Microsoft Visual Studio Express
Visual Studio Express 2012 for Desktop, developing a Windows app calledWikipedia Recon Drone
Developer(s)	Microsoft
Final release	2017[1] / March 7, 2017; 8 years ago (2017-03-07)[2]
Operating system	Microsoft Windows
Type	Integrated development environment
License	Freeware,registerware[3]
Website	visualstudio.microsoft.com/vs/express/

This article needs to beupdated. Please help update this article to reflect recent events or newly available information.(September 2022)

Microsoft Visual Studio Express was a set ofintegrated development environments (IDEs) thatMicrosoft developed andreleased free of charge. They are function-limited version of the non-freeVisual Studio and require mandatory registration.^[3] Express editions started with Visual Studio 2005.

In 2013, Microsoft began supplanting Visual Studio Express with the more feature-richCommunity edition of Visual Studio, which is available free of charge^[4] with a different license that disallow some scenarios in enterprise settings. The last version of the Express edition is the desktop-only 2017.

Visual Studio 2005 Express, the first version of the Express edition, was released in October 2005. It runs onWindows 2000 SP4 and later. The firstservice pack for 2005 Express was released in December 2006. This version is freeware and requires no registration.

Visual Studio 2008 Express reached general availability in November 2007. Its first service pack was first publicly available in on 11 August 2008. This version requiresWindows XP SP3, although it can develop apps compatible with Windows 2000. Microsoft introduced mandatory registration in this version.^[5]

Visual Studio 2010 Express was released in April 2010, alongside Visual Studio 2010. While most of its components (see below) ran on Windows XP, itsWindows Phone component neededWindows Vista.

The 2005, 2008, and 2010 versions of Visual Studio Express consist of several standalone IDEs, each of which is focused on a single programming language:

• Visual Basic Express (theVisual Basic .NET language)
• Visual C++ Express (theVisual C++ language)
• Visual C# Express (theC# language)
• Visual J# Express (the ill-fatedJ# language, 2005 only)
• Visual Web Developer Express (ASP.NET)
• Visual Studio Express for Windows Phone (2010 only)

Visual Basic Express has the following limitations:^[6][7]

• No IDE support for databases other thanSQL Server Express andMicrosoft Access
• No support for web applications withASP.NET (although, it is supported by Visual Web Developer Express)
• No support for developing for mobile devices (no templates oremulators)
• Absence ofCrystal Reports
• Fewer project templates (e.g. Windows services template and Excel Workbook template are unavailable)
• Limited options fordebugging andbreakpoints
• No support for creatingWindows Services (needs a separate project template)
• No support forOpenMP
• Limited deployment options for finished programs
• Nocode folding

Visual Basic 2008 Express includes the following improvements over 2005:

• Includes the visualWindows Presentation Foundation designer codenamed "Cider"
• Debugs at runtime
• BetterIntelliSense support
  • Fixes common spelling errors
  • Corrects most forms of invalidsyntax
  • Provides suggestions toclass names when specified classes are not found

Visual Basic 2005 and Visual Basic 2008 Express feature a Visual Basic 6.0 converter that makes it possible to upgrade Visual Basic 6.0 projects to Visual Basic.NET. The converter is not included with the Visual Basic 2010 Express.

Visual Web Developer Express is a freewareweb development tool^[8] that allows developers to evaluate the web development and editing capabilities of the other Visual Studio editions at no charge. Its main function is to createASP.NET websites. It has aWYSIWYG interface, drag-and-drop userinterface designer, enhancedHTML and code editors, a limited database explorer, support forCSS,JavaScript andXML, and integrated, design-time validation for standards includingXHTML 1.0/1.1 and CSS 2.1.

Visual Web Developer 2005 Express lacks certain features, such as the Accessibility Checker, the ability to create standalone class library projects, third-party add-ins and macros.^[9] Visual Web Developer 2008 Express SP1 supports both class library and web application projects.^[10] It also includes a new integrated HTML designer based onMicrosoft Expression Web. However, this edition cannot publish self-developed websites.^{[clarification needed]}

Visual C++ Express compiles.NET andWin32 applications in32-bit only.^[11][12] It includesWindows SDK's compilers and core files, which developers can use to build Win32 applications.

