Microsoft is attempting to improve the developer experience for those building distributed applications with the latest updates to Aspire, a collection of tools, templates, and packages for building such apps.
One of the new features in Aspire 9.5 that Microsoft drew attention to is a preview for a new command: aspire update. This new command automatically detects and updates SDK and AppHost packages, validates package compatibility before applying changes, and asks for confirmation before making changes. It supports stable, daily, or custom builds.
Aspire 9.5 also adds a preview for the ability to create an Aspire AppHost from a single apphost.cs file without needing a project file. Developers can then add other resources and projects after the AppHost is created.
“This approach reduces the complexity of the Aspire configuration, especially for folks outside of the .NET ecosystem, without comprimising the full power of .NET. New users to Aspire can get started in seconds and can augment their existing applications with 1 command and 1 file,” Microsoft wrote in a blog post.
The Aspire Dashboard got several updates as well, including a new “All” option in console logs that streams logs from every resource that is running and insights into LLM calls within an app, including prompts, responses, and images.
New and updated integrations in Aspire 9.5 include AddOpenAI for modeling OpenAI endpoints and related models, support for Azure Dev Tunnels, and static file serving in the YARP integration.
Finally, this release includes support for Visual Studio’s Call Stack Window, enabling Aspire apps to show call stack frames from other debugged processes that are running on Windows.
“This feature is a game-changer for deep-dive diagnostics on distributed systems. Issues are found faster by reconstructing the full logical call path, even when the request hops between services. With deeper visibility into async operations, developers can debug smarter, not harder,” Microsoft wrote.
A full list of updates can be found in the Aspire 9.5 release notes here.
