Microsoft Visual Studio 2017 Professional at a glance
Visual Studio 2017 is version 15 of Microsoft's development environment, released in March 2017 and refined through a long series of updates that ended with version 15.9. The family comes in three editions: the free Community edition, Professional and Enterprise. Professional sits in the middle and is aimed at developers and small teams who write software commercially and need professional tooling without the specialised testing and architecture features of the top edition.
The software brings code editing, debugging, testing, version control and deployment together in one place. It covers C#, Visual Basic, C++, F#, JavaScript, TypeScript and Python, and it targets Windows desktop applications, ASP.NET web projects, .NET Core services, Azure resources and cross-platform mobile apps built with Xamarin. The editor and debugger are the same core components used in the other editions, so solutions move freely between them.
How it is used in everyday work
A typical session starts in Team Explorer or the built-in Git tools: pulling the latest changes, switching to a feature branch and opening the solution. While writing code, developers rely on IntelliSense completion, the Go To search for files, types and members, and quick actions that suggest refactorings such as renaming a symbol or extracting a method. When a bug report arrives, the debugger lets them set breakpoints, inspect variables and step through calls, and Run to Click jumps straight to a chosen line without a temporary breakpoint.
This edition suits agencies maintaining customer projects, in-house teams responsible for line-of-business applications and freelancers working on .NET or C++ code. It is also a sensible choice for organisations that maintain solutions created in the 2017 generation and want the same toolset on new workstations instead of migrating every project at once. Because the installer only adds the components a project needs, a web developer and a C++ developer can set up very different footprints from the same product.
The functions that make a practical difference
CodeLens is the clearest functional reason to choose Professional over Community in this generation. It displays information directly above each method, such as the number of references, related unit tests and, with Git or Team Foundation Server, who changed the code last. That reduces context switching during code reviews and when estimating the impact of a change. Open Folder lets developers load a directory of code with no solution file at all, which helps with CMake-based C++ code, Node.js projects and script collections.
For C++ work, the 2017 release added built-in CMake support and tooling to build and debug applications on remote Linux machines. EditorConfig support and live code analysis apply a team's coding conventions consistently and flag deviations while typing. Docker container tooling and .NET Core project templates complete the set for developers who deploy services to Azure or other hosting environments.
Choosing the right edition
The Community edition shares the core editor, debugger and language support and costs nothing, but Microsoft restricts its use in larger organisations, and in the 2017 release it lacks CodeLens. Professional is intended for commercial development in companies and adds CodeLens, which makes it the usual choice for teams building software as part of their business. Enterprise extends Professional with advanced quality and architecture tools, among them IntelliTrace historical debugging, Live Unit Testing, IntelliTest for automatic test generation and dependency validation for enforcing architecture rules. Teams that depend on those diagnostics should consider Enterprise, while most other commercial developers are well served by Professional.
Practical limits worth knowing before you buy
The Enterprise-only tools named above are not part of this edition and cannot be added later through the installer. The 2017 generation also has a technical ceiling: it supports .NET Core up to version 2.x and C# up to version 7.3, while .NET Core 3.0 and later frameworks, including .NET 5 and newer, require Visual Studio 2019 or a more recent release. Before ordering, check which framework versions your projects target and whether a build pipeline expects a newer compiler. For established projects built in this generation these limits rarely matter, but new development on current .NET is better served by a newer release.
Common questions before ordering
Can I open solutions created with Visual Studio 2015?
Yes, most projects from Visual Studio 2015 open without conversion, so colleagues on both versions can work on the same solution. Older C++ projects may be offered a retarget to the newer compiler toolset, which you can decline if you need to keep the original one.
Is Git support included, or do I need an extension?
Git integration is built in and available through Team Explorer, covering commits, branches, merges and synchronisation with remote repositories. Team Foundation Server and Microsoft's hosted DevOps services are supported as well.
Can I add C++ or web development tools after the first installation?
Yes, the Visual Studio Installer lets you modify an existing installation and add or remove workloads at any time. This keeps the initial setup small and lets the environment grow with your projects.
Ordering Microsoft Visual Studio 2017 Professional at Keys.discount
Every order is processed automatically, so you normally have everything you need within a few minutes of paying.
Delivery: Your product key and the official download link arrive by email.
Activation guarantee: If activation fails, we replace the key.
Sourcing: Licences come from audited distribution channels and are documented.
Setup help: Written step-by-step instructions accompany every delivery.
Support: Our team answers by chat, email and phone in several languages.
