Update 2 to Visual Studio 2013 was officially released on the opening day of Microsoft's TechEd 2014 conference in Houston, Texas bringing with it numerous and wide-ranging changes to VS2013. Starting with web development, it includes Web Tools 2013.2, improvements to the web editor (including the editors for JSON and Sass/.scss files), and the ability for Browser Link to support HTTPS connections. ASP.NET Identity 2.0 brings support for two-factor authentication, and an improved password validator.
Code generation targets are offered that provide support for AVX2 instructions. TypeScript 1.0 is also included through Update 2 as it is considered an officially supported language in Visual Studio. The Profiler has received significant changes, including enhanced measurement of CPU measurement. Furthermore, the previously released tools under the Performance and Diagnostics Hub can now be run simultaneously on a common timeline making it easier to observe correlations.
Git users will see changes that bring an annotate/blame view, and the ability to amend and revert commits. VS2013’s Git also now supports the ability to push changes to multiple remotes. Team Foundation Server receives several key changes that make the use of tags much easier. Permissions can be used to control who may set tags, work items can be tagged, tags can be queried, and a REST API is available for tracking work items.
Full details of Update 2 are available in the accompanying KB article and should be consulted prior to installation. Among the known issues is the disappearance of the Solution Platform drop-down. The update itself is available through VS2013’s notification hub. Alternatively both a web-based installer and an ISO image are available for download. This update may be applied to all versions of VS2013, including the Express editions. This release is a cumulative upgrade, meaning that Update 1 need not be installed first to provide the benefits of both.