(January 17, 2002) - Microsoft's putative software platform for developing and running e-commerce Web sites, Commerce Server 2002, has been released this week in a public beta version so that developers can see for themselves whether MS delivers on its promise of tight integration with the existing Visual Studio.NET application development environment.

A number of class libraries and interoperability with the Common Language Runtime (CLR) will help developers use ASP.NET to create applications that run on Commerce Server, says Microsoft Corp in its accompanying statement to developers.

Continuing the Redmond giant's focus on the "developer in a hurry," Commerce Server 2002 features a number of pre-built site templates. It will also will support multiple languages and currencies for the first time. Existing components such as product catalogs and transaction analysis have been upgraded to support these internationalized features.

But the main feature is the .NET application framework aimed at speeding up development of Web services based on the .NET platform.

Curious about pricing points, we asked L.J. Germinario, technical product manager for the company's Commerce Server team, what MS would be charging for Commerce Server 2002 on a per server processor basis. " A standalone version is priced at $8,499 per processor," Germinario explained, " and a version bundled with SQL Server costs $12,999 per processor." There will apparently be both a standard and an enterprise edition.

.NET aficionados may also be interested to note that on February 11 Bill Gates is promising to demo in San Francisco the revamped bundle of Microsoft's most popular development tools, such as Visual Basic and Visual C++, now to be known as the Visual Studio.NET development platform. A Visual Studio.NET development tool package is already being made available this week to Microsoft Developer Network subscribers, and once Gates has publicly launched it in SF, the general public will be able to buy the whole bundle for just under $2,500.

If all the prices above seem too much for you, then you'll be relieved to hear that MS has also just posted the .NET Framework SDK to its Web site - a set of tools and documentation for releasing .NET programs built using its Visual Studio tools. The software development kit doesn't cost $12,999 or even $2,499...it's free!