Unified coding has boosted team productivity and has streamlined error detection
What is our primary use case?
My main use case for Microsoft Visual Studio is for writing code. Since I'm a data engineer, projects I work on using Microsoft Visual Studio are related to data engineering. We have GitHub or Bitbucket or GitLab repos that we clone into a local system, and we use Microsoft Visual Studio to write code. That code can be related to any of the programming languages, and if we want to also set up the pipelines or anything, it involves a variety of multiple languages such as Python, C++, and YAML files.
We use Microsoft Visual Studio to configure a virtual environment for our Python environment, install libraries there, have an organized structure, make the code editor more user-friendly, and it provides us with features like widgets, extensions, and a tool that works like Postman.
Great features Microsoft Visual Studio offers include integrations with every sort of environment. For example, if we want to open CSV files, it has the extension for it. Additionally, it includes Python linting for great indentation and creating a great structure of the code, along with extensions for SQL files or any other thing you might think about. Microsoft Visual Studio works as a great tool for developers to write code and work together as a team.
Out of those features, the UI of Microsoft Visual Studio stands out as the most helpful for my daily workflow since its UI is much more user-friendly and makes things easy to work with.
What is most valuable?
Microsoft Visual Studio is deployed in my organization in two ways. For Lambda code, AWS provides Microsoft Visual Studio console, and we also write our code on EC2 instances where we install Microsoft Visual Studio Code. Thus, we use it in both a private cloud and local environments, including multiple use cases in the AWS console for Lambda functions and under VPC for EC2 instances, as well as in a free public environment on our local computer systems.
We use AWS as our cloud provider.
Microsoft Visual Studio has positively impacted my organization as it is the single IDE used across our organization. We currently use it to write our code, and since it's a single platform, it enables coherence and resolves environment-based issues that we face. It eliminates that issue since all of us are working on the same IDE. The configs remain the same, and things are pretty straightforward. It also provides us with a preview and a debugger, which helps in debugging our application much quicker.
Using Microsoft Visual Studio has led to measurable improvements, as it helps us identify errors easily and preemptively due to the extensions and other integrations. We don't need to search specifically for errors because it automatically detects them, improving our productivity and reducing our development time. With the integration of Copilots and AI chatbots, it has also helped in improving our overall productivity and workflow.
What needs improvement?
I think Microsoft Visual Studio is good at the moment.
When I think of additional improvements, I would like to have the ability to use Claude in my Microsoft Visual Studio account since I believe that would be a challenge at the moment. I'm not sure if it can be done, but if it was a native feature provided by Microsoft Visual Studio Code or if it was easier to do, I think that would create a much easier path to develop things faster.
I chose a rating of 9 instead of a 10 because there might be some improvements that can be made with the coming age of AI. Microsoft Visual Studio is already good. If the Claude integration is improved or if any other enhancements are made, apart from that, it's almost perfect.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Microsoft Visual Studio for almost five years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Microsoft Visual Studio is stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Microsoft Visual Studio's scalability is not an issue. It is installed locally, so it doesn't present any problems.
How are customer service and support?
We didn't require any customer support for Microsoft Visual Studio.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Some organizations previously used JetBrains and PyCharm, which I found typical and boring. Microsoft Visual Studio gives me much more freedom, and it is fun to use.
How was the initial setup?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is that since we install it directly from downloads, the cost is minimal. If we have a Microsoft Visual Studio enterprise license, I'm not sure about the cost of that.
What about the implementation team?
I'm not sure if I purchased Microsoft Visual Studio through the AWS Marketplace. I think I installed it directly. For the local environment and for EC2 or AWS console, I think it provides it natively.
What was our ROI?
I have seen a return on investment since using Microsoft Visual Studio helps in debugging easily and identifying syntax errors preemptively. In that way, we save time, which is a form of return on investment.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is that since we install it directly from downloads, the cost is minimal. If we have a Microsoft Visual Studio enterprise license, I'm not sure about the cost of that.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
Before choosing Microsoft Visual Studio, I evaluated a variety of options including PyCharm and Sublime Text. I found Sublime much more simple and plain, so it didn't provide many features. PyCharm had some great utilities, but it is very in-depth and I'm not used to it. Microsoft Visual Studio is much faster, easy to navigate, and helps in solving things quickly.
What other advice do I have?
