The prices for the upcoming SKUs of VS 2005 and MSDN have been revealed now. Yikes! Those seem just waaaayyy to high.

The good part of it is: thank goodness I haven't looked too deeply into what is offered in the team editions of VS 2005 (and especially the architects one), as it would be a complete waste of time. At those prices, I'm never gonna see one of those installed on my work machine, which is a pity, because it seems to have wonderful and much needed tools.

Well, guess at this rate, I'd better start looking for replacement tools, since we're probably need them :(

Note: Yes, I realize fully that for many large corporations, those kind of prices might be workable. But, if you live in a third world country, like me, and work in a company with highly distributed teams (meaning each project team usually moves out of the main office into the client premises bringing everything they need with them), that kind of licensing sounds like a no-go right from the start. Those prices make absolutely no sense for a market like us, and pretty much would leave ISVs / Systems Integrators out in the cold. It's a pity....


Tomas Restrepo

Software developer located in Colombia.