A Detailed Review of Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition

Visual C++ for Free!

Microsoft's Visual C++ has long been it's flagship development tool and now the 2005 Express Edition of Visual C++ is available for download free without any time restrictions.

If you're interested in trying this, this article will tell you how to Download and Install Microsoft Visual C++ Express Edition

But will the limitations leave a bad taste in your mouth afterwards? Well, just a slight aftertaste. True you don't get the Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) but stick to standard C++ with the STL and/or the free Boost libraries and you won't go far wrong.

Big Download!

Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition (VC2005EE) clocks in as a hefty 330MB download but that includes the MSDN help and documentation, and not having that is like programming without fingers. The first time you run VC2005EE you should browse to the help. This is excellent and clicking on the Contents button takes you to a comprehensive list of what you do and don't get with each version of VC2005.
Tip If you have an internet connection, click Tools in the help then Options and enable Online searching.

VC2005EE excludes the MFC, ATL and the C++ Support Library. As most developers will use this version to learn, those won't be a big loss and this is a powerful development system. Most of the other omissions won't be really missed but leaving out the Resource Editors was a bit mean.

I'd used Visual C#.Net 2003 before so the new IDE wasn't too unfamiliar. It is pretty slick looking compared to Visual C++ 6.0 which I use at work.

The biggest surprise was creating a Winforms application. Finally Visual C++ is a Visual tool just like Visual Basic or Borland's Delphi or C++ builder. Those were true RAD (Rapid Application Development) tools. However it's still a pretty complicated tool for the novice but considerably easier to get into than Visual C++ 6.0. If you've ever used Visual Basic you'll feel instantly at home.

Screen space usage is pretty good. There are minimized panels everywhere that expand at a click but I still recommend buying a 2nd screen to give yourself more screen space. It makes testing an application so much easier as well.

Microsoft provide walkthroughs, short tutorials that are an excellent way to get up to speed. These open as webpages in the IDE. Because tools like the Class Wizard are modal you can't flip back to the walkthrough page until the wizard is closed.

Tip Copy the text into Notepad or Ms Word before you start the walkthrough.

I've used both Eclipse and Netbeans with Java and at times the Visual C++ IDE (Integrated Deevlopment Environment) left me feeling just like I was in Eclipse, even to the point where I was expecting syntax checks of my code in the background!

Considering that it is free, this is a very high quality piece of software and Microsoft are to be commended for it. Especially as it can be used for commercial development.

FYI

Can I use Express Editions for commercial use? Yes, there are no licensing restrictions for applications built using the Express Editions.