1. LINQ Support

LINQ essentially is the composition of many standard query operators that allow you to work with data in a more intuitive way regardless.

The benefits of using LINQ are significant – Compile time checking C# language queries, and the ability to debug step by step through queries.

2. Expression Blend Support

Expression blend is XAML generator tool for silverlight applications. You can install Expression blend as an embedded plug-in to Visual Studio 2008. By this you can get extensive web designer and JavaScript tool.

3. Windows Presentation Foundation

WPF provides you an extensive graphic functionality you never seen these before. Visual Studio 2008 contains plenty of WPF Windows Presentation Foundation Library templates. By this a visual developer who is new to .NET, C# and VB.NET can easily develop the 2D and 3D graphic applications.

Visual Studio 2008 provides free game development library kits for games developers. currently this game development kits are available for C++ and also 2D/3D Dark Matter one image and sounds sets.

4. VS 2008 Multi-Targeting Support

Earlier you were not able to working with .NET 1.1 applications directly in visual studio 2005. Now in Visual studio 2008 you are able to create, run, debug the .NET 2.0, .NET 3.0 and .NET 3.5 applications. You can also deploy .NET 2.0 applications in the machines which contains only .NET 2.0 not .NET 3.x.

5. AJAX support for ASP.NET

Previously developer has to install AJAX control library separately that does not come from VS, but now if you install Visual Studio 2008, you can built-in AJAX control library. This Ajax Library contains plenty of rich AJAX controls like Menu, TreeView, webparts and also these components support JSON and VS 2008 contains in built ASP.NET AJAX Control Extenders.

6. JavaScript Debugging Support

Since starting of web development all the developers got frustration with solving javascript errors. Debugging the error in javascript is very difficult. Now Visual Studio 2008 makes it is simpler with javascript debugging. You can set break points and run the javaScript step by step and you can watch the local variables when you were debugging the javascript and solution explorer provides javascript document navigation support.

7. Nested Master Page Support

Already Visual Studio 2005 supports nested master pages concept with .NET 2.0, but the problem with this Visual Studio 2005 that pages based on nested masters can't be edited using WYSIWYG web designer. But now in VS 2008 you can even edit the nested master pages.

8. LINQ Intellisense and Javascript Intellisense support for silverlight applications

Most happy part for .NET developers is Visual Studio 2008 contains intellisense support for javascript. Javascript Intellisense makes developers life easy when writing client side validation, AJAX applications and also when writing Silverlight applications

Intellisense Support: When we are writing the LINQ Query VS provides LINQ query syntax as tool tips.

9. Organize Imports or Usings: We have Organize Imports feature already in Eclipse. SInce many days I have been waiting for this feature even in VS. Now VS contains Organize Imports feature which removes unnecessary namespaces which you have imported. You can select all the namespaces and right click on it, then you can get context menu with Organize imports options like "Remove Unused Usings", "Sort Usings", "Remove and Sort". Refactoring support for new .NET 3.x features like Anonymous types, Extension Methods, Lambda Expressions.

10. Intellisense Filtering: Earlier in VS 2005 when we were typing with intellisense box all the items were being displayed. For example If we type the letter 'K' then intellisense takes you to the items starts with 'K' but also all other items will be presented in intellisense box. Now in VS 2008 if you press 'K' only the items starts with 'K' will be filtered and displayed.

11. Intellisense Box display position

Earlier in some cases when you were typing the object name and pressing. (Period) then intellisense was being displayed in the position of the object which you have typed. Here the code which we type will go back to the dropdown, in this case sometimes programmer may disturb to what he was typing. Now in VS 2008 If you hold the Ctrl key while the intellisense is dropping down then intellisense box will become semi-transparent mode.

12. Visual Studio 2008 Split View

VS 205 has a feature show both design and source code in single window. but both the windows tiles horizontally. In VS 2008 we can configure this split view feature to vertically, this allows developers to use maximum screen on laptops and wide-screen monitors.

Here one of the good feature is if you select any HTML or ASP markup text in source window automatically corresponding item will be selected in design window.

13. HTML JavaScript warnings, not as errors: VS 2005 mixes HTML errors and C# and VB.NET errors and shows in one window. Now VS 2008 separates this and shows javascript and HTML errors as warnings. But this is configurable feature.

