I had to submit a bug to the Visual Studio connection this week and was pleasantly surprised, even astonished, at how easy their site is to use compared to PowerShell’s.
First of all, their connection URL is: https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio … as opposed to the PowerShell connection, which has the url: https://connect.microsoft.com/site/sitehome.aspx?SiteID=99 …
Secondly, I could search and view bugs without ever logging in!
And finally, imagine my shock when I found that I could actually SUBMIT a bug without “joining” their “Connection” ... all I had to do was log in to Live. All this time I thought the whole “membership” clique was just a built-in requirement for Connect.
Now, I don’t know any of the reasons why PowerShell’s connection is so limited, but I presume it’s mostly because it was initially set up as a closed pre-release testing connection and has never been “fixed.” Well, it’s time to get this thing fixed.
Please VOTE FOR: The PowerShell Connection shouldn’t require login + membership
Oh, and if anyone from the PowerShell or Connect team is reading this … you should make the PowerShell Connect front page look like the Visual Studio one too. PowerShell’s front page is a duplicate of a long blog post from the release of the last CTP — Visual Studio’s is a series of very informative button-links which help you figure out what to do next (eg: there’s a “Bug” link, instead of just a link to “Feedback”).