Adam Nathan writes , about a “special” version of the .NET Framework 2.0 (Beta 1) , which if you use to run your managed code, then gives Microsoft feedback on what portions of the .NET Framework and Win32 api you use and are dependent on. The idea is to help MS maintain backward compatibility as newer versions of the framework ship and also help them prioritise their things to do.

You cannot install this version of the framework along with the “normal” version of the .NET Framework 2.0. MS also recommends reformatting (hmmm interesting), your machine after you are done with this instead of just uninstalling it.

Before you do anything with this, I would suggest to check out the documentation . If you are upto it, then you can download this . Below is an excerpt from their site:

By opting in, Microsoft provides you an instrumented version of the .NET Framework containing a tool that collects the code usage information behind the scenes. All you have to do is exercise your code under the watch of this tool, then save and send the data.

By participating and providing an email address, Microsoft may contact you when later versions of the .NET Framework are released with information about code changes that are likely to impact your applications/components. Microsoft can also prioritise testing, compatibility efforts, and feature planning based on areas of the product that are heavily used by customers such as you.

The .NET Framework Code Coverage Edition is to be used for testing purposes only. It should not be used in a production environment. After installing it and collecting/uploading your data according to these instructions, you should uninstall it.

If you are not interested in participating in this special program, you should install the regular .NET Framework redistributable package from link below instead. The .NET Framework Code Coverage Edition runs slower and consumes more memory due to the overhead of the data collection.