GitHub Copilot Chat is now available in Visual Studio and Visual Studio Code for users with an active subscription. Copilot Chat is an AI pair-programmer that allows you to speak in natural language through the chat interface to accomplish programming tasks such as understanding sections of code,
The post Using Copilot Chat with C++ in Visual Studio: Generate code, fix functions, and more.. appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Over the last year, we’ve been building a better Extension Manager for Visual Studio that makes it easier for you to find and install great extensions. Along the way, we’ve invited Visual Studio Preview users to try out the new design and share their feedback with us.
The post A Streamlined Extension Manager comes to Visual Studio 17.9 appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

The new VisualStudio.Extensibility SDK helps you build extensions that run outside of the main IDE process for improved performance and reliability. With a focus on developer productivity, it features a modern, intuitive .NET Core-based API and solid, well-maintained documentation.

This public preview release builds on our previous developer previews,
The post VisualStudio.Extensibility: Install extensions without restarting Visual Studio! appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Less than 3 weeks to go! Join Us at Visual Studio LIVE! Las Vegas

Are you at the forefront of driving business innovation using Visual Studio? With our room block running low, decide today to secure your spot at Visual Studio LIVE!
The post Last Chance: Visual Studio LIVE! – Las Vegas appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

We’re excited to introduce the first preview of Visual Studio 17.10! This is where we get to show you what we’ve been working on and what we’re planning, and with feedback from the most active developer community on the planet, we get to deliver truly compelling products.
The post Introducing Visual Studio 17.10 – Preview 1 is Here! appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Welcome to Visual Studio 2022 17.9! This release comes with more capabilities and improvements that enhance productivity for you and your team, such as AI-assistance and better extensibility. Plus, we’re always improving core productivity and performance! We’ve included suggestions from you in the community and are publishing more about our backlogs in our release notes and roadmap.
The post Visual Studio 2022 17.9 Now Available appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

In retrospect, the past year our team was on a mission to enhance Profiling tools, making them more efficient and user-friendly. We improved instrumentation and our .NET counter tool, broadened platform support, seamlessly integrated unit test profiling, and boosted overall performance.
The post A Look Back: Visual Studio’s Profiling Tool Advancements in 2023 appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

The .NET team has been working hard all through 2023 to create innovative features to enhance the productivity and experience of .NET developers. This blog dives into James Montemagno’s favorite new .NET features in Visual Studio. 

I was particularly interested in Dev Tunnels.
The post 2023’s Top 10 New Features for .NET in Visual Studio appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

December 3rd was celebrated as the International Day of Persons with Disabilities, or IDPWD, to bring awareness and understanding of the issues that people with disabilities face around the world. At Microsoft, we are committed to empowering every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more,
The post Developing With Accessibility in Mind at Microsoft   appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Reflecting on the past year’s journey, our team was on a mission to enhance debugging tools, ensuring they became more efficient and user-friendly. We dedicated our efforts to boosting inner-loop productivity, making external source debugging more seamless, improving overall performance, and optimizing memory analysis.
The post In the Debugger’s Spotlight: A Year in Review appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

As we enter the new year, it’s a good time to look back at all the features and improvements we made for C++ developers in Visual Studio in 2023. We’ve made advancements across the IDE, toolchain, and the vcpkg package manager in both performance and functionality.
The post A Year of C++ Improvements in Visual Studio appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Have you ever wished you had an AI assistant that could help you write code faster and better? That’s what Visual Studio Copilot Chat offers you: an AI-powered pair programmer that can answer your questions, suggest code snippets, explain code logic,
The post Code Faster and Better with GitHub Copilot’s New Features: Slash Commands and Context Variables appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Git and Version Control skills are essential for development, but they’re often glossed over in coding curriculum and onboarding. We often memorize a few commands without understanding how to recover from sticky situations or leverage Git to the fullest. Are you ready to take your GitHub knowledge to the next level within Visual Studio?
The post Elevate Your Git and GitHub Skills in Visual Studio with the Intermediate and Advanced Series appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Over the last year, we’ve invested heavily in new capabilities to help Visual Studio developers code more easily. Let’s look back on some of the additions that aim to make your coding experience more productive.
Feature Name

