Today Jason Zander announced details around Visual Studio 11 and the .NET Framework 4.5 Beta slated to ship on February 29th with the Windows 8 Consumer Preview, and Microsoft posted details on the lineup of Visual Studio 11 product configurations.

Here is a preview of the new Metro style UI used in Visual Studio 11:

 

We’ve been getting questions around the next version of Visual Studio since the Developer Preview was released at Build last year, so I’ll fill you in on the current plans.  Like any major Visual Studio update, we’ve been working closely with Microsoft to make sure that Infragistics controls will be ready and compatible when the updated Visual Studio ships.

• As Microsoft goes through the Visual Studio 11 Beta cycle to RC, RTM and eventually GA, we will fix reported issues and internally discovered issues.
• Starting with the March Service Releases, we will be shipping Visual Studio 11 compatible bits with the Infragistics bugs addressed in monthly Service Releases.
• We will continue to report regression issues to Microsoft that we find in Visual Studio 11 so they can address the bugs.

 

What about Windows 8 & WinRT Controls

This is a question I have gotten even more of in the last month since the buzz around Windows 8 Consumer Preview coming in late February has picked up.  Similar to the Visual Studio 11 Beta story, we are working as closely as we can with Microsoft on our Windows 8 controls story.  After the Consumer Preview ships, and Windows 8 moves into Release Candidate and GA, we’ll keep you updated on the plans we have for controls that are designed specifically for Metro Style Apps in Windows 8.  As you know, the current NetAdvantage Ultimate controls can be used to build Windows 8 Desktop Apps today, no problem.  On the other hand WOA (Windows on ARM) Apps, which are designed to only run on ARM based tablets, are what is getting everyone excited.  As Steven Sinofsky stated in this blog on building the WOA experience:

Metro style apps in the Windows Store can support both WOA and Windows 8 on x86/64. Developers wishing to target WOA do so by writing applications for the WinRT (Windows APIs for building Metro style apps) using the new Visual Studio 11 tools in a variety of languages, including C#/VB/XAML and Jscript/ HTML5. Native code targeting WinRT is also supported using C and C++, which can be targeted across architectures and distributed through the Windows Store. WOA does not support running, emulating, or porting existing x86/64 desktop apps. Code that uses only system or OS services from WinRT can be used within an app and distributed through the Windows Store for both WOA and x86/64. Consumers obtain all software, including device drivers, through the Windows Store and Microsoft Update or Windows Update.

So can you build Windows 8 Applications with Infragistics controls today?  Yes.  Your options today are to build applications that target the Windows 8 desktop experience using Infragistics controls and to keep checking back to this blog as we release more information on our WOA controls.

 

If you have any questions, shoot me an email at jasonb@infragistics.com and I will help out!