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Microsoft .NET Core update asks developers: How you doin'?

RC2 release includes new tools, extended API and... telemetry by default

Microsoft has released RC2 (Release Candidate 2) of .NET Core and ASP.NET Core, the next-generation version of the .NET platform which is open source and cross-platform.

This is a bigger update than the RC2 name implies. Since the release of RC1 in November, Microsoft has introduced new command-line tools for .NET Core, called .NET CLI (Command Line Interface), and removed the DNX (.NET Execution Environment) tools, as reported here.

Open source .NET draws closer with the RC2 release

Open source .NET draws closer with the RC2 release

Despite the new tooling, Microsoft says that the framework itself is "almost ready for RTM". The tooling will remain in preview even after the first version of the framework ships.

This release includes both .NET Core, which is the cross-platform fork of the .NET framework and compilers, and ASP.NET Core (previously known as ASP.NET 5) which is the web framework. New in ASP.NET Core is full debugging support in Visual Studio, and support for authentication and authorization using Active Directory, in both on-premises and Azure varieties.

.NET Core now supports more operating systems, including Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7.2, Centos 7.1, Debian 8.2+, Ubuntu 14.04, Linux Mint 17+, as well as Windows and Mac.

Microsoft is also introducing new deployment options. You can now deploy applications that have a dependency on a shared installation of the .NET Core runtime, making it similar to the way the existing .NET Framework works on Windows. This deployment option is called "Portable apps", the rationale for the name being that "your application is portable between installations of .NET Core."

There remains an option for "self-contained apps", which include the runtime as well as the application code. This kind of app has to be compiled specifically for the target platform.

The API in .NET Core RC2 has some important additions, including System.Drawing for graphics support (sometimes useful even in Web applications), and a fuller implementation of the System.Data namespace for database applications.

This is also the first release to support the .NET Standard Library, a set of base APIs which will be available on all implementations of .NET. This "can be thought of as the next version of Portable Class Libraries", says Program Manager Rich Lander.

Finally, Microsoft has added another feature, on-by-default telemetry "so that we can collect usage information about the .NET Core Tools," says Lander. The data collected covers the commands used, the framework used, and the versions. It does not include personal data, nor scan your code. Despite these constraints, some developers have reservations. "I don't like the automatic "opt in" policy for this data sharing. I think you should ask the user with a checkbox in the MSI installer," remarks one developer. If you want to opt-out, you can do so by setting the environment variable DOTNET_CLI_TELEMETRY_OPTOUT.

This RC2 release is a significant step forward for Microsoft's cross-platform .NET, which is a key part of the company's plans for it Windows Server 2016 rollout. Server 2016 includes Nano Server, which supports .NET Core but not the .NET Framework. Smaller, faster .NET applications also fit well with the push towards microservices and containers.

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