VS 2008 Multi-Targeting Support

Earlier this month at TechEd we announced the official name of Visual Studio "Orcas" - which will be called Visual Studio 2008.  We also said that the official name for the .NET Framework "Orcas" release will be called .NET Framework 3.5 (it includes the new LINQ support, integrated ASP.NET AJAX support, new ASP.NET data controls, and more).

VS 2008 and .NET 3.5 Beta 2 will ship later this summer, and the Beta 2 release will support a go-live license for those who want to put applications into production using the new features immediately.

What is Multi-Targeting?

With the past few releases of Visual Studio, each Visual Studio release only supported a specific version of the .NET Framework.  For example, VS 2002 only worked with .NET 1.0, VS 2003 only worked with .NET 1.1, and VS 2005 only worked with .NET 2.0.

One of the big changes we are making starting with the VS 2008 release is to support what we call "Multi-Targeting" - which means that Visual Studio will now support targeting multiple versions of the .NET Framework, and developers will be able to start taking advantage of the new features Visual Studio provides without having to always upgrade their existing projects and deployed applications to use a new version of the .NET Framework library.

Now when you open an existing project or create a new one with VS 2008, you can pick which version of the .NET Framework to work with - and the IDE will update its compilers and feature-set to match this.  Among other things, this means that features, controls, projects, item-templates, and assembly references that don't work with that version of the framework will be hidden, and when you build your application you'll be able to take the compiled output and copy it onto a machine that only has an older version of the .NET Framework installed, and you'll know that the application will work.

Creating a New Project in VS 2008 that targets .NET 2.0

To see an example of multi-targeting in action on a recent build of VS 2008 Beta 2, we can select File->New Project to create a new application. 

Notice below how in the top-right of the new project dialog there is now a dropdown that allows us to indicate which versions of the .NET Framework we want to target when we create the new project.  If I keep it selected on .NET Framework 3.5, I'll see a bunch of new project templates listed that weren't in previous versions of VS (including support for WPF client applications and WCF web service projects):

If I change the dropdown to target .NET 2.0 instead, it will automatically filter the project list to only show those project templates supported on machines with the .NET 2.0 framework installed:

If I create a new ASP.NET Web Application with the .NET 2.0 dropdown setting selected, it will create a new ASP.NET project whose compilation settings, assembly references, and web.config settings are configured to work with existing ASP.NET 2.0 servers:

When you go to the control Toolbox, you'll see that only those controls that work on ASP.NET 2.0 are listed:

And if you choose Add->Reference and bring up the assembly reference picker dialog, you'll see that those .NET class assemblies that aren't supported on .NET 2.0 are grayed out and can't be added to the project (notice how the "ok" button is not active below when I have a .NET 3.0 or .NET 3.5 assembly selected):

So why use VS 2008 if you aren't using the new .NET 3.5 features?

You might be wondering: "so what value do I get when using VS 2008 to work on a ASP.NET 2.0 project versus just using my VS 2005 today?"  Well, the good news is that you get a ton of tool-specific value with VS 2008 that you'll be able to take advantage of immediately with your existing projects without having to upgrade your framework/ASP.NET version.  A few big tool features in the web development space I think you'll really like include:

  1. JavaScript intellisense
  2. Much richer JavaScript debugging
  3. Nested ASP.NET master page support at design-time
  4. Rich CSS editing and layout support within the WYSIWYG designer
  5. Split-view designer support for having both source and design views open on a page at the same time
  6. A much faster ASP.NET page designer - with dramatic perf improvements in view-switches between source/design mode
  7. Automated .SQL script generation and hosting deployment support for databases on remote servers

You'll be able to use all of the above features with any version of the .NET Framework - without having to upgrade your project to necessarily target newer framework versions.  I'll be blogging about these features (as well as the great new framework features) over the next few weeks.

So how can I upgrade an existing project to .NET 3.5 later?

If at a later point you want to upgrade your project/site to target the NET 3.0 or NET 3.5 version of the framework libraries, you can right-click on the project in the solution explorer and pull up its properties page:

You can change the "Target Framework" dropdown to select the version of the framework you want the project to target.  Doing this will cause VS to automatically update compiler settings and references for the project to use the correct framework version.  For example, it will by default add some of the new LINQ assemblies to your project, as well as add the new System.Web.Extensions assembly that ships in .NET 3.5 which delivers new ASP.NET controls/runtime features and provides built-in ASP.NET AJAX support (this means that you no longer need to download the separate ASP.NET AJAX 1.0 install - it is now just built-in with the .NET 3.5 setup):

Once you change your project's target version you'll also see new .NET 3.5 project item templates show up in your add->new items dialog, you'll be able to reference assemblies built against .NET 3.5, as well as see .NET 3.5 specific controls show up in your toolbox. 

