Neno Loje blogged about an important update that is available and should be installed by everyone that uses Visual Studio 2010 and Team Foundation Server 2010.

It enables Lab Management, but also installs all hot fixes that have been made available since 2010 became available.

Neno’s FAQ says it all:

Frequently asked questions

• Should I install the update although I do not use Lab Management?
  Yes, it contains all TFS fixes that have been made since TFS 2010.
• Is this a Service Pack?
  No.
• If I reinstall or add TFS components later, do I have to reapply this patch?
  Yes.
• Should I stop TFS service prior to installing?
  No, this is not necessary and will be done automatically by the update.

More on: http://msmvps.com/blogs/vstsblog/archive/2010/08/23/update-for-tfs-2010-rtm-version-including-all-hot-fixes.aspx

Or jump directly to the download: KB 983578

Amazon sells various versions of Visual Studio 2010. Here is an overview of versions and this will give you a good indication of prices. Below the prices is a feature comparison also…

Visual Studio Professional

 Visual Studio Premium

 Visual Studio Utlimate

Visual Studio 2010 Feature Comparison

Debugging & Diagnostic
IntelliTrace (Historical Debugger)
Static Code Analysis
Code Metrics
Profiling
Testing
Unit Testing
Code Coverage
Test Impact Analysis
Coded UI Test
Web Performance Testing
Load Testing1
Microsoft Test Manager 2010
Test Case Management2
Manual Test Execution
Fast-Forward for Manual Testing
Lab Management Configuration3
Database Development
Database Deployment
Database Change Management2
Database Unit Testing
Database Test Data Generation
Development Platform Support
Windows Development
Web Development
Office and SharePoint Development
Cloud Development
Customizable Development Experience
Architecture and Modeling
Architecture Explorer
UML 2.0 Compliant Diagrams (Activity, Use Case, Sequence, Class, Component)
Layer Diagram and Dependency Validation
Read-only diagrams (UML, Layer, DGML Graphs)
Lab Management
Virtual environment setup & tear down3
Provision environment from template3
Checkpoint environment3
Team Foundation Server
Version Control2
Work Item Tracking2
Build Automation2
Team Portal2
Reporting & Business Intelligence2
Agile Planning Workbook2
Test Case Management2
Microsoft Visual Studio Team Explorer 2010
MSDN Subscription - Software for Production Use
Microsoft Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 2010
Microsoft Visual Studio Team Foundation Server 2010 CAL	1	1	1	1
Microsoft Expression Studio 3
Microsoft Office 2007 Ultimate, Communicator 2007, Project 2007 Standard, Visio 2007 Professional, SharePoint Designer 2007
MSDN Subscription - Software for Development and Test Use4
Windows Azure™	†	††	†††
Windows (client and server operating systems)
Microsoft SQL Server
Toolkits, Software Development Kits, Driver Development Kits
Microsoft SharePoint
Microsoft Dynamics
All other Servers
Windows Embedded operating systems
MSDN Subscription benefits
Team Explorer Everywhere (tools for cross-platform development)
Technical support incidents	4	4	2	2
Priority support in MSDN Forums
Microsoft e-learning collections	2	2	1	1
MSDN Magazine
MSDN Flash newsletter
MSDN Online Concierge

† Azure benefit includes 250 compute hrs/mo, 7.5 GB storage, 3 GB SQL Server database capacity, 1M .NET messages/month
†† Azure benefit includes 100 compute hrs/mo, 5 GB storage, 2 GB SQL Server database capacity, 500k .NET messages/month
††† Azure benefit includes 50 compute hrs/mo, 3 GB/mo storage, 1GB SQL Server database capacity, 300k  .NET messages/month
1. May require one or more Microsoft Visual Studio Load Test Virtual User Pack 2010
2. Requires Team Foundation Server and a Team Foundation Server CAL
3. Requires Microsoft Visual Studio Team Lab Management 2010
4. Per-user license allows unlimited installations and use for designing, developing, testing, and demonstrating applications.
UML is a registered trademark of Object Management Group, Inc.
Windows is either a registered trademark or trademark of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries.

Last week I mentioned and demonstrated a custom snippet in VS2010 during my BAND talk. Turns out there is an open source tool for helping you create snippets: snippetdesigner.codeplex.com, for more information and background info check Greg’s blog.

I’ve recently installed TFS 2010 and have been running some projects on a complete 2010 oriented environment. Today I found the need to also connect to TFS 2010 from Visual Studio 2008. (essentially due to a project that I cannot convert to 2010, yet). In order to connect to Team Foundation Server from VS2008 you need the Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Explorer, then in order to connect to TFS 2010 you also need the Visual Studio Team System 2008 Service Pack 1 Forward Compatibility Update for Team Foundation Server 2010.

