A complete Arduino development system for Visual Studio 2008 and 2010.
Arduino for Visual Studio is a small free addin for Visual Studio that
provides fully featured Arduino Development.
Developers no longer need to use the Arduino Ide. We can code and upload to
any Arduino microprocessor using Visual Studio. (not available in the
express versions).
Visual Micro is based on the operational procedures of the Arduino IDE and
follows the rules applied by the Processing IDE for Arduino. This allows the
user to load a standard Arduino sketch into the Visual Studio environment
without having to make changes to the sketch or .PDE files
Visual Micro is the most comprehensive and easy to use build environment for
Arduino to date. The Visual Studio addin includes many of the features you
would expect to find in Visual Studio but that are not usually available in
the Arduino IDE.
Some examples:-
1 Compiler Error GoTo Source Location
2 Find In Files
3 Full Arduino Intellisense for the sketch, all cores and libraries
4 Options to “Include All Arduino Files” in the current sketch project. This
makes learning and exploring very easy and does not cause compiler problems.
5 Auto pause and re-start serial during upload (unless using ISP/programmer
which is fully supported)
6 Burn Bootloader
7 Multiple “Serial Viewer” Tool Windows
8 F6 Build, F5 Build & Upload
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@andrea please let us know what the problem was (in the visual micro forum) so that we can make the installation guide better. Thanks for letting us know it is working.
@steve there is a codeplex arduino to “visual studio converter project”. It integrates to the windows shell and allows you to right click sketches and create vs projects.
So, at least you can have intellisense and other vs features. It looks great for express users.
I’ve contacted the author, we will shortly combine the visual micro arduino api allowing us all to compile by right clicking a sketch in windows file manager. You will also be prompted to select a board and port/programmer prior to compile/upload. Hopefully this will be available by year end but no specific time has yet been planned.
@all thanks for your comments. if you have any suggestions, would like to know about updates or planned features such as simple debug then please do join the visual micro forum
Why Visual Studio and not Eclipse? Are that many Arduino users on Windows? I would expect the majority to be on OS X and Linux.
Also it is surprising as the Arduino community is about Open Source, sharing etc. So Visual Studio (even if it works with the free version) doesn’t feel like a natural choice.
@av33 I don’t know Xcode but I suspect Jan might know something that I don’t:)
It is possible to add any language and ui to visual studio using the VS extensibility interfaces as long as that language and supporting tools/sources are open for the world to see.
Some languages will be more difficult to migrate than others. Arduino was easy because we are able to use standard visual studio C++ projects for intellisense.
Please open a http://www.visualmicro.com/forum discussion if you would like to persue the discussion. Thanks
To Everyone:- Your comments are very much appreciated but time is a little limited to allow answering of questions using this blog. Please join the visual micro forum where I and others will enjoy answering questions and entering into discussions. Thank you
@visual micro – you just need match the sliders to each color band on the resistor, it’s fun, teaches resistors and we have zero, that’s right *zero* spam 🙂
@adafruit yep i know that and i think it is really neat. futher more i have always had a problem remembering them so in theory you are quite very absolutely without a doubt completely and totaly right.
BUT remember that we have to add our name and email address (even when logged in) and then slide the sliders so event though you are quite very absolutely without a doubt completely and totaly right it’s a real pain 🙂 🙂 🙂
good job…!
in this days i have writed with visual studio 2010 an asp.net webservice application very very close to pachube.
i love it!
Intellisense for sketches? Wowza!
Holy cow! That’s neat!
Cannot wait to get my grubby little hands on this to try out!
Now, is there a Visual Studio plug-in for the Netduino?
Oh wait…
What?
Nevermind.
I have been using this for a while now. Works like a charm!
Try this and you will never look back at the Arduino IDE.
doesn’t work on vs2010… ;(
Wow, that looks awesome! Bummer it doesn’t work with Visual Studio Express though.
i have fixed it, now it works on vs2010!
@andrea please let us know what the problem was (in the visual micro forum) so that we can make the installation guide better. Thanks for letting us know it is working.
@steve there is a codeplex arduino to “visual studio converter project”. It integrates to the windows shell and allows you to right click sketches and create vs projects.
So, at least you can have intellisense and other vs features. It looks great for express users.
I’ve contacted the author, we will shortly combine the visual micro arduino api allowing us all to compile by right clicking a sketch in windows file manager. You will also be prompted to select a board and port/programmer prior to compile/upload. Hopefully this will be available by year end but no specific time has yet been planned.
@all thanks for your comments. if you have any suggestions, would like to know about updates or planned features such as simple debug then please do join the visual micro forum
And an extension for Xcode?
@Visual Micro: No, thanks to you for bringing such a great tool to us!
Great tool, installed it today.
I am running VS2008, I like it a lot better than Arduino IDE.2
Why Visual Studio and not Eclipse? Are that many Arduino users on Windows? I would expect the majority to be on OS X and Linux.
Also it is surprising as the Arduino community is about Open Source, sharing etc. So Visual Studio (even if it works with the free version) doesn’t feel like a natural choice.
@av33 I don’t know Xcode but I suspect Jan might know something that I don’t:)
It is possible to add any language and ui to visual studio using the VS extensibility interfaces as long as that language and supporting tools/sources are open for the world to see.
Some languages will be more difficult to migrate than others. Arduino was easy because we are able to use standard visual studio C++ projects for intellisense.
Please open a http://www.visualmicro.com/forum discussion if you would like to persue the discussion. Thanks
To Everyone:- Your comments are very much appreciated but time is a little limited to allow answering of questions using this blog. Please join the visual micro forum where I and others will enjoy answering questions and entering into discussions. Thank you
Im not clear on whether this works with the free/express versions of VS?
@Doug No it can’t work with express, microsoft don’t allow it BUT …
@Everyone I think I have found what looks like a Microsoft offer that allows everyone to get a free version of Visual Studio 2010 Pro.
I’ve added some intructions here
http://www.visualmicro.com/post/2011/10/28/Microsoft-Visual-Studio-2010-Free-for-3-years.aspx
@Doug no ms don’t allow addins in the free version
@Everyone looks like ms have a free offer that will give you vs 2010 pro
http://www.visualmicro.com/post/2011/10/28/Microsoft-Visual-Studio-2010-Free-for-3-years.aspx
ps: I really dislike this adafruit blog tool. This is my 2nd attempt at leaving this msg. Luckily for adafruit they are worth the effort 🙂
@visual micro – you just need match the sliders to each color band on the resistor, it’s fun, teaches resistors and we have zero, that’s right *zero* spam 🙂
@adafruit yep i know that and i think it is really neat. futher more i have always had a problem remembering them so in theory you are quite very absolutely without a doubt completely and totaly right.
BUT remember that we have to add our name and email address (even when logged in) and then slide the sliders so event though you are quite very absolutely without a doubt completely and totaly right it’s a real pain 🙂 🙂 🙂
@adafruit Oh and that reminds me. I always make spelling mistakes that i can’t easily correct 🙂