For example, below you can now see the new <asp:listview> control (which is an awesome new control that provides the ability to do data reporting, editing, insert, delete and paging scenarios - with 100% control over the markup generated and no inline styles or other html elements), as well as the new <asp:linqdatasource> control (which enables you to easily bind and work against LINQ to SQL data models), and <asp:datapager> control show up under the "Data" section of our toolbox:

Note that in addition to changing your framework version "up" in your project properties dialog, you can also optionally take a project that is currently building against .NET 3.0 or 3.5 and change it "down" (for example: move it from .NET 3.5 to 2.0).  This will automatically remove the newer assembly references from your project, update your web.config file, and allow you to compile against the older framework (note: if you have code in the project that was written against the new APIs, obviously you'll need to change it).

What about .NET 1.0 and 1.1?

Unfortunately the VS 2008 multi-targeting support only works with .NET 2.0, .NET 3.0 and .NET 3.5 - and not against older versions of the framework.  The reason for this is that there were significant CLR engine changes between .NET 1.x and 2.x that make debugging very difficult to support.  In the end the costing of the work to support that was so large and impacted so many parts of Visual Studio that we weren't able to add 1.1 support in this release. 

VS 2008 does run side-by-side, though, with VS 2005, VS 2003, and VS 2002.  So it is definitely possible to continue targeting .NET 1.1 projects using VS 2003 on the same machine as VS 2008. 

What is compatibility like moving from VS 2005 to VS 2008 and .NET Framework 2.0 to 3.5?

We are trying to make sure that .NET Framework 3.5 is a super compatible upgrade from .NET 2.0, and not require you to change any code in order to target the new framework version.  We've deliberately made only non-breaking modifications to existing .NET assemblies in the .NET 3.5 release, and where possible added new features in separate assemblies to minimize the chance of breaking changes.

We are also not making project model or build changes with VS 2008.  I, like you, hope to never to go through that again!  Both the "web site" and "web application project" models will be fully supported going forward.

Hope this helps,

Scott

83 Comments

  • Scott, you mention that the VS 2008 will no longer support 1.0 and 1.1 versions of the framework, in terms of multitargeting. Will it continue to include and support the conversion utility to 2.0, as an alternative to continuing to run VS 2003 on the same machine?

  • Scott, this is great stuff and I can't wait to get to use it. Loving the idea of being able to use Orcas to develop without having to up our runtime requirements to 3.5.

    Can you tell me whether Orcas fixes the issue where, if you have two web application projects one of which references the other, intellisense and design-time support get confused about paths to user controls in the referenced project?

    Every time we use a in a sub-web application - so that "~/" refers to the *parent* of the application root directory, not the root itself - VS flags it as an error, and can't recognize the type of the user control, even though the project in the root is correctly referenced and all the necessary types are available from code. It'd be great if Orcas would fix this.

  • Hi Tim,

    When you first open projects built with VS 2002, 2003, or 2005 with VS 2008, you'll be prompted with the option to upgrade it to use a newer framework.

    If you pick "don't upgrade" on a VS 2005 project, VS 2008 will open it in multi-target mode targetting .NET 2.0.

    If you say "yes upgrade" on a VS 2003 project, VS 2008 will launch the upgrade wizard like in VS 2005 and allow you to update the project to use a newer version of the framework. You can then chose to have your upgraded 1.1 project target either .NET 2.0 or a more recent version of the framework.

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • Hi Stuart,

    Can you send me an email with more details about that issue? I'll then loop some people in from the web tools team to have them test it and make sure it works.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • 1) So... what's the difference between 3.0 and 3.5? Why would I choose 3.0 over 3.5?

    2) I like the 100% control over the markup for ListView.

    3) Just to be sure: if I open a 2.0 project (made with VS2005) and edit it with VS2008 (without changing the version of the .NET framework it targets) can I go back to VS2005 without any issues? (Basically can the two versions work on the same project?)

    Thanks.

