Microsoft to debut Visual Studio 6.0 this week

Microsoft will publicly debut Visual Studio 6.0 this week (though certainMSDN subscribers have had it for almost a month already) when the suite ofsoftware and Web development tools takes the forefront at the DeveloperDays '98 (Dev Days) event. Dev Days, which will be held in 120 differentcities in over 50 countries worldwide, is a day-long exposition featuringa satellite broadcast keynote address by Microsoft CEO Bill Gates. Gateswill try to explain how the expensive ($1000-1700, depending on the Edition) suite of tools ties in with his vision of a "digital nervous system). He will also introduce a new version of Office 2000, called OfficeDeveloper Edition (ODE) that will debut next Spring after the rollout ofOffice 2K. ODE will be closely integrated with Visual Studio 6.0 and theVBA editor in the ODE will closely resemble Visual Basic 6.0.

Visual Studio 6.0 consists of several programming tools that will also beavailable separately, including Visual Basic 6.0, Visual C++ 6.0, VisualFoxPro 6.0, Visual InterDev 6.0, and Visual SourceSafe 6.0. Visual J++ 6.0will appear about a month later, as it is lagging behind the other VisualStudio 6.0 tools