Don Syme just announced today the F# Community Technical Preview (CTP) Release September 2008 which is now available for download as well  the launch of the MSDN F#  Developer Center.  I've been playing with these builds lately and they are great improvements in usability as well as better integration into Visual Studio and MSBuild.  Be sure to check out Don's post on the matter on how the language has evolved and the changes that have been made.  Some of the big items I've that are part of the CTP include:

• F# Scripting Improvements
• F# Project System Improvements
• Units of Measure
• Splitting of F# into the FSharp.Core.dll and the F# PowerPack on CodePlex

What I really like is the approach that they are taking with regards to the core language and the PowerPack.  The core library will contain the most important pieces from F# as a language, and the PowerPack will include such things as the FsLex, FsYacc tools, and other items such as math libraries, query and so on.  The PowerPack will be released as shared source on CodePlex which will allow it to evolve at a different pace than the standard F# and Visual Studio revs. 

Want More?

The F# team has been pretty active on getting the language to this important milestone, but also have created some really good posts on some of the new features.  Some of these include:

• Luca Bolognese
  • Downloading stock prices in F# - Part I - Data modeling
• Jomo Fisher (F# Team Member)
  • F# Scripts--Zero to Execute in Ten Seconds
• Brian McNamara (F# Team Member)
  • Welcome to the F# CTP project system: project property pages
  • Welcome to the F# CTP project system: project templates
  • Sneak peeks into the F# project system, part three
  • Sneak peeks into the F# project system, part two
  • Sneak peeks into the F# project system, part one
• Andrew Kennedy (Microsoft Research)
  • Units of Measure in F#: Part One, Introducing Units

Also, be sure to read Ted Neward's latest column in CoDe Magazine on F# 101.  So, go and download it today and give it a go!