Hello again everyone, I have a question that should be simple. I just accepted a .net position and they use .net 3.0 features (such as generics) quite extensively. I have been trying to sharpen my skills before I get into the position in a month on that version of the framework but I don't actually see any of it's features in my MSDE. When I go to help and then About Microsoft Development Environment, it is listed as .Net version 1.1. I am using Visual Studio .Net 2003, do I have to buy a whole new IDE to get to that version of the framework? I have installed the .Net 3.0 Redistributable file(found here) but it doesn't change the version to 3.0. Perhaps I am missing something simple. I can't seem to find a clear cut answer on this. Thanks everyone!

Visual Studio Express 2005 will allow you to write .NET 3.0 applications (.NET 3.0 is few new class libraries on top of .NET 2.0), but the form designer doesn't work (so you're stuck with hand-coded XAML). I believe this is something Microsoft will be remedying.

If you're just writing .NET 2.0 WinForms apps, the Express Edition is perfect.

Hmm, I am curious why they brought up 3.0 then. Perhaps it's just my hearing ;) I did have Express once so that I could use 2.0, but does it limit anything? I would assume it does in some way. Either way I will be getting it. As always, you guys are an amazing help.

Quote:Original post by jrmiller84
Hmm, I am curious why they brought up 3.0 then. Perhaps it's just my hearing ;) I did have Express once so that I could use 2.0, but does it limit anything? I would assume it does in some way.

There are no limitations on what you can do with it (in terms of distributing software with it - you're free to do what you like). I believe the C++ version is missing unmanaged resource editor (not an issue if you're using .NET, then). The versions you pay for come with more utilities, can have plugins installed and work from a single IDE (rather than one per language).

Visual Studio 2002 : .NET 1.0
Visual Studio 2003 : .NET 1.1
Visual Studio 2005 : .NET 2.0
Visual Studio 2005 with Extensions : .net 3.0

Any .NET Framework is coupled with a specific IDE. So, yes, you need a whole new IDE (VS 2005) to be able to write (or rather: compile) .NET 2.0/3.0 code. You could write the code in notepad if you are so inclined ;)

The .Net Redistributable contains the runtime. The runtime is required to be able to run programs written for the specific .NET version. To be able to write/compile programs for a certain framework you need the matching IDE.


To see .NET Framework information for classes go to msdn2 (Example).

At the end of the page you'll find the following:



Some pages also have a note at the top like this: "Note: This property is new in the .NET Framework version 2.0."

There are some new 3.0 features, however generics are not among those (they have been introduced with 2.0).


~edit, btw:
MSDE = Microsoft Desktop Engine, a free (limited) database server related to SQL Server 2000.
MSDN = Microsoft Developer Network (which is what you're looking for).