Get started (SharePoint development in Visual Studio)
Applies to: 
Visual Studio 
Visual Studio for Mac
Note
This article applies to Visual Studio 2017. If you're looking for the latest Visual Studio documentation, see Visual Studio documentation. We recommend upgrading to the latest version of Visual Studio. Download it here
This section helps you start working with Visual Studio to develop SharePoint solutions that take advantage of SharePoint Foundation and Microsoft SharePoint Server.
For information about SharePoint add-ins, see Build SharePoint add-ins.
SharePoint offers a Web-based collaboration platform. Visual Studio provides many project templates for creating SharePoint sites and content, including list definitions, workflows, business data connectivity models, and site definitions. In addition, you can create extensions for the SharePoint projects and tools in Visual Studio.
In this section
| Topic | Description |
|---|---|
| Additional information for SharePoint errors | Describes where to find help during SharePoint development and troubleshooting. |
Related sections
| Topic | Description |
|---|---|
| Developing SharePoint Solutions | Describes SharePoint development in Visual Studio. |
| Set up a general development environment for SharePoint | Describes the required installations for creating a SharePoint Solution |
| Create site columns, content types, and lists for SharePoint | Describes how to create custom site columns, content types, and lists for SharePoint by using the Visual Studio tools for SharePoint development. |
| Create SharePoint workflow solutions | Describes workflow design and development. |
| Integrate business data into SharePoint | Describes how to connect to Business Data Connectivity (BDC) models to integrate business data. |
| Create web parts for SharePoint | Describes Web parts and Web Part Pages, the building blocks of pages on a SharePoint site. |
| Create application pages for SharePoint | Describes how to design application pages by using a designer. |
| Create reusable controls for web parts or application pages | Describes how to create custom, reusable controls for application pages and Web Parts in SharePoint. |
| Browse SharePoint connections using Server Explorer | Describes how to navigate through the components of a SharePoint site in a Visual Studio tool window. |
| Build and debug SharePoint solutions | Describes how to build and Debug SharePoint solutions. |
| Package and deploy SharePoint solutions | Describes how to Package and deploy SharePoint solutions. |
| Extend the SharePoint tools in Visual Studio | Describes how to extend the SharePoint tools to create the features that you need. |