>Is the user interface being brought in line with the other parts of Visual Studio. I have read the article in Foxtalk about the IDE enhancements but it mentions nothing of things like toolbars, cool controls etc? If the answer is yes will our applications automatically benifit from them?

Yes, the IDE looks like other tools. When I asked if we will get that capability, I was told that usually what we see in the product can be put in our applications. I consider that a definate maybe.