14. Debugging .NET Framework Library Source Code:

Now in VS 2008 you can debug the source code of .NET Framework Library methods. Lets say If you want to debug the DataBind() method of DataGrid control you can place a debugging point over there and continue with debug the source code of DataBind() method.

15. In built Silverlight Library

Earlier we used to install silverlight SDK separately, Now in VS 2008 it is inbuilt, with this you can create, debug and deploy the silverlight applications.

16. Visual Studio LINQ Designer

Already you know in VS 2005 we have inbuilt SQL Server IDE feature. by this you no need to use any other tools like SQL Server Query Analyzer and SQL Server Enterprise Manger. You have directly database explorer by this you can create connections to your database and you can view the tables and stored procedures in VS IDE itself. But now in VS 2008 it has View Designer window capability with LINQ-to-SQL.

17. Inbuilt C++ SDK

Earlier It was so difficult to download and configure the C++ SDK Libraries and tools for developing windows based applications. Now it is inbuilt with VS 2008 and configurable

18. Multilingual User Interface Architecture - MUI

MUI is architecture contains packages from Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office libraries. This supports the user to change the text language display as he wish.

Visual Studio is now in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Chinese Simplified, Chinese Traditional, Japanese, and Korean. Over the next couple of months. Microsoft is reengineering the MUI which supports nine local languages then you can even view Visual studio in other 9 local languages.

19. Microsoft Popfly Support

Microsoft Popfly explorer is an add-on to VS 2008, by this directly you can deploy or hosting the Silverlight applications and Marshup objects

20. Free Tools and Resources

People may feel that I am a promoter to Visual Studio 2008 as a salesman, but we get plenty of free resources and free tools with Visual Studio 2008.

21. We can use for Commercial

Earlier you were spending lot of money to host your .NET applications for commercial use. Now you no need to worry Now Microsoft is providing you to host your application free on Popfly for web pages and also visual studio express projects.

The DiscountASP.NET hosting platform supports ASP.NET 3.5 hosting and is compatible with Visual Studio 2008.

Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 enables developers to quickly create connected applications that deliver rich user experiences. Visual Studio 2008 delivers advances for developers in three primary areas:

Rapid Application DevelopmentEffective Team CollaborationBreak Through User Experiences

New Features in Visual Studio 2008

Visual Studio 2008 provides advanced development tools, debugging features, database functionality, and new features, for example:

LINQA key addition in VS2008 is support for Language Integrated Query (LINQ), which contributes to rapid application development.

New Web Design InterfaceVisual Studio 2008 incorporates a new Web designer that uses the design engine from Expression Web. Moving between design and source view is faster and the new split view capability means you can edit the HTML source and simultaneously see the results on the page. Support for style sheets in separate files is added. In addition, a CSS properties pane which clarifies the often times complex hierarchy of cascading styles, so that it is easier to understand. Visual Studio 2008 has full WYSIWYG support for building and using ASP.NET Nested Master Pages which greatly improves the ability to build a Web site with a consistent look and feel.

JavaScript Debugging and IntellisenseIn Visual Studio 2008 introduces client-side JavaScript Intellisense support. Not only does the Intellisense give standard JavaScript keyword support, but it automatically infers variable types and provides method, property and event support from any number of included script files. Similarly, the JavaScript debugging support now allows for the deep Watch and Locals support in JavaScript.

Multi-targeting SupportIn previous versions of Visual Studio, you could only build projects that targeted a single version of the .NET Framework. With Visual Studio 2008 supports "multi-targeting". Through a simple drop-down, you can decide if you want your project to target .NET Framework 2.0, 3.0 or 3.5. The builds, the Intellisense, the toolbox, etc. will all adjust to the feature set of the specific version of the .NET Framework which you choose. This allows you to take advantage of the new features in Visual Studio 2008, like the Web design interface, and the improved JavaScript support, and still build your projects for their current runtime versions.

