It's not about "Ponying up" money. Somehow I doubt Microsoft's intent in removing desktop support from VS Express is simply to milk out licensing fees from people like me. I imagine it's a part of their long term strategy to eventually remove "classic" applications all together from their consumer operating system.

I think the argument is that it is about getting people like you to develop Metro Apps rather than regular Windows applications. The money-thing is a reverse incentive.

Has anyone else done a VS -> Xcode switch and what are your thoughts?

I wanted to jab my eyes out with a fork. XCode is annoyingly bad.

Pay special attention to the idiocy which is binding events in XCode. What is a simple double click on the button in Visual Studio is an exercise in dragging and dropping events to code in XCode.

I imagine it's a part of their long term strategy to eventually remove "classic" applications all together from their consumer operating system.

Yes... you and many out there have jumped on wild speculation based on a change of a product... and to think I was under the impression programing was a rational thing... *ponders all the various flame wars which make the average religious debate look tame*... well, maybe I just hoped that was the case.

So maybe they will.. maybe they wont... the thing is Windows, like iOS, like Android, like The Next Big thing will live and die on the apps people want. If it turns out that MS can sell a product which they can lock down to the majority of people then you better bet they will... Apple have already proven you can do this and no body cares.

If the world and his wife, developers included, thought that open and none locked down software was important then iOS would have spirialed into nothing-ness as soon as the more open Android hit the market and, as much as I dislike Apple I have to admit that hasn't happened.

So, if MS can sustain a platform and keep apps coming out to sell to Average User who only cares about such things then that's what they'll do - hell, that's what they have always done, tried to appeal to the market which got them the money.

Apple blazed this path, the consumers followed and now MS are doing the same to do what companies do; make money.

Chances are for "real companies" who want to make Win32/'classic' apps this won't be a thing; game developers have to pony up for consoles anyway which lands them a VS license along with it and I dare say MS will drop plenty of incentive onto others to keep them using the Pro tools, including the recent restructure and probably pricing changes to the tool costs.

On the flipside Apple have seen people flock to making iOS games and not care how locked down/controlled the final system is, hell people moan about MS charging $99 to get your Metro app on the Windows Store when this is the same line Apple have taken and everyone is OK with it... or at least everyone who cares namely people making things.

So, based on the market;
- 'App' developers get a free tool to make apps for MS (just like iOS developers do)
- 'Classic' developers get to carry on using the existing tools or buy the Pro version.

The 'hobbiest sitting in their bedroom trying to write the next *insert popular game here*' is of no intrest to them because they can't make money from it.

Welcome to the real world kid....

On the flipside Apple have seen people flock to making iOS games and not care how locked down/controlled the final system is, hell people moan about MS charging $99 to get your Metro app on the Windows Store when this is the same line Apple have taken and everyone is OK with it... or at least everyone who cares namely people making things.

And the truth is, it's really not hard to get around that $99 fee. Microsoft has some great developer evangelists who if you contact them and show them you are working on a WP7 or Metro app will be happy to give you a code to get your first year for free. Hell, I got a free $500 phone, and a token for the marketplace just for showing them I was working on a WP7 game.

Meet Your Local Microsoft Evangelist

Welcome to the real world kid....

I don't particularly agree with your condescending remarks. It's one thing to disagree with somebody. This is the lounge and everybody is entitled to their own opinions without fear of being down-rated into oblivion for them. That's still no excuse to act like a massive ass. You talk of flaming an yet you are practically trying to incite it.

I would expect better from somebody who carries a moderator title.

[quote name='shurcool' timestamp='1337729625' post='4942376']
Has anyone else done a VS -> Xcode switch and what are your thoughts?

I wanted to jab my eyes out with a fork. XCode is annoyingly bad.

Pay special attention to the idiocy which is binding events in XCode. What is a simple double click on the button in Visual Studio is an exercise in dragging and dropping events to code in XCode.
[/quote]

Maybe I should've specified it for C++/C++11 only, which is what I'm more interested in. I have done a little visual programming in .NET/C# and Cocoa/Objective-C also, and I agree C# seemed easier (although I had a year of experience with C#, and I was doing Cocoa/Objective-C programming for the first time).

Here's a sample screenshot of how my Xcode/C++11 workspace looks like.

Wow... the amount of FUDmongering here is amazing...

One thing that hasn't been brought up yet is that developer demand might not even be there in a couple years. If you think about the majority of apps you use on your computer or even most of the ones you've made, a lot of them could probably be totally metro compliant with a little work, and you'd probably make more money on the MS marketplace than you'd ever have made releasing it as a standard piece of PC software; the one exception probably being if you released on Steam and I only say that because Steam is a known quantity. The MS marketplace could net you more than Steam in 2 years time.

The one thing I'm much more upset about from a Metro standpoint is that there's no more XNA support for metro apps. It seems like it would have been a natural place for XNA to fit in. I'm much more upset about that than anything else.

http://www.microsoft...roducts/express

Visual Studio 11 Express for Windows 8 provides tools for Metro style app development. To create desktop apps, you need to use Visual Studio 11 Professional, or higher.

Well that's just brilliant. Thanks a lot Microsoft.[/quote]Wait... I use VS Express 2008, and it's also missing the tools to make windows desktop apps. Sounds like they've added Metro-app tools, not removed Windows tools??

[quote name='Chris_F' timestamp='1337650160' post='4942054']
http://www.microsoft...roducts/express

Visual Studio 11 Express for Windows 8 provides tools for Metro style app development. To create desktop apps, you need to use Visual Studio 11 Professional, or higher.

Well that's just brilliant. Thanks a lot Microsoft.[/quote]Wait... I use VS Express 2008, and it's also missing the tools to make windows desktop apps. Sounds like they've added Metro-app tools, not removed Windows tools??
[/quote]

Wait, what? C++ Express or C# Express? Or Web-Dev Express?

I use C# Express 2010 and it's got WinForms, WPF (desktop and browser), Console, DLL, and XNA (win32 and 360)...

I thought 2008 was the same, but I never actually used that one. (I have a 2008 Standard edition I got back when VS Launch Event attendance was still free.)