Limitations of Visual C++ Express:

• No support forMFC orATL. These libraries can, however, be installed from an older version of the Windows SDK andWindows Driver Kit,^[13] or a Visual Studio Trial installation.
• Lack of aresource editor, which is available in commercial editions of Visual Studio.^[14]
• Noprofiling support.
• No support for add-ins or IDE macros.
• No option for crash dump generation.
• No "list of all breakpoints" window.
• No support for cross-language debugging, for example, a C# application calling aC++ DLL.

Limitations in earlier versions:

• No out-of-box support for developing64-bit applications (prior to 2012).
• No support forOpenMP (prior to 2012).
• The debugger cannot be attached to a running process (prior to 2010).

While Microsoft lists memory windows as unavailable in Visual Studio 2010 Express,^[15] third parties have reported that they are available when Expert Settings are enabled.^[16][17]

Many open-source projects have started providing project files created with Visual C++ Express; noteworthy examples include theOgre andIrrlicht engines. Modding kits for commercial engines, such as Valve'sSource engine, also support this development system.^[18]

Visual C# Express is a free, lightweight, integrated development environment (IDE) designed for novice developers, students and hobbyists to create applications and (when combined with theXNA Game Studio) video games for Windows,Xbox 360 andZune. It can buildconsole,Windows Forms andWindows Presentation Foundation applications, and class libraries.

Microsoft has found that a substantial community of game players are taking up C# programming.^[19][20][21]

Visual C# Express does not have a breakpoint control panel; breakpoints can only be toggled. The followingrefactoring modes were also unavailable:^[22]

• Encapsulate field
• Promote local to parameter
• Reorder parameters
• Remove parameters
• Extract interface

The limitations effectively reduce the refactoring capabilities of Visual C# Express to renaming and extractingmethods. According to Microsoft, the reason the listed features are absent is "to simplify the C# Express user experience". Some users remarked that the omission of refactoring capabilities removed useful functionality without actually simplifying use.^[23]

The ability to attach the debugger to an already-running process is also unavailable, hindering scenarios such as writing Windows services and re-attaching a debugger underASP.NET when errors under the original debugging session cause breakpoints to be ignored.

For the 2012 release of Visual Express, Microsoft changed its distribution of editions so that each version is geared toward an overall solution type, and can contain more than one project type. (This is unlike previous Express editions, each of which was geared around a single programming language.) For example, a web solution might consist of a web application project and a couple of C# class-library projects. This change was made to reflect the wide diversity of applications available forthe web and the newWinRT platform used on Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8.

Microsoft has released five Visual Studio Express 2012 products:

In October 2013, Microsoft released four new versions of its Visual Studio Express products. Like the 2012 Express edition, they are geared toward an overall solution type that may mix different types of projects. However, different IDEs are still offered for different destination platforms. They are:^[32][33]

• Visual Studio Express 2013 for Web^[34]
• Visual Studio Express 2013 for Windows:^[34]Note: Works on Windows 8.1 only (x86 andx64).
• Visual Studio Express 2013 for Windows Desktop^[34]
• Visual Studio Team Foundation Server Express 2013^[34]

Note that Visual Studio Express for Windows Phone was not released in the set of 2013 products, but Visual Studio Express for Windows Phone is now merged with Visual Studio Express for Windows 2013.2.^[35] With this new release, Windows 8.1x86 is now supported forWindows Phone 8.1 development, but not forWindows Phone 8.0 development or the Windows Phone Emulator, the latter of which also requires a processor that supports ClientHyper-V andSecond Level Address Translation (SLAT).

The Visual Studio Express 2015 editions are:

• Express for Desktop – for creating desktop Windows programs^[36]
• Express for Web - for creating responsive websites, web APIs, or "real-time online experiences"^[36]
• Express for Windows – core tools for creatingUniversal Windows Platform apps. RequiresWindows 10.^[36]
• Team Foundation Server 2015 Express – platform for source code control, for project management, and for team collaboration^[36][37]

Microsoft terminated the Visual Studio Express lineage with the release of Visual Studio Express 2017 for Windows Desktop. This last release has no siblings specialized in Web or UWP projects. Developers interested a free solution for those projects were instead directed towardsVisual Studio Community Edition orVisual Studio Code.^[1]

• Official website
• Semi-official listing for Visual Studio Express 2013 downloads

• 2005 software
• Microsoft Visual Studio

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