Touting a 20-year commitment to Microsoft platforms, Oracle joined the Microsoft Visual Studio Industry Partner (VSIP) program in May, and has now announced Oracle Developer Tools for Visual Studio .NET, a free plug-in that enables developers to use Microsoft Visual Studio .NET to develop and deploy Oracle Database 10g applications on Microsoft Windows. This plug-in integrates Oracle Database 10g and Visual Studio .NET and reinforces Oracle's commitment to meet the needs of the Windows development community.

"Oracle's participation in the Microsoft Visual Studio Industry Partner (VSIP) program has enabled it to deliver a new set of tools to develop and deploy Oracle applications on the Windows platform," said Nick Abbott, group manager in the .NET Developer Product Marketing Group, Microsoft Corp. "It represents the culmination of the VSIP partnership we established with Oracle in May of 2004 and we're excited to continue integrating with them."

Oracle's support for the Windows development community extends beyond Oracle Developer Tools for Visual Studio .NET. Oracle Database 10g Release 2 incorporates new features that further Oracle's commitment to Windows application developers, Oracle says. Release 2 includes Oracle Database Extensions for the .NET Framework, offering improved Microsoft .NET Framework support via stored procedures implemented using Common Language Runtime (CLR).

The new feature enables developers to write .NET Framework-based stored procedures and deploy them into Oracle Database, helping to reduce the time it takes to build and deploy .NET Framework- based applications. Oracle Database 10g Release 2 for Windows is scheduled for availability in the next 90 days.