I often am required to work on multiple versions of a product, some of which may span different versions of .NET, require different versions of Visual Studio, 3rd party controls, etc. Other times, I need a different version of the O/S for development or testing. What’s the best way to manage all those differences and keep from stepping on one environment or another?
My preferred way of doing this juggle is to use Virtual PC. The beauty with using Virtual PC for this is that I can configured a completely self-contained environment that has everything I need to represent the project I’m working on. I can quickly replicate it for the next project, change what is unique and be up and running with an environment that is customized specifically for my needs without breaking the first one, which allows me to return to it when needed.
One caveat with using Virtual PC for this: you need a pretty well configured machine to run it on especially if you want to load up resource intensive tools like VSNET, Resharper, etc. I highly recommend a minimum of 8GB of RAM – more if you can get it. In some cases, I’ll have more than one virtual spun up at a time and having LOTS of RAM is essential.
Perhaps the other tip I can offer here is to take the time to organize your virtual images based on O/S and tool sets installed. It will help you to duplicate an environment quickly and customize it to your needs.
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