Deep underground in the Nevada desert, in the Developer Express high-security development labs bunker, the CodeRush and Refactor! Pro team have been toiling away on a new version of both Visual Studio productivity tools.
In fact, it turns out they've done such an amazing job that we in HQ are in a bit of a quandary. You see, there is so much new stuff, so much new functionality, so many productivity enhancements that we have no choice but to call the new releases version 2.0.
Over the next few days, we're going to be announcing some of the new features that have made it into both products, as well as uploading some cool new videos to show it all off. The release date is really close now: it'll be early next week. Just as a taster, how about these: Refactor! Pro 2.0 has more than twice as many refactorings as ReSharper 2.0; CodeRush 2.0 has a revolutionary next-generation template engine that delivers a significant boost in power, productivity and efficiency.
(By the way, those “revolutionary next-generation” words describing the new engine weren’t made up by some out-of-touch marketing executive; we can't afford one. Those came straight from the architect’s mouth. When you see the mind-blowing power first hand, you’ll agree. But perhaps even more importantly, CodeRush 2.0 ships with an interactive training window, one that makes accessing all this newfound power easy, even for first time customers. Heck, I just wish they'd let me write some code around here then I could use it all for real...)
Of course, if you are going to TechEd next week then by all means come round to our booth for the announcement and to see it all. It'll be easy to find us: our booth will be the one with developers three-deep in front of it all going "Ooooh" and drooling. Tissues will be available.
Together with these new version 2.0 releases, and in concert with our stated policy to move to subscription licenses for all our products, we are going to take this opportunity to change how customers license CodeRush and Refactor! Pro.
With version 2.0 of CodeRush and Refactor! Pro, new customers will be purchasing a subscription license. That means that you will be able to use the product whose license you purchased for evermore, but that you will only get updates for the 12 months from the date of purchase. After a year, customers will have to purchase a maintenance subscription for the next year, and then once a year after that.
For CodeRush 2.0 (which, of course, includes Refactor! Pro 2.0), the initial year costs $249. For Refactor! Pro 2.0, it's $99. The maintenance subscription for subsequent years is much less, $100 for CodeRush and $40 for Refactor! Pro. (Note though that we're still finalizing the details for the renewal subscriptions, so don't take these numbers as gospel. Stay tuned.) Of course, those customers with DXperience Enterprise will get all this as part of that subscription anyway.
Now, we realize that our current customers deserve some break here. So current licensees of CodeRush and Refactor! Pro will get a free upgrade to the version 2.0 releases, as well as a free 90-day subscription from the date of release, or a one-year subscription from the date of purchase, whichever ends later (Updated: 10:35pm 6-Jun-06). We believe that subsequent versions of these productivity tools after version 2.0 are going to be so good, you'll be buying the renewal subscriptions before the end of the 90 days just to keep up with what we've got planned. And, yes, we'll let you know later what that is.
So, all in all, these are exciting times for CodeRush and Refactor! Pro customers. Look out for more announcements and news over the next few days. Now, if you'd excuse me, I've got to download the latest build from our internal servers...