Microsoft has released the first beta version for the next major release of its Visual Studio developer tools and of the .Net framework, the company said Thursday. Visual Studio "Orcas" is designed to allow developers to write programs that can run on top of Windows Vista, Longhorn Server, Office 2007 and the Web. Version 3.5 of the .Net framework is designed to offer better support for Web 2.0 and AJAX applications.
The software maker has been aiming to release Orcas this year, but corporate VP Soma Somasegar told ZDNet blogger Mary Jo Foley recently that the release may or may not happen this calendar year.
Discuss: Microsoft tests new developer tools