[Python-Dev] VC++ 2008 Express Edition now locked away? (original) (raw)

Ezio Melotti ezio.melotti at gmail.com
Wed Mar 6 15:40:42 CET 2013

Hi,

On Wed, Mar 6, 2013 at 12:20 PM, Terry Reedy <tjreedy at udel.edu> wrote:

Clicking this link http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=14597 on this Developer Guide page http://docs.python.org/devguide/setup.html#windows now returns a "We are sorry, the page you requested cannot be found." page with search results.

The first search result http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/nl/Vsexpressinstall/thread/2dc7ae6a-a0e7-436b-a1b3-3597ffac6a97 suggests that one must first go to http://profile.microsoft.com which forwards to the live.com login page. Logging in with my un-expired non-developer account did not make the original link work. The mdsn page http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-US/ has Visual Studio / Download trial, which leads to https://www.microsoft.com/visualstudio/eng/downloads which lists 2012 and 2010 but not 2008. I suspect that an msdn account is required for most people to get 2008. A later link leads to https://www.dreamspark.com/Product/Product.aspx?productid=34# which suggests that vc++2008 express is also available to verified degree students. I don't qualify so I will not try.

I did try a few weeks ago, when I had to download a copy of Windows for a project. Long story short, after 30+ minutes and a number of confirmation emails I reached a point where I had a couple of new accounts on MSDN/Dreamspark, a "purchased" free copy of Windows in my e-cart, and some .exe I had to download in order to download and verify the purchased copy. That's where I gave up.

Best Regards, Ezio Melotti

So it would appear that section "1.1.3.3. Windows" of "1. Getting Started" (setup.rst) needs further revision.

Or perhaps we could persuade Microsoft to let us distribute it ourselves so Windows versions of 2.7 do not become increasingly unusable. -- Terry Jan Reedy

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