Microsoft Launches Visual Studio Express, VS 2005 Beta

Posted by simoniker on Tuesday June 29, 2004 @01:47AM from the express-to-impress dept.

An anonymous reader writes "At the TechEd Europe keynote today, Microsoft launched Visual Studio 2005 Beta 1. With it, they also released a set of five 'Express Editions' of Visual Studio. These currently free applications offer a student and hobbyist-oriented version of Visual Studio, and are available in C#, C++, VB, Web Developer, and SQL flavors. Each download weighs in at right around 50MB and features tools, documentation, and starter kits. There's been multiple posts and more information on this announcement over at MSDN Blogs, too." Update: 06/29 13:57 GMT by S : A clarification from the Express FAQ: Although the Beta Express products are currently free to download: "We have not announced pricing and licensing and will not do so until next calendar year."

1 of 541 comments (clear)

Microsoft's Viral Licenses by Lexicon · 2004-06-29 02:25 · Score: 1, Troll

I find it highly amusing how Microsoft whines about the GPL being viral, yet they release things like this; where you can develop code and applications, yet they aren't legal to distribute. This is far worse than the GPL, as apps touched by this trapware isn't safe to use for freedom OR commercial purposes. I wonder if this just a trap to try to suck in free software developers, as once the app has been touched by this IDE, it is illegal to distribute it.