Today, we are excited to announce the releases of Visual Studio 2013 Update 2 RC and the Azure SDK 2.3 for .NET.  These releases add a number of great features for Azure development:

Visual Studio 2013 Update 2 RC

This update to Visual Studio 2013 includes built-in tooling for Azure developer and test scenarios:

• Dev/Test: Create Dev/Test environments (Azure Web Sites or VMs) for Web apps and generate automated PowerShell deployment scripts [Article]
• JSON Editor: New editor with IntelliSense support when editing Resource Manager templates [Release Notes]
• Mobile Services: .NET support including remote debugging [Article; Mobile Dev Center]
• Notification Hubs: Send test notifications [Article]

Azure SDK 2.3 for .NET

With the additional install of the Azure SDK 2.3 for .NET you also can take advantage of the following features:

• Virtual Machines: Remote debug native or managed code [Article] and create virtual machines from Server Explorer [Article]
• Web Sites: View and edit remote files and logs [Article] and easily publish Web apps using the improved Publish Web experience [Article]
• Cloud Services: General availability of Emulator Express [Article] with Run as Normal User support & Remote debugging for native code [Article]
• Storage: Updated Storage Emulator & Storage Client 3.0 now included in new projects [Storage Dev Center]
• PowerShell, X-Plat CLI and .NET Automation (separate downloads from Azure SDK 2.3): Support for using Resource Manager [PowerShell Article; X-Plat CLI Article], and lots of new commands for automating Web Sites, Cloud Services, VMs and more [PowerShell Article; X-Plat CLI Article]

Visual Studio 2013 Update 2 RC is available for download here.  The Azure SDK 2.3 can be downloaded from the Azure .NET Developer Center.  And, the automation tools are available as part of the Azure PowerShell, X-Plat CLI and .NET client library downloads.

Stay tuned for an upcoming post with more details on these features.