and I support that move. It was because the new dean did not like his faculty being (mis)used for the benefit of The Mathworks, against free or cheaper alternatives such as GNU Octave, Python NumPy / SciPy, etc, etc.

reliance on a single expensive, proprietary, vendor-driven tool. Whether it's the predominance of Adobe in design programs, of Visual Studio in many computer science programs, ...

Visual Studio is free for students, OSS contributors, and small teams. It's only larger enterprises that have to pay for it.

Visual Studio Code is free and cross-platform, runs great on Linux (and mac), and is a pretty handy tool for working in node.js and other languages.

(disclaimer: I work in the Visual Studio team)

The "free" version is missing key libraries which make it useless for any practical purpose. The usual problem of commercial vendors dishonestly claiming their useless adware is useful software.

reliance on a single expensive, proprietary, vendor-driven tool. Whether it's the predominance of Adobe in design programs, of Visual Studio in many computer science programs, ...

Visual Studio is free for students, OSS contributors, and small teams. It's only larger enterprises that have to pay for it.

Visual Studio Code is free and cross-platform, runs great on Linux (and mac), and is a pretty handy tool for working in node.js and other languages.

(disclaimer: I work in the Visual Studio team)

The "free" version is missing key libraries which make it useless for any practical purpose. The usual problem of commercial vendors dishonestly claiming their useless adware is useful software.

reliance on a single expensive, proprietary, vendor-driven tool. Whether it's the predominance of Adobe in design programs, of Visual Studio in many computer science programs, ...

Visual Studio is free for students, OSS contributors, and small teams. It's only larger enterprises that have to pay for it.

Visual Studio Code is free and cross-platform, runs great on Linux (and mac), and is a pretty handy tool for working in node.js and other languages.

(disclaimer: I work in the Visual Studio team)

reliance on a single expensive, proprietary, vendor-driven tool. Whether it's the predominance of Adobe in design programs, of Visual Studio in many computer science programs, ...

Visual Studio is free for students, OSS contributors, and small teams. It's only larger enterprises that have to pay for it.

Visual Studio Code is free and cross-platform, runs great on Linux (and mac), and is a pretty handy tool for working in node.js and other languages.

(disclaimer: I work in the Visual Studio team)

I still love languages like Scala and Python and I still want Linux for most of my web servers, but the gaps are closing and the game is getting really interesting. If you are ignoring Microsoft, you may get caught by surprise.

The funny part is, MS is no longer trying to pretend that the world ends at its bubble - .NET is nice, but not all people like it, and it's not perfect for everything; and that's okay. So, for example, you can do Python using Microsoft tools and on Microsoft platforms (and yes, it is all open source under sane licenses like AL 2.0). At the same time, a Microsoft employee is one of the core CPython maintainers, and is basically responsible for the official Win32 releases. Expect more of that kind of thing in the future.

(full disclosure: I am a developer on the PTVS team)

While I'm very much a vi and command-line guy, I'd like to point out that Visual Studio Code already supports Linux. While it mainly markets to people using ASP.NET and Node.JS today, it appears to have some support for C++, C#, Java, Python, Rust, Lua, Objective-C, Go and others.

Don't confuse VS Code with full VS (not sure how to distinguish the two by name). You don't get all the business for doing projects from various predefined templates and build system. VS Code is more like a fancy text editor with some tools for refactor and lint.

While I'm very much a vi and command-line guy, I'd like to point out that Visual Studio Code already supports Linux. While it mainly markets to people using ASP.NET and Node.JS today, it appears to have some support for C++, C#, Java, Python, Rust, Lua, Objective-C, Go and others.

Don't confuse VS Code with full VS (not sure how to distinguish the two by name). You don't get all the business for doing projects from various predefined templates and build system. VS Code is more like a fancy text editor with some tools for refactor and lint.

I hope they guan get visual studio working on other platforms

To that end, you could try out Visual Studio Code, which was introduced at the build conference this year.

Doesn't VS now support web development? I know their free stripped-down multiplatform editor, Visual Studio Code supports does.

Also for Java, why not use J#?

No. Visual Studio is not open source (although there is now a free Community edition), and "open source" doesn't mean "runs on Linux" anyway.

But C# and .NET are fully open source and cross platform, as stated here, and given VS was built with those technologies, there's no reason it won't run on Linux.

Does it mean VisualStudio will run on Linux soon?

No. Visual Studio is not open source (although there is now a free Community edition), and "open source" doesn't mean "runs on Linux" anyway.

In light of this news it shouldn't be long before we have Java code compiling and running on .NET runtimes.

We had that for many years now, in form of IKVM.

But, outside of a few very narrow interop scenarios, why would you want to? Java already has a perfectly good runtime, what's the point of porting it to another which is not significantly (if at all) better?

What you is, in fact, happening, is Microsoft supporting the existing Java stack as is - like this, or this. And it's not just Java, but also Python, and Node.js, and now R - and there will be more of that to come.

In light of this news it shouldn't be long before we have Java code compiling and running on .NET runtimes.

We had that for many years now, in form of IKVM.

But, outside of a few very narrow interop scenarios, why would you want to? Java already has a perfectly good runtime, what's the point of porting it to another which is not significantly (if at all) better?

What you is, in fact, happening, is Microsoft supporting the existing Java stack as is - like this, or this. And it's not just Java, but also Python, and Node.js, and now R - and there will be more of that to come.

Of course they'll have another great new version of Visual Studio that I'll have to fork out $$$

We've now got the free Visual Studio Community Edition that is as potent as the real thing.

I was assuming a standard Visual Studio Professional subscription: http://www.visualstudio.com/pr... ($1200 per user per year). Maybe you can negotiate big discounts. I never tried. I saw $1200 and balked. :)

Guess you haven't noticed that Visual Studio 2015 Community is free for OSS development -OR- small business (< $1 M gross revenue AND < 250 computers).

Read all about it here or here.