Can Visual Studio 2005 Team edition for Developer coexist peacefully with Visual Studio 2008 Database edition on my machine? Are they completely separate applications that won't interfere in any way with each other?
Update:
What about Visual Studio 2008 Developer edition? If I install this on the same machine as 2008 Database edition, will it create two different 'VS 2008' installs or will they merge together as a single Visual Studio 2008 with the combined functionality?
2008 is side by side compatible with 2005. Also, be sure to apply 2008 SP1 as it will change the icon slightly so that you can tell the difference.
You can have both installed and make use of both. However, there are some caveats:
Opening a vs2005 solution with vs2008 will update to solution so that it can no longer be used in vs2005.
You can only have one default debugger on the machine, so they may fight with each other.
It's generally easier to get everyone up to vs2008 and just use that to target .Net2.0 when needed, but certainly not impossible for them to co-exist.
Generally speaking, yes that are completely separate applications. I've not tried the specific combination you mention, but I have had any number of combinations of VS 2003, VS 2005, VS 2008, and VS 2005 Express Editions all running without issue.
If VS2005 and VS2008 are mixed together on your development team, I believe you can have a VS2005 solution and a VS2008 solution and they can both load the same VS2005 projects. I'm not sure if you lose anything there (other than the VS2008-specific stuff like 3.5) but I believe it will work.
yes.
I use Visual Studio 6, Visual Studio 2005 and Visual Studio 2008 concurrently without any issues. [That too with all of them integrated with VSS]
Yes, they are completely separate apps that won't interfere with each other. I've been running both for over a year now.
Related
We are currently in a position to move up from Visual Studio 2008 to Visual Studio 2010. Unfortunately, we don't have a server allocated for a TFS upgrade yet (should happen in about 6 months), so we are stuck with TFS 2005 for now. Will VS2010 be compatible with TFS 2005? If so, any potential issues we need to consider?
Visual Studio and Team Explorer 2010 do not officially support TFS 2005 servers (see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd997788.aspx for the compat matrix). I don't think it is actively blocked, though, and it may work just fine for the mainstream scenarios. I don't have TFS 2005 server to try it.
Currently using VS2010 and TFS2005 here and they work well together.
I recently downloaded VS 2010 trial, the new version is more easy to use.
I have VS 2008 installed, If i decide to use VS 2010 in the future, do I still have to keep VS 2008? Is there any compatibility issue with it?
You would need to keep VS2008 installed if you target Windows CE (via Compact Framework, native smart device projects, etc.)
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/sa69he4t.aspx
Also if you want to write native applications that run on versions of Windows before XP SP3 and Server 2003 SP2, this is no longer possible with VC++ 2010. The same applies to managed code written for the .NET Framework 4.0, but you can still use Framework 3.5 with VS2010 for projects with managed code only.
And Intellisense for C++/CLI code is gone (MS promises to remedy that in the future, whether a service pack or the next version I cannot say).
If you open a VS 2008 solution or a project in VS 2010 it will be converted to VS 2010 and you will not be able to open it in VS 2008.
If that is not a problem then you don´t have to keep VS 2008, unless you are using a addin or some other third party application with VS 2008 that is not compatible with VS 2010.
Edit:
Look at Ben Voigt´s answer for information for which version have support for different platforms.
VS2010 allows you to specify the target framework that you'd like to develop on. There should be no reason to keep VS2008 installed unless you've become accustom to some handy plugins :)
I have around 50 projects in Visual Studio 2005 that I am building a new development machine for and I'd like to slowly move those projects to VS 2008 but also have 2010 available for select new projects.
Can this work? Are there any gotchas for this sort of setup? Any general advice for running multiple versions of Visual Studio on the same system would be greatly appreciated. Specifically related to managing a controlled migration of projects to new versions but being able to selectively keep some on old versions.
I've got 7.1, 8, and 9 installed at the same time (well, and VB part of 6 as well) and I've not really had a problem opening projects file in the wrong version. The Visual Studio Solution files is "associated" with a particular version even if they all have the same extension of .sln, as you can see from its little icon. Microsoft Visual Studio Version Selector seems to handle individual project files (.vcproj) fine as well.
The only thing I've had is the individual source code files not opening up in the latest version like I want, but that's easily fixed with the click of a little button in VS Opions.
Microsoft have this to say:
Visual Studio supports the installation of Visual Studio .NET 2002, 2003, ... on the same computer.
In general, you should install the earliest release of Visual Studio first, and then install subsequent versions of Visual Studio in the order in which they were released.
