Microsoft introduced Visual Web Developer 2005 with its release of Visual Studio 2005 and .NET Framework 2.0 and I never understood the use of this tool. Most of developers use Visual Studio 2005 to develop .NET 2.0 applications then why do I need Visual Web Developer?
Recently, I was reading on MSDN for development and they have categorized downloads in four categories – Windows Development, Web Development, Games Development, and Hardware Development. Funny thing is, when you select Web Development, you see downloads for Visual Web Developer only.
Let’s take a look at current tools available from Microsoft for Web Development.
- Visual Studio 2005
- Visual Studio 2005 Express
- Visual C# or Visual Basic .NET or Visual C++ .NET (for different language)
- Visual Web Developer
- Office Live
- Front-Page 2003 or later
I understand the purpose of Office Live and Front-Page to compete with other similar products from other vendors but it seems like Visual Web Developer doesn’t fit anywhere.
If I can’t buy Visual Studio, I can use the Express edition, which is absolutely free.
It seems like Microsoft folks like to confuse us and don’t resolve it. They should just let Visual Web Developer go and stick with the standard Visual Studio products.
I would like to know any body who is using Visual Web Developer for their development. If yes, Why??