VS 2015 Targets C++ Standards, Perf, Cross-Plat Dev

Visual Studio (VS) 2015 delivers Microsoft’s latest revision of the C++ programming language, Visual C++ 2015, and VS 2015 Updates 1, 2, and 3 have added further improvements to the implementation. VS 2015 and Visual C++ 2015 increase conformance to recent ISO C++ specifications, speed build times, improve productivity and diagnostic tools, and enable cross-platform mobile development. The enhancements could ease code porting, simplify debugging and maintenance, cut development process times, and eliminate the need for developers to use multiple tools. However, teams will require time and resources for upgrading and training, and some code may require rewriting due to changes.

C++ Remains Relevant

The C++ language has been a top developer choice for nearly three decades for applications requiring high performance and flexible control over computing resources such as memory and low-level hardware functionality. C++ (and C, which is mostly a subset of C++) is often the best option for solutions such as OSs, back-end services, games, device drivers, scientific applications, embedded systems, and shared runtime libraries like DLLs. Traditional Windows desktop applications (such as Microsoft Office) are frequently written in C++. Microsoft supports C++ as a native (unmanaged) language and as a managed language running on the .NET Framework Common Language Runtime (CLR) using C++/CLI. (CLI is an abbreviation for Common Language Infrastructure.)