I attended a seminar on .NET a few weeks ago, asking much the same questions as yourself. I came out thinking, "Man, is that ever cool!"
Essentially, if I get the gist, .NET is a set of technologies that allow a programmer to use the same pre-defined libraries regardless of which programming language they use. So Java programmers, C++ programmers, VB programmers etc. can all include the same functionality and worry only about the differences in syntax between each language. Essentially I guess the mantra is 'Code in whichever language you're comfortable with and get the same results.'
There appeared to be literally dozens of '.NET enabled' languages available.
The other difference, and I don't know if this applies to only the languages supported by Visual Studio.NET or all of them, is that when compiled they don't produce a standard executable, rather a form of bytecode which the .NET Framework essentially optimises during the first run of the code. Struck me as being somewhat similar to the Java Virtual Machine in some ways.
What they didn't explain at the seminar (hey, it was a Microsoft shindig) was how you would write .NET apps for platforms other than Windows. I'm for some reason dubious about the likelyhood of a .NET framework for Linux!!
I'm sure other people here can explain a little better. I'm somewhat of a programming newbie and could have gotten the wrong end of the stick completely!!
Typedef Enum: How is C# to develop for in comparison to C++ or Java? A programming teacher friend of mine thinks it's the best thing since sliced bread!
