Is it ok to continue using VB6 1

[kennycad]

Hi,

First up, I am very fond of VB6. I have been using it for a number of years and have had some great success with it. I use it to write programs that assist with engineering calculations and automation of report writing, excel etc. I also use VBA when it suits.

I understand that VB6 is been phased out for VB.NET. I have made a few attempts to familiarise myself with NET but I find it very complex and always find myself reverting back to VB6. I dont really have the time to invest in learning NET and would prefer to continue utilising my current skills with VB6 and VBA. Is this going to be a major issue for me in the future. I have read that VB6 wont be supported post windows 7.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks

 

[strongm]

>I have read that VB6 wont be supported post windows 7

I don't believe MS have made any official statement on this. Since they have not announced Windows 7's successor they have not announced whether the VB6 runtimes will be supported on it. The same was the case before W7 was released - we didn't know whether the VB6 runtimes would be supported on it or not (however we do have 10 years of support for those runtimes on W7 ...)

 

[strongm]

I lied! I have found an official statememnt from MS on the subject. oops!

"However there are no plans to include VB6 runtime in future versions of Windows beyond Windows 7.

 

[Ajay011]

The only easy alternative to VB is C# as far as I know and have heard.
>"However there are no plans to include VB6 runtime in future versions of Windows beyond Windows 7." is a bad news..

 

[strongm]

I'd guess that future versions of Windows are planned to be 64bit only (if they can get away with it). And there has never been a 64bit version of the VB6 runtimes. Hence they won't work on a future version.

>only easy alternative to VB is C#

Or VB.NET which superficially bears a passing resemblance to VB6 which C# does not

 

[dilettante]

That "no plans" statement was exactly how Microsoft phrased the same thing prior to Windows 7 and Vista. It means nothing until an actual "no support" statement comes out.

That doesn't mean you shouldn't start exploring alternatives though.

There are even "VBish" compilers for the JVM, like Jabaco. I'm not sure how viable they are or how long they'll be around, but they might serve as an introduction to Java. They use Java libraries and you can create two-language solutions using them.

 

[MichaelRed]

In the broader sense, I believe that in 'todays' world, any / all professionals need to continiously 'going back to school'. In all walks of life (and employment) change in the society and the tools used therein are continuiously changing. Failuse to keep up with the changes is more-or-less an admission that you are no longer useful on the orkplace (e.g redy for that terminal departure).

Excuses ("I don't have the time ... ") will not suffice to save your job. If you are sufficiently endowed to think that retirement is not just possible, but preferable to your currnt status, then by all means just coast on till you reach the " ... no moe ... " of some comodity and retire gracefully.

Otherwise, hit the books and start your preperation NOW.



MichaelRed

 

[kennycad]

Couldnt agree more with continuation of education but i am not a programmer by profession. I have built up sufficient knoweledge of VB6/VBA to be of great assistance to me with my actual job. With what i have seen of VB.NET so far it seems to differ in many of the area's i currently use VB6 for and i have read some forums that suggest certain tasks are more complex than they were in VB6. Communication between autocad and VB.NET versus autocad and VB6 seems to have changed completely.

For instance, if i have a requirement for a program at present i can usually knock something up that works in a week. To learn VB.NET and then to have it be a language that takes longer to create programs is a concern.

We have many custom programs in our office written in autoLISP for CAD which we use all the time and save us heaps of time and that language is ancient but remains supported. If its fit for purpose why do we have to continually update?

it is likely the ipads will one day become a common tool in our workplace maybe i should look at objective C instead?

 

[SimonSellick]

There is a permanent conflict between vendors like Microsoft whose income depends on selling more product and users who want some stability. If you do not want the pace of change dictated to you, the only safe answer is to go to another vendor - as you have done with LISP. There are many alternatives to VB, including non-commercial offerings, and some of them are extremely good.

Your specific question was about VB6 and this is not the first time that Microsoft has attempted to drop it. Even if they do so, it is likely that any future Windows would ship with a 32-bit virtual machine which will run it - after all, Windows can still run MS-DOS .com programs which go back to the early 1980s.

 

[dilettante]

MS-DOS programs under Windows relies on a 16-bit WOW subsystem.

64-bit editions of Windows don't include one, so they can't be run there. PC vendors have pushed 64-bit Windows on consumers recently (probably to sell more hardware because otherwise prices would drop more), so this isn't a theoretical issue.

You might still load up a tool like Virtual PC and install DOS, FreeDOS, Win3.x, Win9x, or 32-bit Windows to run those old programs, but in general they're just about dead for the average consumer.

 

[kennycad]

Thanks for all your comments. I think i am going to stick with the VB6/VBA combination for the time being. A search on the internet for VB6 alternatives returned a few programs one of which was REALbasic, anyone had any experience with this?

 

[dilettante]

I tried it back when they released Standard for free. I didn't care for it, the IDE seemed very slow and quite buggy with lousy docs. The was a long time ago though, almost 6 years now I think.

At least Jabaco is free and doesn't have the carnival midway look to its IDE.

 

[BobRodes]

@MichaelRed: I'm thinking about becoming a New Age minister. That way, I'm the one who gets to say "this behavior is by design" and I also get to decide whether we have plans to support this or that doctrine.

Kinda goes to my head, though.

 

[kennycad]

After further consideration I will have another go at NET. As it turns out another program we use and one that will be more prevalent in coming years (REVIT) uses NET only with no support for VBA.

Thanks again for your comments.

 

[George1111]

However there are no plans to include VB6 runtime in future versions of Windows beyond Windows 7."

I wonder what that is supposed to mean ?

I never knew VB6 runtime was included in any of the Windows operating systems (I always install it myself).

I have never wanted Microsoft to have the VB6 runtime in their OS as it probably would never include all the controls I use, anyway.

 

[dilettante]

I never knew VB6 runtime was included in any of the Windows operating systems (I always install it myself).

I'll bet you don't!

Since Windows 2000 Windows has worked harder and harder to prevent people like you from over-writing system components with bad versions. The core VB6 runtime libraries have been part of the OS for a long, long time now. This was extended starting with Vista (and indeed they're now referred to as "the VB6 Extended Runtime").

All of this is serviced via Windows Update so that serious security flaws can be corrected when uncovered.

There is almost never a reason anymore (since XP SP3) to include the VB6 runtimes at all. If you do they'll be silently ignored. if you bypass that, Windows will put back cached versions of the correct libraries.

You only need to deploy the VB6 runtimes when you support downlevel systems, and in that case you probably ought to be deploying a lot more (DCOM95/98, MDAC_TYP, MSXML, etc.).

 

[kennycad]

An update for anyone who may be interested.

I recently set aside a couple of hours a day for 2 weeks in order to make a final attempt at VB.NET, and toward the end of the last week the penny dropped.

Now i have started a number of projects and am making good progress.

Thanks again

 

[Ajay011]

I would also suggest REALBASIC.

 

[tedsmith]

Being of the ranking of 'New Age Bishop', has anyone developed a program like VB6 that will create applications that run directly in UNIX so I can excommunicate MS?

 

[jlcca]

Consider Ubuntu and Wine. You can run many MS Windows programs in this environment.

An alternative to Visual Basic is PowerBASIC. Much faster and smaller apps, and no runtimes to worry about.

Links:

http://www.ubuntu.com/

http://www.winehq.org/

http://www.powerbasic.com/

I used to develop with MS VB5, but have not looked back since switching to PowerBASIC many years ago. Both the PowerBASIC development package, and the .EXEs created with PowerBASIC, run fine on MS Windows, or in Wine under Ubuntu.

Joe