My advice to others looking into using Microsoft Visual Studio is that it's a good product, and they should go for it since it's the industry standard.
Microsoft Visual Studio gives me much more freedom, and it is fun to use.
Microsoft Visual Studio is stable.
I have covered all of the points about Microsoft Visual Studio, and I would rate this product a 9 out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Hybrid Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Application development becomes streamlined with intuitive features and comprehensive debugging tools while integration needs refinement
What is our primary use case?
Recently, I have been working with the Power Platform, which is a Microsoft product. Currently, I am exploring and doing one project as well. Power Platform is looking promising, and it provides various features. It is very easy to learn Power Platform. Power Platform may only be applicable to small size to mid-size applications, so I think it will not be applicable to enterprise level applications.
What is most valuable?
Power Platform provides workflows and database functionality. The database application is very good. When creating an entity, based on that entity, you can create views and pages automatically based on the table. That is one good feature in Power Platform. It also supports customization features, though it takes some time to understand as there are many steps for customization. If any system exposes functionality using REST API, we can get the URL and environment details such as headers. In
Microsoft Visual Studio, if a system exposes services, we can consume those services by getting their proper URL/URI and header information. If they have any authentication mechanism using tokens, we can utilize those in
Microsoft Visual Studio to invoke and call the REST APIs provided by external systems.
What needs improvement?
Microsoft Visual Studio provides almost all features. When adding classes, if references to class files or namespaces are missing, improvements could be made. Sometimes when missing namespaces and calling functionalities in other classes, Microsoft Visual Studio shows errors. While clicking on the cursor shows which particular namespace is missing, when adding new namespaces, it still shows some errors. Microsoft Visual Studio should avoid these errors.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Microsoft Visual Studio for almost five years.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
Issues with Microsoft Visual Studio are very rare. Sometimes crashes happen and occasionally there might be hanging issues. We close Microsoft Visual Studio and once opened again, the issue resolves automatically.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Regarding stability issues, the system makes sure it should be up and running throughout the day. In case of any downtime issues, the system will notify us about the timing so we can take appropriate actions beforehand. These informations are automatically provided by the system, so we don't need to manage this ourselves. The system helps keep the server up and running.
How are customer service and support?
In the frontend, we need to download Microsoft Visual Studio, which is available in different versions including community editions and professional editions. You can download any edition of the latest version. Once downloaded, you need to provide login credentials and set up the code. They will provide the link from wherever your code is located, and you have to clone it.
How was the initial setup?
Microsoft Visual Studio provides entity framework which supports both code-based and database-first approaches. Based on these options, we can proceed with implementation. If you choose the database-first approach, all the tables from your SQL database and related components will be created as classes in your C# implementation.
What was our ROI?
The ROI involves a one-time payment. Once you have the license, the return depends upon how many projects you are acquiring and how many clients you have. If you develop three to four projects, you can achieve ROI within four or five months. With more projects, ROI can be covered within six months or one year based on your investment. After that, you will get more benefits. It is purely based on the projects in the pipeline.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Regarding maintenance, if you have the Microsoft Visual Studio license, Microsoft will support your product. If you encounter any downtime, Microsoft will notify you in advance so you can take respective actions. They provide temporary solutions to ensure applications do not go down. A backup system ensures end users are not affected. The maintenance is provided by Microsoft.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
For .NET development, I haven't used any other tools besides Microsoft Visual Studio, but we have used third-party controls to display information, such as
Telerik controls. We obtained the license and integrated
Telerik controls into Microsoft Visual Studio to create data tables and combo boxes. The main competitors to .NET are
OutSystems, low-code technologies, and Java.
What other advice do I have?
Debugging tools are very important. In Microsoft Visual Studio, we can use debugging by placing debug points where we need to execute particular functions or code. When you run the application, Microsoft Visual Studio automatically triggers the debugging point. From there, you can check the particular code in the below window where you can see all values, variables, and written statements. You can track everything. Microsoft Visual Studio provides detailed debugging options to see how the application flows with calling functions and working functions. You can identify exactly where data is not loading and what errors are occurring. This information helps resolve issues quickly. Microsoft Visual Studio provides comprehensive development capabilities. You can create any type of application, including mobile applications, console applications, Windows applications, WPF,
ASP.NET MVC, and .NET Core. It provides many benefits and can create reusable components. During coding, it provides intelligence features that automatically identify issues. It is very user-friendly and helps avoid coding errors.
