Whidbey Beta 1 Ships

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Well, we've finally released beta 1 of .NET 2.0 and Visual Studio 2005.  In adition to the beta 1 release, we've also announced Express SKUs for Visual C++, Visual Basic, Visual C#, Visual J#, and SQL Server (as well as a web developer express SKU).  The Express SKUs target students and people just learning to program, and the betas will be free to download.

MSDN subscribers can download beta 1 of VS 2005 here, and anyone can download the express SKUs for free here.  Go ahead and download a copy to start playing with.  I'll have some posts later this week on what's new for various security features and ClickOnce.

Somasegar (the developer division VP), has some more information available about the Express SKUs on his blog today.  You can also find the VS 2005 Beta 1 Readme and MSDN Documentation for VS and .NET 2.0.

One other exciting feature that's available on the VS 2005 site, is the Product Feedback Center, where you can report bugs and suggestions, and track their status.