So my initial setup was:

• Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit
• Visual Studio 2008 Team Suite SP1
• Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate

I installed Visual Studio 2008 Team Explorer and then on top of that the Forward Compatibility Update. I received no errors during the installations, but I was unable to connect to my TFS 2010 machine. I tried Martin Kulov’s suggestion of entering a full URL. This was not accepted as input. Neil Rees blogged about reinstalling Visual Studio 2008 SP1 after installing Team Explorer 2008. So I did. Then I reran the installer for the Forward Compatibility Update. Initially still no juice, but then when I entered a full URL (http://servername:8080/tfs/collectionname) it all came together and I was able to connect to a specific collection of team projects from within Visual Studio 2008.
Oh, and not unimportant during all this my VS2010 installation was unaffected.

VS2010 is not yet available on Amazon.com, but VS2008 with MSDN subscription is. If you purchase VS2008 with a MSDN subscription today then you will still qualify for a free upgrade to VS2010 when it goes RTM.

More info on the offer here: http://www.microsoft.com/visualstudio/en-us/howtobuy/ultimate-offer.mspx

Now that the Release Candidate is available and RTM is scheduled for April 12th it will be time to see how you can get licenses for these great tools.
Read the Licensing Whitepaper to find out what you need: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=2b1504e6-0bf1-46da-be0e-85cc792c6b9d

Both Visual Studio 2010 RC as well a Team Foundation Server 2010 RC are available to MSDN Subscribers as of today.
Go to: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/subscriptions/downloads/default.aspx

If you want to provide feedback on this release then you do so by using Microsoft Connect.
Go to: https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio

For any additional information about versions of Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4,
Go to: Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4 Release Candidate

Soma just announced that the beta period for VS2010 and .NET 4.0 has been extended and the release date is being pushed back a couple of weeks (no new date mentioned yet).

Also, in addition to the 2 beta’s that have been released there will be an additional public Release Candidate that everyone gets to play with

Read more: http://blogs.msdn.com/somasegar/archive/2009/12/17/visual-studio-2010-and-net-framework-4-beta-period-extended.aspx

Just discovered that TFS2010 will retail for $499 and this will include provisions to allow 5 users (without CALs) to access the server. This is regardless of installation choice: Basic, Advanced or Custom.

More on: http://beta.blogs.microsoft.co.il/blogs/shair/archive/2009/10/24/tfs-2010-server-licensing.aspx

A feature I’ve been waiting for in the ReportViewer control is “Export to Word”. After installing Visual Studio 2010 Beta 2 I immediately created a little test to see if the feature made it. Good news! It did. Here is a screenshot:

From Scott Guthrie’s blog:

VS 2010 Product Line SKU Simplifications

With VS 2010 we are simplifying the product lineup and pricing options of Visual Studio, as well as adding new benefits for MSDN subscribers.  With VS 2010 we will now ship a simpler set of SKU options:

• Visual Studio Express: Free Express SKUs for Web, VB, C#, and C++

• Visual Studio 2010 Professional with MSDN: Professional development tools as you are used to today with the addition of source control integration, bug tracking, build automation, and more. It also includes 50 hours/month of Azure cloud computing.

• Visual Studio 2010 Premium with MSDN: Premium has everything in Professional plus advanced development tools (including richer profiling and debugging, code coverage, code analysis and testing prioritization), advanced database support, UI testing, and more.  Rather than buying multiple “Team” SKUs like you would with VS 2008, you can now get this combination of features in one box with VS 2010. It also includes 100 hours/month of Azure cloud computing.

• Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate with MSDN: Ultimate has everything in Premium plus additional advanced features for developers, testers, and architects including features like Intellitrace (formerly Historical Debugging), the new architecture tools (UML, discovery), test lab management, etc.  It also includes 250 hours/month of Azure cloud computing.

More on: http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2009/10/19/vs-2010-and-net-4-0-beta-2.aspx

PCMag reports the following:

Microsoft said Monday that Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Beta 2 and Microsoft .NET Framework 4 Beta 2 are now available to MSDN subscribers.

Microsoft also added what the company is calling the "Ultimate Offer," making it available to all active MSDN Premium subscribers at the official product launch on March 22, 2010. Under the offer, all active MSDN Premium subscribers will be transitioned to a higher-level Visual Studio 2010 with MSDN subscription at the product's launch.

The beta will also be made available generally on Oct. 21, Microsoft said. Microsoft will provide more details at its Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in Los Angeles on November 17 to 19.

Go to: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2354440,00.asp

Brian Harry has a post on a little gem called Team Foundation Server 2010 Basic. Price and such is not yet know, but it is set to be a replacement for Visual SourceSafe.

TFS 2010 Beta 2 is available for download (if you’re an MSDN subscriber).

Read the more here: http://blogs.msdn.com/bharry/archive/2009/10/01/tfs-2010-for-sourcesafe-users.aspx

Go to: http://msdn.microsoft.com to start downloading (I’m at 15% right now ).

If you’re a little confused about the rebranding, then go here for a nice overview of the new names and how they replace previous versions.

The MSDN Visual Studio 2010 page can be found here.