Microsoft has announced a new .NET web app template designed to streamline the development of AI-powered chat applications. The AI Chat Web App template, unveiled on March 6, is part of the company's ongoing effort to make AI development with .NET more accessible and user-friendly.

The template can be easily installed using the Microsoft.Extensions.AI.Templates package, and is accessible in Visual Studio, Visual Studio Code (via the C# Dev Kit extension), and the .NET CLI. By running the command "dotnet new install Microsoft.Extensions.AI.Templates" and then "dotnet new aichatweb", developers can create a new AI-powered chat web app in their working directory.

The initial release of the AI Chat Web App template focuses on a Blazor-based web app, built using abstractions such as Microsoft.Extensions.AI and Microsoft.Extensions.VectorData. The template also supports the retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) pattern, commonly used to guide AI chat responses. This enables developers to create a chat-based UI to interact with sample PDFs or a user's own data using RAG.

The template includes code for data ingestion, caching, and processing, and supports both a local store for prototyping and Azure AI Search for more advanced configurations. Additionally, the generated code includes UI components for chatting, citation tracking, and follow-up suggestions, providing a solid foundation for building AI-powered chat applications.

Microsoft has plans to expand the template offerings in future releases, including the addition of an AI Console template, a Minimal API template, support for .NET Aspire, and inclusion of templates by default in the .NET SDK. The company is also considering support for Azure AI Foundry and possible template options for Semantic Kernel users.

The introduction of the AI Chat Web App template is a significant step forward in making AI development more accessible to .NET developers. By providing scaffolding and guidance, Microsoft aims to simplify the development process and enable developers to build more sophisticated AI-powered chat applications. As AI technology continues to advance, this template is likely to play an important role in shaping the future of chat application development.

With the AI Chat Web App template, Microsoft is demonstrating its commitment to making AI development more mainstream and user-friendly. As the company continues to expand its template offerings, it will be interesting to see how developers respond and what new innovations emerge in the world of AI-powered chat applications.