Visual Studio 2017 reached general availability in March 2017. With its full release, Microsoft moved to a schedule for updates that brings fixes and features more regularly. Mirroring Windows, VS 2017 works as a service, with consistent feature releases and monthly patches.
As Visual Studio is now a fast moving platform, customers have requested more access to upcoming releases. Taking that feedback on board, Microsoft has now published a Visual Studio Roadmap.
The page offers a glimpse of what Microsoft has planned for VS 2017, showing details for the next two quarters (Q2 and Q3). Users can see some key features and the company also supplies a timeline for when the additions will be adding. Regarding the latter, Microsoft says the timeframes are general and may change as features are developed.
Additionally, the company also points out the list is not comprehensive. Instead, it is an overview to provide visibility, some features may be added or removed as time goes on.
Microsoft has made it easy to use the roadmap. It is split into quarterly segments. For example, in the second quarter (Q2, April-June), the items planned for that frame are listed. Yes, we are currently in Q2, so many of the listed items are on the horizon.
Among some of the features to look forward to in this quarter are:
- Create, build and deploy applications using Kubernetes and Helm charts to Azure Container Service (AKS).
- Edit visual states and animation in Blend for Visual Studio in Universal Windows Platform projects targeting Windows Fall Creators Update and above.
- Publish .NET Core applications to Azure App Service Linux from Visual Studio.
Expansion
Those three above really only scratch the surface, so we advise checking out the roadmap to see if there is anything you are particularly excited about.
Microsoft says the roadmap will be updated when features move from planned to available. As usual, the company is asking for feedback and will provide some feature suggestions in the roadmap.
