Microsoft previewed the release candidate for Visual Basic 5.0 today for the press in Redmond. Apparently, VB5 is on schedule for a March 19th rollout at the Developer Days conference. Visual Basic 5.0 includes a new integrated development environment, a native code compiler, support for creating ActiveX controls, and a smart syntax insertion editor. Officials at Microsoft will also be previewing other development tools this week, including Visual C++ 5.0, Visual J++ 1.1, Visual FoxPro 5.0, and Office 97 Developer Edition. All of these tools will be available on March 19th, except for Office 97 DE, which should be in stores next week. You can preview Visual Basic 5.0 yourself by downloading Beta 1 of the Control Creation Edition from the Microsoft Web Site. If you're interested in Developer Days, check out Microsoft's new Web site at http://204.203.124.10/devdays/
