(Scheduled) Why Visual Studio Is Thriving in the Age of AI with Mads Kristensen - E3
Scheduled
In this episode, I sat down with Mads Kristensen, a principal product manager from the Visual Studio team to unpack what a PM actually does inside a large engineering organization and how that role blends user research, roadmap planning, technical decision-making, and product experimentation. We talked about his 15+ years working on Visual Studio, why he still builds extensions himself to test ideas quickly with real users, and how Visual Studio continues to grow even in the middle of all the noise around AI-powered coding tools. He also shared why Visual Studio remains especially strong for professional C# and C++ developers, enterprise teams, and anyone who treats code as a long-term asset rather than just a throwaway artifact.
We also got into what’s next for Visual Studio: deeper AI integration, especially around debugging, testing, code review, and project scaffolding, while still preserving the strengths that make the IDE unique. Along the way, we covered some lesser-known but powerful features like Dev Tunnels, saved window layouts, and floating tool windows, plus the move to yearly Visual Studio naming with evergreen in-place updates. If you’re a longtime Visual Studio user, curious about where the product is headed, or wondering how AI fits into serious software development, this conversation is packed with practical insight and a lot to be excited about.
People / Social
• Mads Kristensen on X/Twitter (@mkristensen): https://twitter.com/mkristensen
• Mads Kristensen's blog (Fancy Zones + Visual Studio post referenced): https://www.madskristensen.net
• Mads Kristensen on GitHub: https://github.com/madskristensen
Microsoft / Visual Studio
• Visual Studio: https://visualstudio.microsoft.com
• Visual Studio Insiders / Preview channel (recommended in the episode): https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/vs/preview/
• Visual Studio Marketplace (extensions): https://marketplace.visualstudio.com
• Visual Studio Code: https://code.visualstudio.com
• GitHub Copilot: https://github.com/features/copilot
• GitHub Copilot CLI: https://docs.github.com/copilot/github-copilot-in-the-cli
• Microsoft PowerToys: https://learn.microsoft.com/windows/powertoys/
• PowerToys FancyZones: https://learn.microsoft.com/windows/powertoys/fancyzones
• Dev Tunnels (mentioned as "DevTunnel"): https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/developer/dev-tunnels/overview
• .HTTP file support in Visual Studio: https://learn.microsoft.com/aspnet/core/test/http-files
• Hot Reload (.NET): https://learn.microsoft.com/visualstudio/debugger/hot-reload
• ASP.NET (web apps referenced): https://dotnet.microsoft.com/apps/aspnet
• WPF: https://learn.microsoft.com/dotnet/desktop/wpf/
