confused about .NET 2.0

[Tim Wallace]

OK, I'm a bit confused about what .NET 2.0 includes. I was adding a
reference to my project, and lo and behold, I saw Microsoft.Vsa in the list
of .NET components available. I added it. Then, I checked it out in the
Object Browser. The version is the same as for System. What gives? Has
Microsoft.Vsa been dropped or what. I hope not, but I've heard otherwise.

Tim

 

[Willy Denoyette [MVP]]

OK, I'm a bit confused about what .NET 2.0 includes. I was adding a
reference to my project, and lo and behold, I saw Microsoft.Vsa in the
list of .NET components available. I added it. Then, I checked it out in
the Object Browser. The version is the same as for System. What gives?
Has Microsoft.Vsa been dropped or what. I hope not, but I've heard
otherwise.

Tim

All classes in this namespace are deprecated, .NET VSA will be superseded by
VSTO, check following for details:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/office/understanding/vsto/

Willy.

 

[Tim Wallace]

It appears as though VSTO is Office-specific. My application has nothing to
do with any of the Office producst.

Tim

 

[Willy Denoyette [MVP]]

My bad, I was talking about VBA.
Anyway here is what MS PM has to say about the subject.
Thank you very much for your interest in VSA. Application customization
technology is an important part of Microsoft's developer offering, which
currently includes both VSA and VBA. Although application customization will
continue to be an important part of our strategy, we are beginning the
process of redesigning the VSA technology in response to customer feedback.
We expect to have more details soon on a comprehensive application
customization solution that will target the Longhorn wave of products.

There are alternatives to VSA that are available for you to investigate
today. If you just need runtime customizations and don't require an IDE, you
should use the ICodeCompiler interfaces in the .NET Framework. If you do
need an IDE, you should consider integrating into Visual Studio via the
Visual Studio Industry Partner Program (VSIP), which includes free access to
the VSIP SDK. Integrating into Visual Studio via VSIP provides you with a
few more options than VSA, such as support for Windows Forms and Visual C#.
For more information, please visit
http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/extend/vsipoverview/

We appreciate your patience and understanding.

Mike Hernandez
Community Program Manager
VSTO Team, Microsoft