Enables seamless cloud-native migration and robust debugging features
What is our primary use case?
I use
Microsoft Visual Studio to deploy and migrate different solutions from monolithic to 100% cloud-native solutions in
Azure. When I have a client-server solution that is very monolithic, I can perfectly migrate it to
Azure to create backends in different
Kubernetes environments and utilize modern frontend technologies like React for a more efficient solution in cloud platforms.
What is most valuable?
Microsoft Visual Studio is a very robust application. I can read and analyze logs in C#. It's friendly with JavaScript, TypeScript, and Java, making many deployments guided for different solutions possible. The .NET library, although very old, is a very robust application for deployment in cloud settings, being friendly for working with functions and logic apps, which are best used for deploying .NET services. Visual Studio offers a great debugging tool where I can debug quickly and resolve issues efficiently with specific solutions designed for strong debugging.
What needs improvement?
The patching aspect can continue to be improved. Although Visual Studio has very expressive refactor solutions and efficient, reliable patching for code, there is always room for enhancement in these areas.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Microsoft Visual Studio for more than twenty years.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
The deployment depends on the project as I use methodologies like Agile or Kanban, allowing the creation of very structured steps in projects. A big deployment can start for three to six months. Locally, when working with Azure, I deploy with Visual Studio on my local machine, integrating with the cloud when I publish.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Microsoft Visual Studio is a very robust and stable application, especially when I have integration with
Azure DevOps.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Microsoft Visual Studio is scalable in integrating with various cloud platforms and solutions for effective deployment.
How are customer service and support?
Microsoft's support is very strong, with good resources available when creating support tickets. They respond quickly and have professional resources for resolving different software or deployment issues. A very big library is available at dev.microsoft.com with many solutions for investigation.
How would you rate customer service and support?
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup of Microsoft Visual Studio is not complex. I have been using it for maybe 10 to 15 years and it is the most robust application software for deployment.
What was our ROI?
The ROI depends on the contract I have with Microsoft. For example, in an Enterprise Agreement (ELA), Microsoft might provide free licenses for deployment. The ROI varies based on the company's agreements, and different subscription licenses are available like basic, standard, and business premium.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing for Microsoft Visual Studio is favorable. While many open-source solutions are available, none offer the robustness of Visual Studio, which includes a Marketplace for creating different add-ons and integration solutions for quality assurance.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
I have knowledge of
NetBeans, an open-source solution, but it does not have the robustness of Microsoft Visual Studio which offers a Marketplace to create different add-ons.
What other advice do I have?
I recommend Microsoft Visual Studio for different clouds as it can integrate with
AWS, GCP, Huawei, and
Red Hat OpenShift due to its add-ons. I rate Microsoft Visual Studio a nine out of ten. Despite rating it a nine, all features align well with my personal experience, reflecting no dissatisfaction on my part.
Integration with AI and a powerful debugger supports efficient application development for university needs
What is our primary use case?
I develop applications and work at Roma Tre University. We develop applications ranging from student career management to employee and HR office functions.
What is most valuable?
One valuable feature of
Microsoft Visual Studio is its powerful debugger, which is the only feature I primarily use. Another significant advantage is the integration with Copilot and AI support. Additionally, the ease of integration with solutions is worth mentioning.
What needs improvement?
Some improvements could include a more visual interface for automating common tasks in application development. Introducing this feature would enhance productivity.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been working with
Microsoft Visual Studio for almost ten years.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
It is very easy to install Microsoft Visual Studio.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Microsoft Visual Studio is stable overall.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
As of now, I have not encountered any limitations in the use of Microsoft Visual Studio. It is scalable for our purposes.
How are customer service and support?
The technical support from Microsoft is very good.
How would you rate customer service and support?
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
In my past, I used Mirth Connect while working in a hospital for HL7 integrations using JCAPS and Mirth and Rhapsody Data, which are old products.
How was the initial setup?
It's very easy to install.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
I do not know the pricing or costs as we have a global agreement with Microsoft for all universities in Italy.
What other advice do I have?
I am searching for an enterprise service bus product, so if Microsoft Visual Studio could have a plugin or an extension in this direction, it would be great. I rate my overall experience with Microsoft Visual Studio as nine out of ten.