  • Hi Peter,

    Quick answers to your questions above:

    1) .NET 3.5 has LINQ, ASP.NET AJAX, new controls, richer WCF support, and a few other features that aren't in .NET 3.0. For server/asp.net scenarios I'd probably always recommend going with .NET 3.5. For client scenarios, .NET 3.0 is interesting to target since is pre-installed on all versions of Windows Vista - so you have good deployment of the runtime.

    Note that all applications that target .NET 3.0 or .NET 2.0 will work run on .NET 3.5. You can't use the new features in .NET 3.5 if you target .NET 3.0 - but your application will obviously still work.

    2) Yep - I think you'll like the listview control. It is pretty sweet.

    3) From a code perspective you should be able to open the code back in VS 2005. I am still getting details on it, but I believe there are some solution file changes that VS 2008 makes that prevents the solution itself loading in VS 2005 unless you go in and make some changes to the .sln file. Once you do this the project should work in VS 2005 though. I'll try and post more details on these steps later this summer.

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • Hey Scott,

    I was wondering if you could provide some details on 64bit support of VS2008? I was talking with (well, maybe harrassing) Omar @ MIX07 and he kind of hinted that most of your development efforts were still centered around the 32bit desktop OS

  • Scott, Is there an official date planned for the release of VS 2008?

  • Scott:
    Since Visual Studio SLN files use XML markup, why is it that every new version completely breaks the solution/project files for older versions?

    We've had three Visual Studios so far RTM'd, and every single one prevents a previous version from opening the "upgraded" file.

    Don't get me wrong, I love all the new features, but sometimes, as an independent developer, I have to work with other contractors on a job that don't or can't afford the latest and greatest, so I have to maintain (currently) 3 different project files (in minor cases)... Please end that madness!

  • Hi Kevin,

    We haven't announced any official RTM dates, but we are planning to have our final beta (Beta2) ship later this summer. Historically the final RTM date of a VS release is usually not too many months off from that.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Hi Steven,

    The framework itself ships with a 64-bit version, so from a runtime perspective you definitely take advantage of 64-bit. The VS shell in VS 2008 will still be a 32-bit process (but obviously still run on a 64-bit system).

    The reason the process runs 32-bit is that there are a lot of VS shell plug-ins (1000+) from different vendors that run in-process, and so switching to a 64-bit address space would require them to-do work in order to run. Our current thinking is to have the next release of VS be a native 64-bit process, and given them time to migrate their plug-ins to support 64-bit more gracefully.

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

    P.S. The build system in VS 2008 has been optimized to support multi-core processors better. So that is one area where running on modern multi-core machines (32-bit or 64-bit) should provide performance boosts.

  • @ Eric -- The .proj files are XML based MSBuild files, but the .SLN file is not XML (it is a text file format - but doesn't have a nice versioning story like XML). I'm going to try and get more details on what the differences that VS 2008 does to the file and what tweaks are needed to open it in VS 2005.

    @ Tyrone -- The "Save As" idea is a good one - I'll have to ask around to understand whether that is a possible option better.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Hi Zack,

    The Beta 2 release will be the next update (hopefully in a few weeks). Beta 1 is probably the best build to pick up today - since it is very stable, and you can also install it side-by-side with VS 2005 (and uninstall and install Beta2 later when it ships).

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • Scott - any idea on future plans for VS and multitargeting. For example will VS08 support .NET 4.0 when it comes out. And the other way around - Will the next version of VS (after VS08) support v4 as well as 2,3,3.5?

  • Hi John,

    We'll continue to support multi-targeting going forward in Visual Studio, so you'll get additional frameworks in the future with the same model.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Scott,
    Fantastic stuff - this will make it so much easier to migrate to newer versions of the IDE.

    I'm curious how ASP.NET AJAX will be handled across versions. Can you build a 2.0 app with AJAX v1.0, then switch it to .NET 3.5/AJAX 2.0? Or will the .NET 3.5 version of the AJAX assemblies automatically be used when you load up a 2.0 app on the 3.5 framework?

  • Nice post, I was hoping to hear more about VS 2008 and ASP.NET 3.5!

    1. Any new features in the built in development web server improved in VS 2008? For instance, we will not buy Vista, but we _do_ like IIS 7, so perhaps some features could be incorporated into the built in web server?

    2. Also, if I were to take an existing ASP.NET 2.0 application and just open the Solution, target 3.5 and build, would I see any performance improvements?

