To understand the language support in VSTA 2015, one must first understand its lineage. VSTA is the spiritual successor to Visual Basic for Applications (VBA). While VBA relied on a proprietary, older version of Visual Basic, VSTA was designed to leverage the full power of the .NET Framework. It allows Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) to embed a customized IDE into their applications, giving end-users a familiar, Visual Studio-like environment to write add-ons.
VSTA 2015 handles this through a complex mechanism of type library conversion and proxy generation. When a host application initializes the VSTA IDE, it passes its object model to the VSTA environment. VSTA then generates a proxy assembly. This assembly allows the .NET languages (C#/VB.NET) to communicate with the host application, which might be running on different memory boundaries or threads. To understand the language support in VSTA 2015,
is an SDK and runtime environment that allows independent software vendors (ISVs) to integrate customization and automation capabilities directly into their own applications. By providing a version of the Visual Studio IDE for end users, it enables them to write managed code—specifically using C# and Visual Basic .NET —to extend a program's functionality. Supported Programming Languages in VSTA 2015 It allows Independent Software Vendors (ISVs) to embed
VSTA 2015 was released as part of the Visual Studio 2015 wave. Its primary role was to replace the aging VSTA 2012 and provide compatibility with the .NET Framework 4.6. Unlike the full Visual Studio IDE, VSTA is an isolated shell; it is stripped of compilers and language services by default. The host application (the software embedding VSTA) is responsible for configuring which languages are available to the user. VSTA then generates a proxy assembly
. Supported Programming Languages For authoring macros and customizations, VSTA 2015 primarily supports two core .NET languages: Visual C#: Provides a modern, object-oriented environment for developers comfortable with C-style syntax. Visual Basic (.NET): Offers an easy-to-learn, object-oriented language focused on rapid Windows application development. Note on authoring: VSTA 2015 does not provide its own standalone IDE for writing code. To edit and debug customizations, you must have a supported version of Visual Studio 2015 (Community, Professional, or Enterprise) installed on the machine. UI Language Support (Language Packs) While VSTA uses English by default, the
The backbone of VSTA 2015 language support is the .NET Common Language Runtime (CLR). By design, VSTA 2015 supports any language that can compile to Intermediate Language (IL) and runs on the CLR. However, in practice, the "out-of-the-box" support centers on the two primary managed languages: C# and Visual Basic .NET (VB.NET).