Is VB6 dying? 1

[deek05]

Is VB6 still being used very much or is it dying? IT dept. is saying there is no use for it anymore and to embrace c#. The reason: one of our IT team doesn't use VB just c#. I use VB6, VB.NET and c# and I don't like c# one bit. There are another 5 to 6 people plus many, many apps that are built in VB. Also most if not all of our outside developers/contractors use VB. Retrain 1 to use VB or 5 to use c#? Doesn't make a whole sense. Any advice to stick up for VB?

Thanks

 

[dilettante]

Two or three cents worth of opinion:

It's dying but the death is slow. We haven't seen a formal announcement but I suspect it will run fine on Windows 7, giving it an extended life reaching to nearly 2020.

At the same time it is becoming more and more difficult to meet today's demands using VB6. Many new Windows features are only delivered with managed APIs and those more suitable to C++ (and clumsy from VB6). Tools support is becoming just awful as time moves on leaving VB6 behind.

I believe reg-free COM gives VB6 a big boost, relieving some of the biggest headaches: deployment and DLL Hell. But even this really isn't enough as the landscape changes and proliferating modes and styles of Web Services move beyond what is easily done using the now-unsupported SOAP Toolkit. If something like cloud computing catches on I doubt there will be much room at the table for VB6.

However VB6 is as good as it ever was at the sorts of applications it was designed for. With cleverness and persistence (and some 3rd party offerings that help shim it up) you can still do new and creative things in VB6.


It just isn't the tool for large-scale efforts anymore though, and it is a tough sell trying to get a go-ahead for anything major in VB6 today. Its sweet spot now is really in keeping legacy applications on life support until they can be replaced or ported to some other technology.

 

[ettienne]

Long live VB6!
In the past 20+ some years of my programming experience VB6 is certainly my favorite tool.
You will be surprised how many companies still use VB6 and how many commercial applications still rely on VB6, so it will not go away overnight. The reality is that everyone must move on with new technology, so yes VB6 will fade away.
Many companies are looking at the issue and deciding to break away from the MS VB/.Net/C# train of thought and looking at alternatives, there are many options out there.
In your case it sounds like VB.Net and C# would be a natural progression. Look at your company policy and/or management to make a decision on which way to move forward, no one needs disharmony in a programming team.

 

[ousoonerjoe]

VB6 does still have a place, but dilettante is correct. It's propping up legacy applications long enough for them to be replaced by new technologies. VB6 is great, but there are fewer and fewer jobs to come by (at least in the Big 12 region). Most companies looking for VB programmers want a VB6/VB.Net developer to upgrade their old apps. That being said, there are many government/military jobs still using VB6 as their primary language. Many are still upgrading the old Cobol/Mainframe systems to VB6/SQL.

Is VB6 dying? Yes. Is it a quick death? Not really. You have time, but be aware that it is limited and migrating to VB.Net would be a prudent progression. VB6's death will be an exponential one--very slow then as more convert, it gains speed and before you know it, VB6 is just another old arcane language everyone jokes about.

"...and did we give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? NO!"
"Don't stop him. He's roll'n.

 

[strongm]

>migrating to VB.Net would be a prudent progression

That's where I have reservations. I'm not sure, if you are moving to .NET, that VB.NET is necessarily the best .NET language to move to, given that you have to learn a new language (don't be conned by the term VB in VB.NET)

 

[ousoonerjoe]

Oh, don't get me wrong. I think C# has much wider implications and possibilities for employment. Not to mention that it makes for a great stepping stone to C++. Not much you can't do there. I suggested VB.Net simply because of the OP's comment "and I don't like c# one bit". If you don't like it, then VB.Net is the next logical choice based on the list above.

"...and did we give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? NO!"
"Don't stop him. He's roll'n.

 

[JoeAtWork]

I have 10 years professional programming under my belt, and VB is my "mother tongue". It's a great work horse, very stable, but has it's limitations, especially for writing distributed applications.

I love C# for some of the following reasons:
1. Supports all OO features - I especially like finally having full inheritance capability, which is something I often wished for in VB
2. Great development environment - when I have to go from VS.NET back to the old VB IDE, I really miss the useful features like the advanced intellisense. OK, it's not a language feature, but nothing like that is available (as far as I know) for VB6
3. Simple deployment - drag and drop the contents of your folder and you are good to go!
4. Can use it to write web apps (ASP.NET), windows apps, and even services

And then you have some of the next generation, such as WPF, which revolutionizes how we can design our UI's (want to make an octagon shaped button which contains a dropdown control inside of it - no problem!).