    Thanks!

  • So where does this leave vc++ and MFC? Will it support MFC9 only and multi Dot Net targets?

  • Very exciting! Scott, is there any chance that all ASP.Net controls will get a change so that there are never hard-coded inline styles that can't be turned off? Also, any chance of scaling down some of the out of the box html so it is cleaner? ie. removing the encapsulating table for a formview.

    Thanks,
    Tyler

  • ASP.NET data controls??? *PLEASE* tell me you guys *finally* included a Two-Way databinding control. :) :) :)

    You should definitely post an article about these controls!

  • This means I can open a VS 2005 project in VS 2008. Then do some changes, exit and finally reopen the solution in VS 2005 and do some more changes?

    Last time I checked, Orcas made breaking changes to my VS 2005 project files (it converted the solution) and the result was not possible to reload in VS 2005.

    Breaking the "make file" for each new version of the IDE sucks. Also adding noise to the default class templates to further make the source files incompatible makes it even worse. This isn't the first time that's happened either.

    My suspicion is this is deliberate to force businesses to buy upgrades for everything for each new version.

  • Probably a great place to mention that another reason to move to VS2008 while still targetting your existing .NET 2.0 projects is to leverage the new C#3 and VB9 language features (as detailed on my blog ;)).

  • Scott,

    This is pretty direct, but when's the planned release date (approx.) and secondly, where/when can we sign up for the beta?

    Thanks,

    Bill Konrad

  • It is nice to see Visual Studio 2008 support multi-targeting, a few years later than the open source IDE SharpDevelop. However, late is better than none.

  • Hi Kevin,

    Yep - the good news is that you can build a version of your app using ASP.NET AJAX 1.0 running on ASP.NET 2.0 and have it work inside VS 2008 (you'd just target the .NET 2.0 runtime). You can also then easily upgrade it to .NET 3.5. This will update the version of System.Web.Extensions.dll you use - all code can stay the same.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Hi Bill,

    You can actually download the Beta1 build for free off of MSDN today (no need to be a MSDN subscriber - everyone has access to it). Beta2 will hopefully be out in a few weeks and will likewise be available for everyone to download.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Hi Bjorn,

    I believe the project files are compatible across both VS 2005 and VS 2008. I think the challange is that the solution file (.sln) that points to the project files doesn't have versioning support, and so extra attributes that VS 2008 supports aren't recognized by VS 2005.

    I am going to try and do a blog post that describes how to fix any issues with opening a VS 2008 project in VS 2005.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Hi Aaron,

    Unfortunately I'm not 100% sure how native cross-targetting works in VS 2008 - so am not sure if that scenario works. If you send me email, though, I can connect you up with someone on the VC++ team who can help answer your question.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Thanks Scott for a nice blog on VS2008.

    Surprisingly i found no information on the DLR and the new languages ( IronRuby, IronPython, VB and Javascript) support on VS2008 via DLR.

    I also could not see the New language mentioned under Project Type support.

    Will you please clarify, how are you going to support this in VS2008.

    I just have a little information about IronRuby from Mr. John Lam that IronRuby shall support LINQ, and thats really great news for me.

    You havent blogged much about DLR. It would be nice to hear few more things on DLR front and Progress in Dynamic languages.

    A little blog to create Silverlight project in IronRuby shall also be helpful. Since Ruby.Net licence has already been acquired by you, the things should not be much difficult now.

  • when we would be able to install orcas version. i download orcas but it could run by virtual os only but even when i run from there i got visual studio 2005 rather than visual studio orcas :-o . did i make any stupid mistake :p whilst installing but i m pretty sure i downloaded visual studio orcas and after running that thru virtually i got visual studion 2k5 in it. i keep searching multi targeting feature , .net 3 feature, .net 3.5 features, split window, css builder but :(.... i m looking forward orcas version which i could INSTALL on my OS.

  • Hi Muhammad,

    Here is a pointer to the VS Orcas Beta1 download on MSDN: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/aa700831.aspx

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • Hi Tyler,

    Our plan is to improve the markup generated from existing server controls to be more CSS friendly (and avoid inline styles). We also will have more flexibiliy on how "id" values are rendered (and when they are rendered). We don't have an exact ETA for this - but it is definitely the plan.

