At its BUILD developer conference, Microsoft delivered preview versions of Visual Studio 2011, Windows Server 8 and Team Foundation Server offered as a service on the Windows Azure cloud.
ANAHEIM,
Calif.-Microsoft announced a series of moves meant to advance developer
opportunities and productivity, including a developer preview of Visual Studio
2011, a preview of Windows Server 8 and the company's Team Foundation Server
(TFS) delivered as a service on the Windows Azure cloud.
In a
Sept. 14 keynote at the Microsoft BUILD
conference here, Satya Nadella, president of Microsoft's Server and Tools
Business (STB), discussed how new application patterns across connected devices
and continuous services boost opportunities for developers to build the next
generation of continuous services that are dynamic, scalable and optimized to
connect with the multidevice world.
"In
today's world of connected devices and continuous services, we are focused on
helping developers build the next generation of client applications that are
tethered to a back-end cloud," Nadella said.
Microsoft
officials said Windows Server 8 applies the company's background in building and
operating the Windows Azure public cloud to provide a cloud-optimized operating
system focused on delivery of applications, interoperability within today's
diverse IT environments, high-performance virtualization and strong links to
public clouds.
Moreover,
Windows Server 8 provides multitenant infrastructure for cloud services with
significant enhancements to help reduce the costs of high availability and to
automate service management, Microsoft said. As an open application and Web
platform that shares common management, identity and development tools with
Windows Azure, Windows Server 8 empowers developers and IT professionals to
deliver services across their choice of private and public cloud environments,
or a combination of both, the company said.
Meanwhile,
Nadella noted Microsoft's history with developers. "Developers have long been
the cornerstone of Microsoft's success, and that relationship is now more
important than ever," he said.
With that
in mind, Microsoft delivered a Visual Studio 11
Developer Preview. The product provides an integrated development
experience spanning architecture, code, test and deployment. This release adds
support for Windows 8 Metro-style applications built with HTML5, JavaScript,
C#, Visual Basic and C++, as well as numerous productivity enhancements for
project compatibility, extension management, game development, code analysis,
code review and agile testing, said Jason
Zander, Microsoft's corporate vice president for Visual Studio, in a
meeting with eWEEK. The Visual Studio
11 Developer Preview is available as of Sept. 14 for Microsoft Developer
Network (MSDN) subscribers and available to the public on Sept. 15.
During
Nadella's keynote, Microsoft showed off its newly announced preview of TFS
running on the Windows Azure platform, which provides a collaborative application
lifecycle management (ALM) environment delivered as a Microsoft-hosted Windows
Azure cloud service, making it easier to deploy, scale, operate and access
collaborative development projects, the company said.
Darryl K. Taft covers the development tools and developer-related issues beat from his office in Baltimore. He has more than 10 years of experience in the business and is always looking for the next scoop. Taft is a member of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) and was named 'one of the most active middleware reporters in the world' by The Middleware Co. He also has his own card in the 'Who's Who in Enterprise Java' deck.
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