The latest game-changer in cloud-native application development, .NET Aspire 9.4, has just been launched, and it’s packed with groundbreaking features that will elevate your coding experience!

What’s New in .NET Aspire 9.4?

This release marks a significant milestone for .NET Aspire, focusing on enhancing developer experience and deployment automation through deeper integration with cloud services. Ready to streamline your workflow? Let's dive into the incredible new enhancements.

Introducing the Aspire CLI!

One of the most exciting features in this release is the Aspire CLI—now in general availability! This standalone command-line tool empowers developers to easily create, configure, and deploy Aspirified applications. With handy commands like "aspire new," "aspire run," and the preview commands for publishing and deploying, your workflow just got a serious boost.

Enhanced Deployment Workflows!

The 'aspire deploy' command introduces customizable deployment workflows, allowing developers to tailor the deployment experience. Automating complex deployment scenarios, like database seeding and interactive environment configurations, just got easier!

Dashboard Upgrades for Real-Time Insights!

The Aspire dashboard is also getting a makeover! Developers can now view external parameters and connection strings directly within the dashboard and receive automatic upgrade alerts. Plus, enhanced peer visualization offers unparalleled insights into external service connectivity.

The All-New Interaction Service!

This release also heralds the debut of the interaction service, a revolutionary runtime component that handles dashboard and CLI interactions seamlessly. From input collection to confirmation prompts and multi-step workflows, user experiences are about to get richer and more interactive.

Prepare for the Future with Robust Service Modeling!

Version 9.4 broadens support for modeling external services alongside persistent container networking—albeit with a note that these features are experimental and may evolve.

Integration Like Never Before!

The release also significantly enhances integrations with GitHub-hosted AI models and Azure AI Foundry, enabling on-device inference. This means developers can connect their services to cutting-edge AI capabilities effortlessly!

What's New in Azure Support?

Several Azure enhancements have also been implemented, such as hierarchical partition keys support in Cosmos DB and simplified Azure Key Vault secret references. These updates are all about reinforcing your security and efficiency.

Prepare for Some Breaking Changes!

Remember, with great upgrades come some breaking changes. API modifications in Azure Key Vault and Azure Storage will necessitate careful migration, but fear not! The release documentation includes thorough guidance for smooth transitions.

A Glimpse into the Future!

The Aspire team isn’t stopping here. A new public roadmap detailing the next six months of development has been released, aiming to transform Aspire into a robust, code-first toolchain for managing distributed systems. Stay tuned—this is just the beginning!