    For .NET 3.5 all new controls will also be built to be CSS/markup friendly. The Listview is a good example of this (I'll blog more on it in the next few weeks).

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Hi Scott,

    nice post as usuall. I've couple of questions to throw.

    1) How do you decide which things to include in the particular version and what to exclude and how to number the version?

  • Hi Scott,

    nice post as usuall.
    My question is How do you decide which things to include in the particular version and what to exclude and how to number the version?

  • Thanks for the info Scott. Enjoying your blog, keep up the good work.

    For me I think the best anwser to 'So why use VS 2008 if you aren't using the new .NET 3.5 features?' is that (and I'm assumming this!) I can run it on Vista without having to be an Administrator!

    I'm I correct in that assumption?

  • This is a heartbreaker! I've been holding off on Vista till Orcas comes out, thinking that Orcas would enable me to properly do 1.x development on Vista. Obviously not.

    I'm very very disappointed about this.

  • Hi Scott;

    You mentioned in your original post that VS2008 will have "New" ASP.Net "Data" controls. I haven't seen any info on that and I was kind of disappointed that ASP.Net 3.5 only has AJAX added to it. But now you mentioned data controls. Could you please give us some info. on these controls? Are they related to LINQ or ADO.Net or SQL? Do we still have to create our own DAL layer in ASP.Net to access data?

    Much appreciated!
    ..Ben

  • Does this mean that the Visual Studio for Applications (VSA) scripting environment will be in 3.5?

  • Hi Scott,

    What changes are there with regard to ASP.NET re hosting? Will ASP.NET projects developed in VS 2008 run within existing ASP.NET 2.0 app pools ?

    Cheers
    Kevin

  • Hi
    Will we do AJAX in design mode?
    Thanks

  • I am really looking forward to VS 2008 especially for Silverlight integration. I think Silverlight will be a huge success and is one of coolest technogies that I have seen in a while. I have not coded Flash stuff but the fact that a developer can now use Silverlight integrated into VS is a huge plus. Thanks.

  • Ben,

    One of the new data controls is the 'ListView' which looks at first glance like a more flexible DataList.

  • Is there going to be a new version available also in the Express editions also?

  • Hi Mozes,

    We will be releasing a Visual Web Developer Express 2008 edition, along with other express editions, as part of the VS 2008 release. They will also all support multi-targeting.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Hi Ben,

    There are two new ASP.NET data controls that work with any data backend: and

    We are also then shipping a new that allows you to bind any ASP.NET control against a LINQ data provider. This provides a really great way to create a new DAL using LINQ to SQL (which I covered in a previous blog post), and then easily create web UI against it.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Hi Kevin,

    If you use multi-targeting in VS 2008 and target the .NET 2.0 profile, then any application you build will run totally fine on an existing ASP.NET 2.0 server.

    You can also run a .NET 2.0 and .NET 3.5 application within the same application pool within IIS.

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • Adding the C# Event Handler for Web Page:
    In .NET 2.0 if we use C# we need to explicitly type the event handler method for Page events.

    But if we use VB.NET we can select the object and event for page events.

    Is anything coming or we can have in Visual Studio 2008 for C# to add event handler for page events using GUI.

  • Thanks Scott & Lynn!

    VS2008 will keeps us happy for several years! Thank you Scott and your team!

    ..Ben

  • > We also will have more flexibiliy on how "id" values are rendered (and when they are rendered). We don't have an exact ETA for this - but it is definitely the plan.

    That sounds very interesting! Would like to hear more about this, maybe in a new blog post -- especially about the "how 'id' values are rendered and when" (hmm juicy stuff :-)

    Peter.

  • It's a real pleasure of reading your blog posts, thanks for taking time to write so many great posts!

  • Hi DM,

    I've been using SnagIt! lately for doing screen-captures and have been very impressed with it.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Hi Scott, great info. We have one of the largest projects per solution ( about 110 of them ) and I could convert and compile with 3.5 (beta1) with no errors, good job from compatibility team !

    I still don't understand what the linker would do for about 1 minute after it says "build successful /failed", till the status becomes "Ready" ?? Interesting in vc9 is it takes 50% of the CPU during this period, where as in 2003/2005 it would just sit there non-responsive.

    Another issue is in situation like what we have ( more than 100 projects) the build is still slow takes about 15 minutes. The irritating part is if I make a single line of change still it would take about 5 to 7 minutes. Why are we building other projects when I did not even touch it ??


