[josteink]

Fair enough (and I say this as a Visual Studio user), but we should also note his aim was not to have an IDE. The IDE was not a goal, it was a means to a goal.

His goal, what he wanted to try out, was creating Windows Phone apps, and for this the big complex IDE is was a prerequisite, and this prerequisite caused him to fail reaching his goal.

Contrast this to other development tasks, like web-development, and the need for these complex tools went away and he could be instantly productive. Does that say anything about developing Windows Phone apps?

It's definitely not a direct apples to oranges comparison, but when making Windows Phone apps gets its complexity way beyond web-apps, that is entirely something within Microsoft's control.