So sorry, despite the fact that VB has served me well over the years, I don't see much of an argument for using it over .NET. I would say it is mostly for supporting legacy apps now.

Joe Schwarz
Custom Software Developer

http://www.plandev.net

 

[SkipVought]

I can remember, in 1992, a group of students from University of North Texas, toured our plant and were absolutely astounded that our major aerospace company had hundreds of thousands line of COBOL code. They had been told by their prof, that COBOL was dead.

Not so! And neither is it for VB, at least, not in the next 20 years.

Skip,

_{Just traded in my old subtlety...
for a NUANCE!}

 

[strongm]

True, but a clue to the direction it is going may be found in the volume of traffic through this forum; not all that long ago this was one of the most active forums on the site, hardly an accusation that can be levelled at it today ...

 

[three57m]

I always find it interesting and encouraging when people new to VB6 post to this site. The facts may show vb is in decline but certainly not dying or soon to be dead.

 

[JoeAtWork]

but a clue to the direction it is going may be found in the volume of traffic through this forum

And an increasing amount are people asking VB.NET questions. I wouldn't be surprised if some of them are not even aware of VB6's existance.

Joe Schwarz
Custom Software Developer

http://www.plandev.net

 

[deek05]

Hey all...thanks for the replies. This is pretty much what I expected. I guess we'll see what the future holds!

 

[BobRodes]

Let me first state that IMO, VB.Net and C# are virtually equivalent except in syntax.

It amuses me that C# is more popular by quite a bit than VB.Net. I guess people think that C# derives from C++ and Java, whereas VB.Net derives from VB, and is therefore less powerful a language. Well, it is perhaps less powerful in that there are capabilities to write unmanaged code in C# ("unsafe" pointers) that aren't in VB.Net. But that's about it. And, why would anyone want to use that anyway, except old C++ programmers that aren't willing to admit that 95% of the world's memory leaks are written in C++?

So, I guess I'm seeing the inevitable; that people will have their illusions and that's all there is to it. I'd say one is better off being able to say that they have C# than VB.Net. For now. One day, the market for C# programmers will be saturated, and VB.Net programmers will be able to command more money. Never mind that 90% of either discipline has to do with understanding the same underlying .Net framework. Nobody gets that, at least no recruiter I've ever seen does.

 

[tedsmith]

What I'd really like to see is a program like vb6 or even c#the works in Linux and doesn't need Windows at all!
Whoever made one would truly make a fortune!

 

[strongm]

>even c#the works in Linux

Mono:

http://www.mono-project.com/Main_Page

 

[tedsmith]

Do you mean I can install the normal C# application in a computer without Windows being installed at all?
Will it compile into an application that only need Linux to run it?
What happens to activex objects?

 

[strongm]

>What happens to activex objects?

Nope. No legacy support. Just .NET

If it were me, I'd just read the Mono pages at the link I provided for more info (e.g. the Mono team are working on COM support)

 

[dilettante]

As people have said many times but haven't been heard: the Cobol analogy is flawed because VB6 is a specific product, not a language. Not even a vendor's private implementation of a standard language.

Without the COM underpinnings it is almost useless. Look a REALBasic for an example of just how useless.

VB 5 & 6 were a language, a GUI framework, and an IDE that exists primarily to glue COM objects and controls into applications.

 

[Foada]

I am not sure that "old technologies" will ever die. I have been on a three year project that has converted an old DOS 5 control system to a Windows 3.1 control system as that is all that manufactuer supported. The company I was working for had millions of dollars worth of equipment that was just being updated to a "Windows" based control system. My point here is that regardless of what "Cutting Edge" is there is always going to be a need for people that know what "Fortran" is and what a "Punch Card" was for. I know for a fact that companies are still looking for people that know Pascal. There are machines out there that have transitioned from relay logic to punch cards to a "386". In an age of "Web" people tend to forget that the base for everything that we do is still a "zero" or a "one". VB6 will be around for years and years in my opinion. It is still one of my best tools when it comes to putting out a "prototype" demo. It may be based on "old" technologies but there is still a large portion of the world that does not know the potential of the modern technologies. Until everyone gets up to "speed" there will always be a need for a "Pascal" or "Fortran" or whatever programmer.

If you choose to battle wits with the witless be prepared to lose.

 

[ousoonerjoe]

I just had a headhunter call me about a VB6-Access contract to hire job for a gov contractor. They're still out there, but they are getting rare. (at least in this part of the country).

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"...and did we give up when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? NO!"

"Don't stop him. He's roll'n."
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