Summary of an interview with the Microsoft Visual Studio SDK team

From the Editor

I spoke with Tom Crozier, Strategic Partner Marketing Manager – VSIP, and Phil Taylor, Program Manager, about the upcoming release of Visual Studio SDK V2. For those who don't know, the Visual Studio SDK is used to add features to the Visual Studio 2005 IDE. The SDK gives developers the same tools Microsoft uses to add language support, new project types, and additional functionality.

Visual Studio SDK V2 New Features

Some of the highlights of V2 are:

• Updates to the IronPython sample

  This example is an end-to-end integration sample, showing ISVs how to integrate a new language into the IDE. Learn how to add syntax coloring, intellisense, and more.

• Visual Studio Team System integration

  Create Team System work items, and extend the Team System tools from your own tools.

• Domain Specific Language (DSL) Tools

  Create custom language templates using a custom graphical designer, and integrate them into Visual Studio.

• Visual Studio Tools for Applications (VSTA)

  The tools formerly known as Visual Studio Tools for Office are now integrated into the SDK, and provide samples of integrating the VSTA IDE and tools into your own applications.

• Reference samples for C# and C++ Editors, Version control integration, XML designer, and many others!

As you can see, the list is quite extensive :)

Conclusion

Microsoft’s goal is to release a new version of the SDK every month. Some features you might see in V3 will be: more integration with Team System, extension of the Iron Python sample, improvements to help control vendors plug into the IDE, and component versioning.

To learn more about Visual Studio extensibility, please visit MSDN. Access to the SDK download requires registration, but is free.