Details of installed project templates in Visual Studio 2015 Community

After installing Visual Studio 2015 launch the application to display the start page.

StartPage.png

Click on New Project to open the New Project window as shown.

NewProj_01

It is displaying Visual Basic separately from other languages and the reason for this might be that Visual Basic was used recently, or perhaps this is the default New Project page in VS 2015 Community.

The number and types of Visual Basic templates are as shown here:

NewProj_01_VB

Visual Basic templates are fewer than C# project templates because there are templates for Android and iOS in C#.

NewProj_01_C#

For Android there are application templates for Wearable and WebView.

NewProj_01_Android

For iOS as well, Apple Watch template project is available.

NewProj_01_iOS

However for iOS Mobile applications templates use Xamarin. Forms.

NewProj_01_iOSMobile

Both Type Script and JavaScript project templates requires Tools for Apache Cardova which you can get by choosing the option.

For Python templates you need to install Python tools for Visual Studio and install Tools for F# for F# templates.

In C++ you can install support for both Android as well as iOS. Of course for MFC and Extensibility project templates you can install the requires tools. However for Windows templates -Windows 8.1 and WindowsPhone 8.1 can be installed.

I am not sure how these are going to change after the debut of Windows 10, perhaps a new version or an update. For developing Windows Phone applications you may need to install a different version of Visual Studio.

Xamarin is going to play a key role in cross-platform development using Microsoft Visual Studio and perhaps you may want to read more about Xamarin and its resources here:

Android Apps with Visual Studio
http://hodentek.blogspot.com/2015/03/android-apps-using-visual-studio-part-1.html
C# Universal Coder
http://hodentek.blogspot.com/2014/01/master-c-and-become-universal-coder.html
Cross-Platform Apps
http://hodentek.blogspot.com/2014/07/cross-platform-app-development-part-1.html

Move on to Visual Studio 2015 RTM / Community

You have been using Visual Studio 2013 or non-rtm versions of Visual Studio 2015. Now Visual Studio 2015 RTM is available and the Visual Studio 2015 Community edition is free. Visual Studio Community is free for individual developers, open source projects, academic research, education, and small professional teams.

All Visual Studio 2015 items shown below can be downloaded from this link.

VS2015RTM01.png

Download button for the Visual Studio 2015 Community is here.

  

VS2015RTM02.png

It has everything you need for productive programming:

• Flexibility- PC, tablet, smartphone OK

• Designers, editors, debuggers, profilers all in one place

• Extensive extensions makes you reach out

• Multiple language support, C#, VB, F#, C++, Python, HTML, JavaScript and more

• Support Windows Desktop Programs, Universal Windows Platform, iOS, and Android

• Develop for web with ASP.NET, Node.js, Python etc with several frameworks(AngularJS, jQuery, Django, etc)

Oracle Data Provider ODP.NET is available in two flavors

Oracle Data Provider for .NET (ODP.NET) is a free, high performance ADO-NET complinat data access provider. Using this .NET Developers can access Oracle databases using .NET Languages. ODP.NET supports all ADO.NET and .NET Framework features.

You can download it from here:
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/topics/dotnet/utilsoft-086879.html

In the download look for Oracle Data Provider for .NET and is part of the Oracle Data Access Components (ODAC)12.1.

ODP.NET is available in two forms:

• ODP.NET Unmanaged Driver --Some librabries compiled to machine code rather than .NET code

• ODP.NET 12.1 Managed Driver - Completly compiled to .NET Byte code and runs inside Common Language Runtime

These two are comparable to JDBC thick and thin clients.

The managed driver is really 'thin' comprising of just two dlls with less than 10MB size. It is totally self-contained requiring no other Oracle client networking hooks.

However this does not support connecting to Oracle database via Server Explorer in Visual Studio Express Edition.

Read this complete article for using the Managed Provider:
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/issue-archive/2014/14-mar/o24odp-2147205.html?msgid=3-9850712152

Roslyn and Visual Studio

Roslyn with the last public preview released in September 2012 is described as, Microsoft's 'compiler as service' project (new language object models for code generation, analysis, and refactoring, and the upcoming support for scripting and interactive use of C# and Visual Basic). It appears Roslyn is being used internally by Microsoft and is in the process of being 'solidified'.

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/csharpfaq/archive/2013/12/16/throwing-the-big-switch-on-roslyn-matt-gertz-vs-managed-languages-development-manager.aspx

Rosalyn will create APIs for the compiler which is no longer a blackbox  - the Visual Basic and C# compilers being written in C# instead of C++.

Presently the only version of Visual Studio you can use with 'Roslyn' is Visual Studio 2012. The September 2012 CTP can be downloaded here:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=34685 - get this file:

RoslynSetup.exe (10.8 MB)

The CTP supports all of the following:

• You can use the VS Project templates to get started with the RoslynAPIs and build new VS Extensions
• Provides assemblies that you can add to your project
• C# interactive window 
• C# Script File Editing Support

This image is an example of interactive C# taken from,
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/roslyn.aspx

Read about script support here:
http://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2011/11/16/the-roslyn-scripting-api.aspx

I look forward to the next update.