Release
Spell Checker

17.5
All-In-One Search

17.5
Markdown

17.5
Brace Pair Colorization

17.6
Sticky Scroll

17.6
Compare Files

17.7
Copy and Trim Indentation

17.7
Case-preserving Find and Replace

17.8
Summary Diff

17.8
Rename suggestions

17.9 Preview 1
All-In-One Search plain text support

17.9 Preview 1
Productivity highlights

Here’s a snapshot of some productivity enhancements that shipped in 2023,
The post Visual Studio productivity features in 2023 appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

With the release of 17.9 Preview 3 dropping today, we are bringing some exciting enhancements to the Code Search (also known as All-In-One Search) experience. Since our last update with the search experience, we’ve been hard at work refining the experience and ideating ways to add to the experience.
The post 17.9 Preview 3 brings exciting changes to Code Search appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

As an integral part of our Visual Studio community, we’re thrilled to extend a special invitation to Visual Studio LIVE!, from March 3-8, 2024, at the Paris Las Vegas Hotel & Casino. This event is a hub for developers eager to explore the latest features in the IDE plus additional insights from experts in Visual Studio,
The post Code, Connect & Learn at Visual Studio LIVE! in Las Vegas. appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

As we enter a new year, we wanted to catch you up on several experiments your feedback and participation helped us fine tune over the course of 2023.

A community experiment is when we identify features believed to increase user productivity and happiness,
The post 2023 – a year of community experiments appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

As we step into 2024, we’re taking a moment to look back at the significant performance improvements our team delivered in 2023. Your valuable feedback, active collaboration, and unwavering support have been crucial in enhancing Visual Studio. This past year has been focused on optimizing performance,
The post Visual Studio Performance Highlights Delivered in 2023 appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

It’s a New Year, and a good time for a reminder of upcoming dates in the Visual Studio support lifecycle. Support for Visual Studio 2013 will end on April 9 of this year. If you’re using an older version of Visual Studio,
The post Visual Studio 2013 Retirement: Support reminder for older versions of Visual Studio appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

As we reflect on the past year, it’s clear that the journey of enhancing our Git tooling has been exciting! Our team has been dedicated to increasing GitHub integration, boosting productivity, and addressing valuable feedback from Developer Community. Today, we’re thrilled to share the milestones we’ve achieved and the enhancements that are making your Git experience in Visual Studio smoother and more intuitive.
The post A year of making you more productive using Git in Visual Studio appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

In Visual Studio 2022 version 17.8, we introduced a feature that allows C++ developers to easily view the size and alignment of classes, structs, unions, base types, or Enums. Furthermore, in Visual Studio 2022 version 17.9 Preview 1, we’re taking it a step further by providing the capability to visualize the memory layout of your C++ classes,
The post Size, Alignment, and Memory Layout Insights for C++ Classes, Structs, and Unions appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Ever struggled to name a variable, method, or class—finding that perfect balance between expressiveness and conciseness? You’re not alone. We’ve tackled this universal challenge in the latest Visual Studio Preview via our GitHub Copilot Chat extension (subscription required). Introducing: AI-powered rename suggestions.
The post Naming Made Easy: AI-Powered Rename Suggestions appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Event handler leaks have been around for a long time, and they are one of the peskiest issues WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation) developers regularly deal with. You might be thinking: What makes event handler leaks so important? Event handler leaks are easy to cause,
The post Unlocking the Secrets of Managed Memory: Dive into Event Handler Leak Insights! appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Welcome to the release of Visual Studio 2022 17.9 Preview 2, which wraps up our development efforts for 2023. This update brings new features and enhancements, building on the solid foundation set by Preview 1 in November. 

