In this tutorial we cover downloading and installing Microsoft Visual C# Express and Visual Web Developer, obtaining a registration key and a quick walkthrough of the development environment.
If you already have Visual C# or Visual Studio installed on your machine, you can skip this tutorial and go straight to creating your first console application.
The first thing you will need is a copy of Microsoft Visual Studio. We will be using Visual Studio 2005 Professional for most of the tutorials on this site. If you do not have access to Visual Studio, you can download Visual C# Express for Free from Microsoft. There is no difference in the programming language between Visual Studio and Express Editions, however the Express versions will not allow you to write all of the project types, and there are a lot of features removed from the Express version in order to streamline the environment for beginners.
Once you have loaded up the Microsoft website, you will need to click on the Download link which will then give you a step by step download guide. You will need to download the Visual Web Developer for developing ASP.Net web pages and Visual C# Express for developing Windows Forms Applications.
Installation
Once you have downloaded the set-up file (around 3MB) for the required product, you can launch the installer, which will download and install the full Express Studio (35MB). During the set-up process you will be asked if you would like to download optional components, either Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express Edition or MSDN 2005 Express, which contains a lot of documentation (also available on the Microsoft website). Both of these options can be installed at a later date if you just want the basic Visual Studio installed right now.
When the file is downloaded you should run it and the installer will download the rest of the files and install them into the directory of your choice. It does take a little while to download and install depending on the speed of your Internet connection and computer speed.
Visual C# Express
Once installed, you can launch Visual C# Express from the Start Menu, and when it is done loading you will be presented with the Start Page, where you can see the latest C# news from Microsoft, as well as your recent projects and some shortcuts to common tasks.
Visual C# Express will allow you to create the following project types:
- Windows Application
- Class Library
- Console Application
- Empty Project
- Screen Saver
- Movie Collection Sample App
For the introduction tutorials we will be using only the Console Application project type.
Visual Web Developer
If you would like to be able to develop websites using ASP.Net, you will also need to download and install Microsoft Visual Web Developer, which can be obtained from the same address as Visual C#. Download and install instructions are exactly the same for both products.
Visual Web Developer will allow you to create the following project types:
- ASP.Net Website
- ASP.Net Web Service
- Personal Website
- Empty Website
When creating a new project, don't forget to change the language to C#.
Registration
When you click on the bubble you will be presented with a dialog asking for a registration key. If you do not have a registration key you can click on "Register Now" where you will be directed to the Microsoft site. You will need a Microsoft Passport Live ID to sign in, and there is a short questionnaire to fill in, and then Microsoft will send you a 14 digit registration key which you can copy and paste into the registration dialog of Visual C#.
Summary and Conclusions
Now we have a copy of Visual C# Express installed we will have a look at creating our first console application - "Hello World" and introduce a few new concepts of C#.
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