Make sure when you open up the 2005 files you're doing it in 2005. To open them in another would require a conversion which would render them incompatible with the older compiler set-up. To aid this, structure whatever workspace you're using into 2005, 2008, and 2010 so as to minimize accidental chance of this.
Second, when you double click to open the projects, it will invariably attempt to open them with 2010. You'll have to start with VS#### instead of the solution/project unless you're in the 2010 workspace.
I have VC6, VB6, VS 2008, and VS2010 RC installed on Windows Vista. I cannot double click on the VC6 dsp files without VS2010 opening and asking to perform the conversion. The 2008 C# projects open in 2008 as long as I use the solution file. The 2008 project file opens in 2010 instead of 2008 even though the version selector is the default program. Most of the time I try to remember to open the desired version of Visual Studio and then open the project.
You can mitigate some of these issues by changing the default program associations in the control panel or the registry.
Update: This setup works on Windows 7 x64, with the addition of VS2013.
Yes it can work. I'm not sure if you have to install them in a particular order... but install them in order of the versions... 2005, 2008, 2010. Should be good to go.
I can't speak for 2010, but I have run 2005 and 2008 at the same time on my system without any fuss.
And I made the double-click mistake that wheaties warns about more than once :(
I have VS2005 & VS2008 running without any issues. I have had problems when working with betas, express editions & am assuming you don't have them.
I would say refrain from making too many changes to the setup of these editions, it should be fine.
I also had the same doubt. I work at my company which is still on VS 2008 and I want to personally use the VS 2010 and not risk the 2008. I installed the 2010 and it worked fine with the 2008. Just make sure you note the projects that are in 2005 and open them with the same accordingly.
The reason why it works is simple: if you open your solution file in Notepad, you'll see which version of VS is related to your project.
What reasons are there for continuing to run Visual Studio 2005 when 2008 is available?
I work on a project where the environment is dictated to be Visual Studio 2005. Are there good technical reasons for this? Can I use Visual Studio 2008 and build an app that is 100% indistinguishable from the same app build with Visual Studio 2005?
I think there are two questions here
Can I use VS2008 to create apps compatible with VS2005
Generally speaking the answer is yes. I do this frequently with several internal and external hobby projects with great success. You may encounter an odd ball tooling issue but so far none has cropped up for me.
Is there any reason not to use VS2008 over VS2005
The best reason I can think of is a large developer environment. Once you make the switch to using VS2008, it will upgrade all of the projects in your solution to the new format. This will no longer be usable for anyone using VS2005. They will be forced to upgrade or maintain parrallel versions of the project file. In general, I find it's best to upgrade in groups rather than individuals.
We are currently migrating from 2005 to 2008. If you open and save a project while in VS2008, you will not be able to open that solution/project in VS2005 (at least we couldn't find a way easily). If the rest of your team is still in 2005, you should stay there. You CAN, however set up a project in 2008 and keep it compatible with 2005... as long as everyone opening it is using 2008. You keep the .NET version at 2.5, and don't convert most of the stuff that it wants you to convert.
The only time you CAN'T migrate to 2008 is if you are using a report project and SQL Server 2005. VS2008 will only let you integrate a report project with SQL Server 2008. What did we do?
We migrated to 2008 and all the Team Server stuff, except for the database and reporting. Those we kept on 2005, and so I end up having to open both versions on a daily basis... but that's why they pay me the (somewhat??) big bucks!
Not really, the new version of Visual Studio has the compilers for the new language versions and all the libraries for .NET 3.5. Since they all target the 2.0 CLR and Visual Studio 2008 allows you to target previous versions of the framework I don't see any reason to stick with 2005.
The obvious answer is: No license for Visual Studio 2008.
My company is "saving money" but not upgrading...
One reason might be interaction with existing products.
I write code for AutoCAD in C#.
They (Autodesk) "officially" support VS 2005 but I've been using 2008 since...well 2008.
I maintain several old MFC applications using Visual Studio 7 and I was considering upgrading to Visual Studio 2008. After reading this question, I realise that the Express edition will not be able to do this.
Does anyone know if I will be able to compile old MFC apps with VS2008 Standard edition or will I need to get the more expensive Professional edition ?
You'll have everything you need to build an MFC application with Standard edition. Be warned, though, if it is an application of any size or complexity it will not simply be a matter of upgrading the project/solution files and hitting F5. There are plenty of breaking changes between VS7 and 2008, most introduced in the V8 compiler. Roll up your sleeves.
Yes, the Standard edition includes support for MFC/ATL.
FYI you can compare the features