Visual Studio 2022: Discover the Latest Features for Developers

We have already reached the middle of the year 2021 and Microsoft does not leave for tomorrow what it can announce today. From the hand of CVP Amanda Silver we get some news that the next version of Visual Studio will incorporate, which we already know officially as Visual Studio 2022.

Visual Studio 2022 new features

.NET 6

Probably the most relevant feature is the inclusion of .NET 6, which will be among us in November 2021. .NET 6 will allow the creation of multiplatform applications and will already incorporate specific frameworks for Android and Mac. Here are the news about .NET 6.

.NET MAUI

The most remarkable functionality of this new version of the framework will be .NET MAUI. Is a technology that allows you to create common interfaces for any environment, be it desktop, mobile or web, and on any operating system. .NET MAUI is the replacement for Xamarin Forms and will add the ability to create desktop applications using Blazor.

64-bit Visual Studio

One of the great novelties comes from the same application. And it is that Visual Studio 2022 will be for the first time a 64-bit application, which will no longer be limited to 4 GB of memory in the main devenv.exe process. The goal is to be able to open, edit, run, and debug even the largest and most complex solutions without running out of memory. Obviously, both 64-bit and 32-bit applications can be created.

Unrestricted access to all memory on the PC should result in much better performance across the board and fewer out-of-memory errors. Microsoft says it is working to make every part of the workflow faster and more efficient, from loading solutions to debugging F5.

Here you can see how Visual Studio 2022 loads a solution with 1,600 projects and more than 300,000 files.

New user interface

Other new features include a modernization of the user interface, with lighter icons for the light and dark versions of the interface.Overall, the goal is to reduce complexity, decrease cognitive load, and offer better usability for all users. The new version will include:

• Updated icons for clarity, readability, and contrast.
• Cascadia Code, a new fixed width font for better readability. (It can already be tested at GitHub)
• Updated and improved themes.
• Integration with Accessibility Insights to detect accessibility issues early on, before the software reaches end users.
• Customization of the experience with Visual Studio, with settings for the IDE and the ability to synchronize (or not) settings between devices.

Hot Reload

There is also the Hot Reload feature that allows making changes to the interface while the project is in debugging and applying them without having to restart debugging.