  • Hi Scott,
    MultiTargeting is a nice feature on the road to converge all Visual Studio versions in only one. I have a question about Mobile ASP.Net. Where is it in Orcas ? I have not fount it in any project sections. Is it again under development ? Will it be better than one into VS2005 ? The last one is a nightmare when you have to realize sofisticated web gui mainly for non windows mobile devices.
    Thanks
    Moreno

  • Hi Scott,
    great post! What about Mobile ASP.Net project in Orcas ? I haven't found it in the project list. Is there something new ? The last one in VS2005 are not so user friendly when you have to project a mobile web site for non Windows Mobile devices.

  • Hi Scott,
    Do you know if and when Microsoft might give away free copies of Visual Studio 2008 like it did with the previous version? Is there any where I can sign up to receive notification of such offer?

  • "Unfortunately I'm not 100% sure how native cross-targetting works in VS 2008 - so am not sure if that scenario works. If you send me email, though, I can connect you up with someone on the VC++ team who can help answer your question."

    I emailed Scott as well, and he did pass the request along. The response from the VC++ team was that this new functionality is not for MSVCRT or MFC. Those versions continue to be tied to the compiler version.

  • Hi Dundee,

    The betas for VS 2008 are free to download. We'll then have a lot of special offers once VS 2008 is released that should enable you to get a free copy of VS 2008 Standard easily. I'll blog about them more once VS 2008 is released.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Thanks Scott. I will check back from time to time. It will be nice if Microsoft gives away in some kind of promotion VS 2008 standard edition.

  • When will be VS 2008 released?

  • Hi Ramesh,

    We will release VS 2008 Beta2 in a few weeks. The final release won't be too many months after that.

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • will any express version have the Multi-targerting feature? So that we can try this out with existing 2.0 projects or it is only enableded with full version of Visual studio? :-)

  • Hi Mehfuz,

    Multi-targeting will be supported with both Visual Studio as well as Visual Web Developer Express and the other Express products.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • A question has been bothering me for sometime. I use VS quite a bit and I need to deploy my programs. Why didn't Microsoft provide a good set creator with VS. There are a few install creators (freeware) that are far better than the VS 2005 installer. Are there any plans to improve the install creator in VS?

    Thanks.

  • IS there a final release date set yet for VS 2008?

  • Hi Kenny,

    The Beta2 release of VS 2008 will be out in a few weeks. The final release will then ship a few months after that.

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • Hey Scott,

    great information, reading through the comments i noticed a couple of interesting things:

    1) you mentioned you guys plan on making the rendering of the "id" attribute more flexible, will this be implemented in the orcas release?

    2) you mentioned there will be some promotions to get the visual studio 2008 standard edition for free, these promotions are generally US only (like most cool microsoft promotions). Is there any chance these promotions will be valid in europe(The Netherlands) too?

    thanks

  • Hi Tomh,

    Right now our plan is to make the rendering of the "id" attribute more flexible with a service pack that will work for both Orcas and .NET 2.0. We don't have an exact ETA for when this would ship yet - but it is something we are going to be working to-do.

    On the promotion front, we'll definitely make sure to offer those promotions in Europe as well. We'll also probably give our free copies at the launch events next spring.

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • How does multi-targeting work with compact framework projects?

  • I was wondering if there is anything installed with VS2008 that is required for builds using VS2008 solutions and projects. The reason I ask is that we have a CruiseControl.NET server set up as a build machine, and have had a few problems with things like MSBuild targets files in the past with other things that are installed with VS (ie Compact Framework).

    If we install the .NET 3.5 framework beta redistributable on a build machine, will it contain everything we need to build VS2008 solutions and projects?

  • Scott,

    I tried the new Beta 2 but it converted the VS 2005 project to 2008. There was no option to not upgrade. I would like to actually use 2008 while the other team members would most likely still be using 2005, is this possible?

  • Hi Jack,

    >>>>> I was wondering if there is anything installed with VS2008 that is required for builds using VS2008 solutions and projects. The reason I ask is that we have a CruiseControl.NET server set up as a build machine, and have had a few problems with things like MSBuild targets files in the past with other things that are installed with VS (ie Compact Framework). If we install the .NET 3.5 framework beta redistributable on a build machine, will it contain everything we need to build VS2008 solutions and projects?

    I believe you'll need to have the .NET Framework 3.5 framework on your build server, and might also need to copy the targets file to the machine.

