Whidbey "Express" Editions
If you are reading about this for the first time in my 'blog … well, color me twelve shades of surprised. Just in case you haven't heard, we've released the Express editions if Visual Studio 2005 to the web for any and all to download and play with. You can join the feeding frenzy by pointing your browser to http://msdn.microsoft.com/vs2005 and downloading right from there. You can also get SQL Express 2005 Beta to play with as well, which is the next generation of MSDE, but built on the Yukon engine. And, of course, because it's built on the Yukon engine, you can write your stored procs in any .NET language! (Well, not quite any, but really close. It needs to be verifiable, that's all.) DBA's of the world: BEWARE!!! .NET code slingers are comin' at ya!!!
Anyway, I've been playing with these nifty little toys. They're pretty functional and quite stable (especially compared to some of the recent Tech Previews) … and give you a good idea of what you'll see with Whidbey. Later for now … gotta go play with my new toyz.