After a long beta period Microsoft pushed Visual Studio .NET 2008 (code named “Orcas”) out to MSDN in November - keeping their promise to deliver it by the end of the year. Develop Mentor has been using Orcas in many of our .NET classes for a while now and I for one, am pretty excited that it’s finally here. There are a ton of new features and enhancements in this release that make it almost a no-brainer to upgrade - I thought I’d take a moment and list my top ten favorites in no particular order:

#10: WPF designer (“Cider”)

I spend a lot of time on a rich-client island and compared to the embarrassing support for WPF provided for VS2005 (through an add-on) VS2008 just plain rocks. Not only does the designer just work, the XAML intellisense is full featured and driven through a real XAML parser and not an XSD file. That means custom types and namespace completion actually function as you would expect them to! The visual designer and XAML views stay synchronized and “mini” thumbnails and scaling bars are used to help you see what you are building. You can also see how the new Cider environment has borrowed from Blend - a Search box is present to filter properties down and the selection in the XAML pane is synchronized with the visual designer so if you highlight a tag, it selects the appropriate object in the visual pane.

#9: WPF and Windows Forms integration (“Crossbow”)

Hand in hand with the designer view, VS2008 improves the designer experience for Windows Forms to WPF integration. Specifically, ElementHost is now present in the toolbox and you can drag and drop WPF user controls right onto your Form! You get a live preview of the control and can edit the content right in the designer.

#8: ClickOnce improvements

Microsoft introduced a simplified way to deploy Windows Forms clients from the web with Visual Studio 2005 called ClickOnce. With 2008, they’ve improved the experience by allowing deployment through FireFox (previously only IE was supported), better file associations so your application can be launched by activating a data file, better support for certificate expiration and changing the deployment location without resigning the application and support for Office add-ins and WPF XAML Browser application deployment.

#7: Multi-framework targeting

This release of Visual Studio has a much-needed feature that I wish had been there before - the ability to target multiple versions of .NET. Specifically, you can select your target framework (2.0 SP1, 3.0 or 3.5) and the project types, toolbox, references, intellisense and features will be appropriately set to that version. This selection can occur during project creation - in the project templates dialog or on the project properties dialog. Be aware that selecting .NET Framework 2.0 actually means 2.0 SP1 and not the original .NET 2.0 framework released with Visual Studio 2005.

#6: Better Intellisense support

Web developers benefit from this release too - Visual Studio now has intellisense and code completion support for JavaScript! It’s smart enough to look at the underlying type currently assigned and correctly infer the methods which are available. So, for example if

you assign a numeric type, the dropdown will be populated with the proper methods available for the type.

Visual Studio will also look at the comments applied to your methods - just like in C# and VB.NET, it will pull descriptions out of XML based comments on your JavaScript methods and display descriptions as tooltips when you are navigating the intellisen se dropdown.

Another cool feature added to intellisense is the filtering applied - now if you press a letter and start typing, it will begin to restrict your choices displayed, not just scroll to that section. This filters the output and makes it easier to find what you are looking for.

#5: Organize your "using" statements

Visual Studio now has the ability to organize your using statements. As a project evolves, you often end up with a ton of using statements at the top of each file which are not really being used - either because the project template added it, or because you originally did use something from that namespace which was then removed later. Now you can right click on your using statements and sort and/or remove unused namespaces.

#4: Refactoring enhancements

The refactoring support was a welcome addition to VS 2005 - and Microsoft has enhanced the support in 2008 to support C# 3.0 features and allow you to refactor anonymous types, extension methods and lambda expressions.

#3: C# 3.0 support

Speaking of C# 3.0, that has got to be one of the coolest features - functional programming seems to be all the rage these days and introducing these features into C# 3.0 will allow you to be the coolest programmer on your floor. Things like automatic properties, lambda expressions (which reduce your typing for anonymous delegates), partial methods, anonymous types and extension methods will radically change how you can build applications. They can seem weird at first for some people, but don’t be afraid of them! They will cut down your typing and provide for some really cool ways to enhance and evolve your projects.

#2: Visual Studio Split View

It is becoming increasingly more common to have multiple monitors on developers desks. Building on the “split” window feature of VS 2005, Visual Studio 2008 now allows you to tile the window horizontally or vertically so you can split your design and code view across monitors! This works in any of the designers (ASP.NET, WinForms, WPF, etc.)

