Nessicary VB.Studio downloads/Add-ons?

D

Denaes

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I just got Visual Studio 2003 (I had VB Standard before) today and I found a long huge list of downloads for it.

I thought I'd cut to the chase and find out which ones have been useful to people around here.

What have/do you use?

I already have that swell pack of c1 componants (which IS nessicary as VS.Net doesn't have a flexgrid for some strange reason)

Anything to add nice features to the IDE? Really helpful companants by MS or 3rd party? Anything that adds more functionality to VS?

Primarily I'm still doing VB.Net, but at least I have the option for J# and C#. I can now create componants which might be nice (VB Standard did not have that option).

I prefer free, or at least free for non-profit use like Devil has. In fact, I'm gonna get the free version of Divil's componants. If I can figure out how to use the docking componant I might end up purchasing it for this project I'm working on and would surely use it for future projects.

So, anyone have a list of "Must Haves" or a CD full of add-ons you toss onto any fresh installation of VS 2003?

Thanks :)
 
Re: Re: Nessicary VB.Studio downloads/Add-ons?

samsmithnz said:
hehe J#... does anyone use that here? Does anyone use that anywhere?
Click to expand...

I can't think of a reason to do so.

Heck, I can only think of 3 or so reasons to use C# over vb.net, and those are some .net implimentations that arn't available in vb.net for some reason. Nothing that I'd really care about that much though.

I guess J# is for those comming over from Java and want to use an IDE that doesn't suck.

But I don't really see the point since the Framework isn't on any other system, and isn't that the main point of Java? That it runs on multiple OS's?

I guess it might be more comforatable for the Java user who just wants to program on the PC or something.
 
J# really surprised me when it came out, as I thought that c# was supposed to be the best of java and c with a nice vb rapid development enviroment anyway.

The number of questions here in the dotnetforums about j# is evidence enough that isn't hardly used. And to think we are forced by default to install useless J# redistributable runtimes when installing vs.net 2003... (which can be manually skipped by the way).
 
Downloaded Reflector. That looks pretty kick !

Anakrino v9 I downloaded and it wouldn't run on my machine.

Resharper - I never found hte actual download page, but 50 or so pages talking about it and complaining that it wasn't finished or had bugs. I still have no clue what it actually does.

NAnt & NUnit - While the people who are working on these projects might be tech genius's, in common sense, they're clownshoes. Based on their sourceforge pages, they seem like elitist linux user's or something. Both sites didn't really tell what it did on the summary or main page, just leaving trails of links:

"Just like Ant" - well is Ant!? I follow the link to Ant. "Just like Maker, but not as annoying" !? Go back to google and try NUnit. Just like Unit!!!!!!! :mad:

I assume you're not ment to use their software unless you've followed some random train of software development going back multiple programs.

But thanks for the tips :D
 
When I first began researching .NET before taking the plunge into it myself, I rather got the idea that J# was to be an avenue for those who had used J++ from MS to migrate to the .NET platform. I also got the idea that J# was to be a potential way to entice Java programmers over to the .NET platform and away from Java.

This is not to say it is a perfect replacement for Java as really it isn't Java per say. But it was to be somewhat of a familiar home to those who would seek to make the jump to .NET.

True, .NET is actually available for the MS Windows platform at this time, made possible by MS itself. There is the project called Mono which is making a .NET framework available for the Linux environment. Personally I can't vouch for their progress as I have only begun to research this myself.

I have not seen anyone else attempting to port .NET to their environment. That doesn't mean that it won't happen as I tend to think others are waiting and watching what might happen.

.NET does give MS a vantage it never had before, that being the ability to allow programs and applications to be moved to other platforms other than MS. This will become a necessity if the Linux movement keeps going and growing. Without .NET, MS stood to loose it all if another operating system ever made any noteable gains in the marketplace. With .NET, MS may not get the whole pie but they can have a good slice of it if their apps are ported to .NET and if the fees for VS.NET remain fairly high. Keep in mind that MS recently extended support for Win98 citing that there was a concern a good number would switch to Linux rather than pay for the upgrade fees and potential hardware retrofits or purchases.

Also keep in mind that .NET solves other issues that were at the heart of problems for MS. The main one was the infamous DLL conflict.

Please keep in mind as you read this posting that I am just sharing my observations, nothing more. I really don't rant, rave, or flame so never view anything I post in that light.

What I am saying is in no way a negative reflection on MS. Actually I truly belive .NET is a very good thing all the way around. The IDE is very polished, at least to me. I do not know for sure on this, but if other language vendors ported their language to .NET, wonder if it would be that their language would be accessable through the .NET IDE?

If so then you really have a good draw as at that point as long as your preferred language was ported to .NET then you could have the vantages of the wonderful IDE found with VS.NET.

I can't recall where I saw it at, but I have seen one Cobol vendor port their product to .NET. Now I am not saying everyone run out and learn Cobol, but I truly found this to be amazing and happy that other language vendors are beginning to port to .NET.

I hope this rambling has been insightful to some. I am still amazed and impressed by what I am seeing in .NET, the IDE in VS.NET, and the many potentials it has for so many areas. :)
 
irasmith said:
I have not seen anyone else attempting to port .NET to their environment. That doesn't mean that it won't happen as I tend to think others are waiting and watching what might happen.
Click to expand...

There is also a java implimentation of the framework for OSX. Last I'd heard it wasn't released yet, only demos.

Its not free from what I gather either.

I think its a little humorous. The .Net Framework resting on the java framework... now if we could make a .Net implimentation of something else... maybe a .Net implimentation of the Java framework, then you could have a huge daisychain of .net running java running .net, etc, etc :D
 
Now that is quite interesting to know and thank you for bringing that point to light as I had not looked at OSX options.

Your idea of a daisychain made me chuckle. Truthfully who knows where it will all end up. I just try to learn what I think will be useful and press onward. Sometimes I'm right, sometimes I get it wrong. That's when I backup and punt a bit :cool:
 
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