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"Codename: Phoenix" Prerelease is Now Available

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Yesterday we released the PRERELEASE version of the research software development kit for Phoenix (aka the Phoenix RDK).  It's available for download at https://research.microsoft.com/phoenix/.  Prior to yesterday it was only available to selected academics.  The RDK does require Visual Studio 2005, as the RDKrequires the .NET 2.0 Fx, as well as makes use of the compilation technology in VS2005.

On the above Phoenix webpage there are also some great material to help learn about Phoenix.  I'll use this blog to discuss some technical issues around Phoenix.  Currently I'm debating if my next blog will be a walkthrough a code sample or a primer on symbols in Phoenix.  In either, have fun with the RDK until then.  And as always, I look forward to your feedback (either as a comment or via email).

Comments

  • Anonymous
    December 08, 2005
    Hey, this is really cool
    Where can I post questions/suggestions?
  • Anonymous
    December 08, 2005
    Hi Dmitriv, the forum appears to only be available for students and faculty. If you qualify for that, you can do the forum on teh Phoenix page. Otherwise, feel free to post the questions here, or send me an email directly.

    BTW, glad you find it cool. I find it quite cool myself :-)
  • Anonymous
    December 13, 2005
    Hi,
    The download link on the phoenix website appears to be broken. I tried a couple times but get a "Page Not Found" error. Is there any other link I can use?

    Thanks.
  • Anonymous
    December 19, 2005
    I find this project extremely useful and interesting. However:
    Why does it require Visual Studio 2005? Why does it require .NET v2.0? Isn't it a native compiler written in C or C++? I might only want to do native code compilation and no managed code, why should it require .NET? In academia not many people use .NET and Visual Studio, let alone the very latest versions.
    I don't have Visual Studio 2005 and I don't plan to buy it soon since I am happy with the tools I already have.
    Why are the forums restricted to faculty members? Who is eligible and who is not?
    Why create these restrictions (VS2005 and be a faculty) when you have an excellent project in your hands? Why take away our enthusiasm by these restrictions?
  • Anonymous
    January 04, 2006
    First my apologies. I didn't realize that I had feedback that I needed to post. Weird client for this blog.

    Pavan, the link was broken for a while, but it should be fixed now.

    Nektar, why does it require VS2005 and .NET? The reason is that Phoenix itself is built on top of .NET v2.0 and it exposes a managed interface. You can read/write native or managed code with Phoenix, but the programming model is managed. For this reason you need Visual Studio 2005 as this is the only toolset that targets .NET v2.0.

    You can get Visual Studio 2005 for free. It's called Visual C++ 2005 Express and Visual C# 2005 Express. Go here to get the edition that works for you (if you prefer C# or C++): http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/express/default.aspx