Usually, that doesn't matter much to us sys administrators. We're managing the servers and network; let the programmers worry about their tools. But Visual Studio has gotten serious dings for a slew of beta bugs that Microsoft simply closed out and never fixed in order to get the product out the door. All this information is off blog fodder, so take it with a grain of salt, but enough fodder got fed to get me worried, especially given that a big part of the new VS is to sell you integrated Team Foundation services: Bugs can conveniently affect everyone instead of inefficiently plaguing only one programmer at a time.

If your programmers are embarking on platform upgrades that include SQL Server 2005 and Visual Studio 2005, then you'd best read up on these platforms' architectures and administration capabilities. (Both products have a good selection of articles on their respective Web sites, but for immediate help, get familiar with their support forums.) Then make sure you've got a fast and automatic backup running -- and running often. Nothing's worse than a frustrated support call from an overcaffeinated programmer who thinks he or she has just lost six or seven hours' worth of work.