Microsoft announces the release of Visual Studio 2017

At the Connect () developer event, Microsoft has announced the release of Visual Studio 2017 Release Candidate. This comes with support for automated tasks as well as improved navigation, and immediate feedback on quality and code. The Visual Studio 2017 RC goes on to make use of Visual Studio 2015 investment in Roslyn, so as to include several new features.

Microsoft introduces the all new installer that comes with the following features as per the official blog:

• Reduce the minimum footprint of Visual Studio.
• Install more quickly with less system impact, and uninstall cleanly.
• Make it easier for you to select and install just the features you need.
• The smallest install is just a few hundred megabytes, and it contains basic code editing support for more than twenty languages along with source code control.

Image Source: visualstudio.com

Microsoft, in its official blog, states,

“Most users will want to install more, and so you can add one or more 'workloads' that represent common frameworks, languages and platforms - covering everything from .NET desktop development to data science with R, Python and F#.”

The system administrators will now be able to create an offline layout of Visual Studio which contains the entire content so as to install the product without the need of an Internet access. 

In order to install from the layout folder, all you need to do is simply run the bootstrapper executable from the newly- created layout folder. It is to be note that the signature certificates will still need to be downloaded from the Internet. Microsoft claims that they will go on to fix the need to be connected in the upcoming release. It is also important for you to note that the Android SDK requires an online connection to install.

The following are the overall improvements, as per the official blog:

• The GitHub extension for Visual Studio can be selected in the new Visual Studio installer.
  
  
• Visual Studio has been optimized to reduce startup time and solution load time. The very first launch of Visual Studio is at least 50% faster.
  
  
• Visual Studio will now monitor the extension performance that impacts startup, solution load, or editing. You will be alerted about poorly performing extensions via the "Notification bar" in the IDE. The new "Performance Center" (also available via Help | Manage Visual Studio Performance) lets you view not only extensions that are impacting performance, but also discover tool windows that are impacting your startup performance and change their startup load behavior.
  
  
• "Reload All Projects" has been replaced with Reload Solution to support better performance of switching branches external to VS. When using the Git command line to switch branches, choose Reload Solution after the branch has switched in order to achieve the maximum performance improvement.
  
  
• File globbing capabilities for .NET Core and ASP.NET Core projects have been enhanced.
  
  
• You are now automatically taken to the folder view of your repository after cloning. You can view files or open Solutions with the new Solution selection list in the "Solution Explorer".
  
  
• A new external service host is being introduced that will replace VSHub; this new service host is an external process and will appear in Task Manager as ServiceHub.Host.CLR.*.exe, as well as ServiceHub.Host.Node.x86.exe. This host will ultimately eliminate the localhost http traffic that was introduced with VSHub which should alleviate the noise Fiddler users reported.
  
  
• Pre-release license expiration messages more clearly communicate the current license state.
  
  
• The Account Settings dialog is now more accessible to screen readers.
  
  
• The version control status bar makes it easier to publish local repos to an SCC host and keep track of uncommitted and un-pushed work.

New Features

The following are the new features available in Visual Studio 2017:

Navigating Code - When the developers go on to drill into a bug, discover the implications of a refactoring, or work on an unfamiliar code base, they completely depend on the accuracy and ease of code navigation. The new release delivers an improved navigation experience with Find All References, GoTo, and Indent Guides, in order to get you from A to B with greater confidence and lesser distractions.

Reading and Writing Code - In addition to navigation, developers spend a lot of their time in reading and writing code. Visual Studio 2017 RC completely focuses on facilitating the writing of correct code along with maintaining the readability of developer code bases. This has been built on the features of the Visual Studio 2015, providing the users with a refined IntelliSense experience, more refactoring and code fixes along with customizable code style configuration and enforcement.

Testing Code - Visual Studio 2017 RC has gone on to introduce "Live Unit Testing" for C# and Visual Basic.

 

Image Source: Microsoft

The Live Unit Testing analyzes data which are generated during run time to run only impacted tests after an edit and goes on to provide immediate feedback on the status of the test in the editor. This inline visualizations appear on line-by-line basis.

• If a line of executable code is hit by at least one failing test, it’s decorated with a red “x.”
• If a line of executable code is hit by all passing tests, it’s decorated with a green checkmark.
• If a line of executable code is hit by no tests, it’s decorated with a blue dash.

Debugging Code - Developers completely rely on debugging, when everything fails, so as to help them to identify the source of the issue. The new Visual Studio 2017 RC saves time by going on to reduce the number of actions which are required so as to step through a program and to drill into the information.

For more information, check the official blog. You can now download Visual Studio 2017 here. 

Reference:

Microsoft announces Visual Studio 2017