#1: Debugging the .NET source code

There are actually several debugging enhancements (try debugging JavaScript on the client-side for example - it works great!) but I think the coolest feature by far has got to be the debugging enhancements which will allow you to actually debug into the source code of the .NET framework. Scott Guthrie announced a few weeks ago on his blog that they intend to release the source code under the Microsoft Reference License. As part of that release, VS2008 will have integrated debugging support so that you can step into the framework libraries (ever want to know why your DataBind isn’t working??). Visual Studio will automatically download the source file from Microsoft’s server and you will get full watch and breakpoint support. This isn’t quite ready yet, but it’s coming soon and promises to be one of the biggest timesavers added to Visual Studio!

There are a ton of other features that make VS 2008 a worthwhile upgrade - you can experience it yourself by downloading a copy at no cost today Scott Guthrie's Blog (Express editions have been released) or upgrading from MSDN. VS 2008 co-exists just fine with 2005 and 2003 but be aware that the project format has changed and it’s not backwards compatible, so sharing projects with your coworkers may be slightly painful for you until everyone moves to the new release as you will have to maintain two project and solution files.

.NET Framework 3.5 New Features

Faster .NET Framework execution Base Class Library – New Class Additions Language Integrated Query (LINQ)

1. Faster garbage collection2. Smarter, faster NGen requiring

smaller working set RAM3. 64 bit client improvements4. ThreadPool performance

improvements5. Security check caching during

NGen

6. BigInteger, HashSet and DateTime2 types

7. NSA Suite ”B” and FIPs compliant cryptography

8. Lightweight Reader/Writer Lock Classes

9. Anonymous and Named Pipes IO Classes

10.   Integration with Event Tracing for Windows

11.   New Addin hosting model for extensibility

Deep integration of LINQ data-awareness into the programming languages and framework.

Workflow Enabled Services – Process and Messaging together

Web 2.0 Friendly and AJAX Enabled WCF Services

Visual Studio Developer Tools for WF, WCF and in Visual Studio “Orcas”

Using workflow to provide for durable and long-running services. New Tools, WF activities and new programming model classes have been added to simplify building workflow-enabled services using WF and WCF. This allows a .NET Framework developer to build business logic for a service using WF and expose messaging from that service using WCF. These improvements not only provide tools for this scenario but they reduce the amount of glue code that was previously required.

Ajax is a web development technique for making asynchronous exchanges of small amounts of data between browser and web service calls from the browser client script to the web server. A programming model is provided for building Ajax style web applications using WCF services. An HTTP programming model is also provided allowing for REST style web services.

Visual Studio”Orcas” has built in tools for web service authoring with WCF and for building workflow enabled software with WF. There are new project templates for WCF services, WF business logic, workflow enabled services, and AJAX services. The templates are conveniently set up to compile and run even before any custom code is added enabling .NET developers to get going quickly. There are also numerous other tools for developing with WF, WCF and WPF.

More WS-* Standards Support RSS and ATOM Syndication API Partial Trust Support for WCF Hosting

Implementation in WCF of the latest OASIS specifications Web Services Atomic Transaction (WS-AtomicTransaction) 1.1, WS-ReliableMessaging 1.1, WS-SecureCOnversation and Web Services Coordination (WS-Coordination) 1.1.

Applications built using WCF will be able to easily expose syndicated data which can be consumed by an RSS or ATOM reader.

Partial trust on the vlient is provided for ASMX parity focussing mainly on partially trusted WCF applications deployed through click-once. Support is provided for basic HTTP binding provided that the application runs in the Internet zone permissions and have granted the apropriate WebPermission. Secure communication is possible through transport security only. All other features are not available to partially trusted applications including hosting services, duplex communications, non-HTTP transports, WS-* protocols and any WF use.

Rules Data Improvements Built-in WPF tools for Visual Studio

“Orcas”

Additional WPF Features and Improved

Performance

The rules engine in WF is improved to add support for C# 3.0 extension metods, and for operator overloading . Also the ”new” operator is added to compete the base set of expression types.

The Visual Studio designer for WPF was previously released as a CTP. It is not integrated into the development environment and is significantly improved.

WPF has smoother animations, faster startup and better overall performance. There are also new data types available for data binding with LINQ. Better integration support is now provided for with codename “WPF/E”.