In this preview, we’ve made some improvements to the C++ and .NET MAUI development experiences.
The post Visual Studio 17.9 Preview 2 has arrived! appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

In the dynamic landscape of database development, SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT) is a powerful tool for database developers in the Visual Studio ecosystem.  SSDT 17.8 is included in the latest version of Visual Studio 2022 v17.8, which was released on November 14th,
The post Embracing SQL Server 2022 with SSDT 17.8: Unveiling Key Updates appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

When you have lots of tabs open in Visual Studio, your horizontal screen resolution determines how many fit in the document tab well. The remaining document tabs are hidden unless you configure Visual Studio to display tabs in multiple rows. Alternatively,
The post Scroll to expand document tabs appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

It was a busy week for the Visual Studio team, preparing for both Ignite and .NET Conf. And releasing the latest version of Visual Studio 2022 which is now up to version 17.8. There were lots of announcements of cool new features,
The post My favorite features in Visual Studio 17.8 appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

After spending hours on a bug fix or a feature update, often the last thing we developers want to do is carefully explain the contents of the Git commit. The latest Visual Studio preview is here to help. Use the new generated Git commit message feature to help you describe your set of changes.
The post Write Your Git Commits with GitHub Copilot appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

The Visual Studio team depends on community feedback from all users to help create, design, and improve Visual Studio. We’re thrilled to announce that Visual Studio version 17.8 (available here today) utilized more than 360 feedback items from Developer Community. We are currently working hard to build the next version of Visual Studio and just released 17.9 Preview 1,
The post Community Feedback Building 17.8 & 17.9 Preview 1 appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

 

Version 17.8 welcomes an array of exhilarating performance enhancements, including Responsive File Opening Experience, Improved Razor/Blazor Responsiveness, Enhanced F5 Speed, Optimized IntelliSense for C++ Unreal Engine and Build Acceleration for Non-SDK style .NET Projects.  At the heart of these changes is our commitment to enhancing performance,
The post Visual Studio 2022 – 17.8 Performance Enhancements appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Introducing the latest updates to Visual Studio 2022, designed to make your development experience more productive and efficient than ever before. Our Visual Studio 2022 17.8 release includes powerful C++ productivity features that empowers you to check the size and alignment of classes,
The post Visual Studio 2022 v17.8 Brings Increased Productivity, Further Unreal Engine Integration, and Cross-Platform Enhancements to C++ appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

You can now create a pull request in the 17.8 release of Visual Studio. With over 280 votes and 60 comments in Developer Community, integrating create a pull request has been a highly suggested feature with community involvement to make it happen.
The post Create a Pull Request with Summary Difference View Available in GA appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Back in May, we showed a first look into the UI Refresh that we’ve been working on for Visual Studio. We’ve been working on a refresh for the Visual Studio UI to improve productivity, create a more inclusive environment, and keep up with evolving global accessibility requirements.
The post The Visual Studio UI Refresh Preview is here! appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

We’re excited to introduce Visual Studio 17.9 Preview 1, another leap forward in our continuous effort to enhance your development experience. This latest iteration is not just an update; it’s a transformation, enriched with features that speak directly to your needs for productivity and flexibility. 
The post Introducing Visual Studio 17.9 – Preview 1 is Here! appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Unlock New Heights in Developer Productivity: Optimized C++ Support, Enhanced Enterprise Capabilities, and Full .NET 8 Integration

The latest update for Visual Studio 2022 is officially out. Offering a comprehensive suite of enhancements that span productivity, programming languages, and enterprise management,
The post Visual Studio 17.8 now available! appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.

Visual Studio has native CMake integration that allows C++ users to build and develop using CMake and supports their unique needs. CMake is a cross-platform build tool for C++ and with Visual Studio’s latest tools, users can be more productive when it comes to configuring with CMake.
The post Latest Updates for CMake Development in Visual Studio appeared first on Visual Studio Blog.