Visual Studio 2012 Update 1

With Visual Studio 2012, Microsoft will continually deliver value by adding new capabilities year-round. These update releases will be aligned with core software development trends in the market, ensuring developers always have access to the best solution for building modern applications, company officials said. VS2012 Update 1 will offer new capabilities in four main categories, including added support of agile teams, continuous quality enablement, SharePoint and Windows development, and will be made available this month as a preview and later this year as a final release.

Visual Studio Express 2012 for Windows Desktop extends the Visual Studio tools offering for desktop applications by providing developers with Express tools for building Windows Desktop applications in C#, VB.NET and C++. The offering enables developers to get started on building Windows desktop applications quickly and for free. Visual Studio Express 2012 for Windows Desktop is available immediately.

F# Tools for Visual Studio Express 2012 for Web provides developers with a free add-on with VS2012 that enables development of F# on ASP.NET, Azure and Cloud. The F# Tools add-on is available immediately.

TFS Power Tools for Visual Studio 2012TFS Power Tools give development teams everything they need to get the most out of their Team Foundation Server 2012 installation, including advanced backup tools, extensions for Windows Explorer as well as PowerShell, and a process template editor. TFS Power Tools are available for download now.

Productivity Power Tools for Visual Studio are a set of enhancement tools and command-line utilities that help developers accomplish tasks more efficiently. The Productivity Power Tools will be available for download in October.

Windows Embedded Compact development is now fully supported in Visual Studio 2012, including access to application lifecycle management (ALM). These improvements will be available with the next version of Windows Embedded Compact, which is scheduled for release in the first quarter of 2013.

Microsoft announced that Visual Studio 2012 is launching with 72 partners delivering more than 100 products at launch, which officials said demonstrate strong ecosystem support for Visual Studio and the developer community.

Visual Studio VS2012 enables developers to view the user interface in their local language. Visual Studio 2012 is launching with support for 10 local languages.

Any customer with an active Visual Studio Professional with MSDN subscription, purchased prior to Sept. 1, is eligible for a 30 percent discount on upgrading to Visual Studio Premium with Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN).