Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Professional 2002

by Microsoft

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S. and to APO/FPO addresses. For APO/FPO shipments, please check with the manufacturer regarding warranty and support issues.
• ASIN: B00005RV4Z
• Date first available at Amazon.com: December 9, 2001
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,076 in Software (See Top 100 in Software)
  • #30 in Software > Programming > Development Utilities
  • #38 in Software > Programming > Programming Languages
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com Review

Visual Studio .NET is a superb, next-generation development tool. At its heart is the .NET Framework, a runtime engine and class library that enables rapid application building for both Windows and Web applications. The runtime engine handles housekeeping tasks, like memory management, while also providing fine-grained security and version awareness. The class library reduces the code needed to build rich applications. Visual Studio .NET also provides a slick visual environment, with features like tabbed and docking windows, dynamic online help, and automatic code completion and hints.

The common runtime is language-neutral so, for example, Visual Basic programmers can use components written in C# and vice versa. Other languages, such as COBOL and FORTRAN, can plug into Visual Studio, and Microsoft provides a version of the Java language called J#.

Overall, Visual Studio .NET is a radical break from the past for Microsoft. C# is an entirely new language, aimed at C and C++ programmers looking for something safer and more productive. Visual Basic .NET is a new twist on the old Microsoft favorite, losing compatibility with earlier versions, but gaining full object orientation as well as access to all the .NET libraries. These two languages, along with J#, have full support for the visual design tools in Visual Studio .NET. Also included is JScript .NET, Microsoft's version of JavaScript, although this comes without a form designer. Visual C++ is similar to earlier versions and is the only compiler included that can build old-style Windows executables. With a compiler switch, it can also target .NET, making it particularly flexible.

Visual Studio .NET has two distinct form designers. Windows Forms are for traditional Windows applications, but managed by the common runtime. Web Forms are ASP.NET pages, which means they run on Web servers and work over the Internet. Microsoft has made designing and coding Windows Forms and Web Forms as similar as possible so that both types of applications can share components and much of the complexity of coding Web applications is kept hidden. Another key feature is Web services, which lets developers create an XML interface for an application so that it can be called across the Web or from any platform or language. XML support generally is strong, with a range of classes for parsing and transforming XML data. There is also a visual designer for XML Schema.

There are a few points against Visual Studio .NET. One is that, like earlier versions, it only creates applications that run on Windows. Web applications are a partial exception, in that they support cross-platform clients, but deployment requires a Windows Web server. Another factor is that, with its multiple compilers and mountains of documentation, Visual Studio .NET eats up gigabytes of disk space, and the IDE tends to be slow with less than around 384 MB RAM. Serious developers will take this in stride, but casual users could have difficulty. Fortunately, the applications created have more modest system requirements, although Windows 95 is not supported. Finally, developers coming from earlier editions face a lot of learning due to radical changes in both Visual Basic and ASP.

Despite these minor issues and a steep learning curve, Visual Studio .NET is an extremely versatile, sophisticated, and capable development tool. --Tim Anderson, Amazon.co.uk

Product Description

Microsoft Visual Studio.net Professional 2002 lets you build next-generation applications for Microsoft Windows and the web. You can create components that can be accessed on any platform using XML web service, and build high-performance database applications quickly. You can create solutions that span multiple platforms and devices, and even target hand-held devices using the Mobile Internet Toolkit. You can also cut time-to-market for powerful, scalable applications. Part Number 659-00844.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars True Object Oriented IDE from Microsoft, May 7, 2002

By 

"ramadude" (Columbia, SC, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Professional 2002 (CD-ROM)

As a java developer, who got a little curious, I wanted to see what Visual Studio.net (professional edition) offers to a developer. During installation, the first thing that I noticed is the 2 gig disk space that the professional edition requires. After the installation, I test drove the IDE and I have to admit that I was not disappointed with Visual Studio .NET. Here is why.

Well-Integrated IDE: -
This is by far the best suite of Microsoft languages and tools. It contains the new Visual Basic .NET, which is totally object oriented and also Visual C# .NET that I found easy to use. The ASP .NET really captured my vote at how easy it was to create asps. The Visual Studio .NET provides thousands of .NET framework classes making a developers life easy and simple.

The similarity to the J2EE framework indicates that that the .NET framework has the capabilities of delivering object oriented enterprise applications. A downside is that, Windows .Net servers and windows operating systems are automatically included into the application environment. This environment may not be desired in all circumstances.

Web services: -
XML Web services are built on XML, SOAP, WSDL, and UDDI specifications and can be built or consumed by your application without having to write the plumbing code yourself. The tools does it for you. All I had to do was to define my function that I want exposed as a web service and it was automatically deployed for me. I like that in an IDE.

Great Documentation and User interfaces: -
Trust Microsoft to woo you with good looks. The user interface is very intuitive and limiting my reference manual lookups. Even when I needed help, all I had to do was open up my help window and I had access to context sensitive help all the time. Microsoft has done a very nice job there.

Unfulfilled wishes :-
Built-in UML modeling. No architecture is complete without models. MS Visio 2002 integration is made available but I don't have a copy of that installed to see whether there is code synchronization with the models. I think that not providing this feature severely limits the use of vs.net as an IDE of choice for enterprise apps.
Another feature conspicuous by its absence is a built-in automated unit-testing framework, something similar to JUnit testing framework.

Finally, I think that this is a very powerful IDE and it is very developer friendly. For those that are open to any technology, Windows .NET servers and Microsoft Visual Studio .NET is definitely a viable option.

56 of 65 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Great Leap Forward, January 2, 2002

By 

David C. Veeneman (Southern California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Professional 2002 (CD-ROM)

My apologies to Chairman Mao, but I've been using the beta version of VS.Net for several weeks now, and its advances are impressive. For VB programmers, there is a new, fully object-oriented version of the language that stands on an equal footing with C. For C++ programmers, there is C#, which combines the power of C with the RAD features of VB. It really is possible to knock out a Windows application in a morning! Finally, for Java programmers who are a bit frustrated with the quirks of that language, C# is a Java clone that is easy to learn, that has most of the power that Java left out, and that has a really spectacular IDE. I haven't raved about anything since VB3, but I'm raving about this.

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent design work, April 2, 2002

By 

S. Kim (Hoffman Estates, IL United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Professional 2002 (CD-ROM)

The concept of the virtual machine is nothing new. The design of .NET would solve many problems associated with DLL and COM. Programs compiled with .NET is slower because Just-In-Time compiler must compile the code before the execution. Loading time for new application appears to be around 2 - 4 seconds in my system(K7 700MHZ). The initial execution memory requirement for a very small program appears to be around 6 - 12 MB. The memory requirement drops down to 1MB soon as you minimize the app (some type of memory clean up kicks in) The class library is object oriented, and all examples are in either C# or VB. If you are a C++ user, it will require some additional learning time.
The developing and debugging environment is easy to use. The debugger even let you trace the compiled x86 assembler code. Learning the system takes few days (very easy, but there are many objects) and experienced programmer can be productive in a week.