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • Hi Mike,

    >>>>> I tried the new Beta 2 but it converted the VS 2005 project to 2008. There was no option to not upgrade. I would like to actually use 2008 while the other team members would most likely still be using 2005, is this possible?

    When you open up a VS 2005 projects in VS 2008, it will convert it to be a VS 2008 project. Rick Strahl has a good article about this, and how you can use the duel IDE version strategy with your projects: http://west-wind.com/weblog/posts/122975.aspx

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • Hi Scott,

    Just installed VS 2008 Web Express Edition and opened the VS 2005 Web Express Edition Solution and Project I was working with. As Mike noted, there is no option to not convert the solution. I read the article you linked to, I mean it's a workaround, but if the solution file was going to change anyway, why not make it XML like the project files so we don't have to keep going through this with future Visual Studios?

    Anyway, the more disturbing thing is that the Project I had in my solution was automatically retargeted to 3.5 without any questions. I thought Multi-targeting worked in VS 2008 Web Express Edition too?

  • Scott,

    I read Rick's blog, and it's good to hear, however it's too bad about solution editing :(

    Our main solution deals with 33 projects, 8 Web application projects. I really wanted to test this out in a major environment to see how it functioned and worked with it, and hopeuflly use it while the rest of my team uses VS 2005.

    So far I don't see this happening. My managers don't mind us using beta software, even in our live environment if it's needed for our customers, but I don't think our cutomers "need" us to go to vS 2008 :P

  • Hi,

    I have a ASP.Net 2.0 web site which has a reference to a lot of 2.0 assemblies.

    If i upgrade my web application to .Net 3.5, can it still use the .Net 2.0 assemblies or will they have to be upgraded to 3.5 too ?


    In a solution, can some projects be 2.0 and some 3.5 ? Or do all the projects in a solution have to be the same .net version ?

  • Hi Tarique,

    >>>>>>> If i upgrade my web application to .Net 3.5, can it still use the .Net 2.0 assemblies or will they have to be upgraded to 3.5 too ?

    You can still use your .NET 2.0 assemblies with .NET 3.5.

    You might also want to check out this blog post that contains more instructions on how to upgrade ASP.NET AJAX applications: http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2007/07/30/asp-net-ajax-in-net-3-5-and-vs-2008.aspx

    Hope this helps,

    Scott

  • If I use VS2008 to work on my current project based on .net framework 2.0. Do I need a go-live license as well? When I deploy my application? If not, I am quite happy to use the Beta 2 of VS2008.

    Many thanks.

  • Does the "Multi-Targeting" apply to the 2008 Express additions?

  • Hi Scott,

    It looks great, installation went smooth.

    I would like to make one request: would it be possible to get the Team Explorer installation package included in the VS 2008 media in addition to the VSTS media or have it available as a separate download?

    The TFS install is done only once while the VS install happens more often. Within our company, the developer installs his/her own PC, but has only access to the VS media and not the TFS media. It seems to make more sense to have Team Explorer to be part of the VS install process when you think of it.

    Anyways, these are exciting times.


  • VS 2008 and Bootstrapping:
    I am trying to set .Net Framework 3.0 as a prerequisites for my WPF application (goto Project Properties -->Publish --> Prerequisites. VS 2008 says that .Net 3.0 cannot be found for boostrapping. How can I make VS 2008 find .Net 3.0 for bootstrapping?

    Thanks!

  • Hi Mikkel,

    Good question - I haven't seen this issue before. Can you email me (scottgu@microsoft.com) and I'll loop some folks in to help.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Hi Wouter,

    >>>>>>> I would like to make one request: would it be possible to get the Team Explorer installation package included in the VS 2008 media in addition to the VSTS media or have it available as a separate download? The TFS install is done only once while the VS install happens more often. Within our company, the developer installs his/her own PC, but has only access to the VS media and not the TFS media. It seems to make more sense to have Team Explorer to be part of the VS install process when you think of it.

    Good suggestion! I will send mail to the TFS team about this. Hopefully they can then fix it.

    Thanks,

    Scott

  • Cool! But I don't see 1.1 in that list. VS 2003 doesn't run on Vista, and we still have hundreds of .NET 1.1 sites to support. If VS 2008 won't support .NET 1.1, my condolences to the Vista team for all the money they still won't be getting from developers like me.

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