GrowingHaze
Programmer
I've just started programming and am taking a VB 6 course, would it be in my best intrest to take VB .NET later on?
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VB6 and VB .NET? 3
- Thread starter GrowingHaze
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TheVampire
Programmer
One person's *progress* may be another persons hell....
Robert
Robert
I think we're getting off-topic here. Let's try posting on
a new subject.
VB.net is probably the moniker for VB7. VB.net isn't perfect, neither are any of the earlier VB's - that's
what WE'RE for. (But MICROSOFT Help will solve any problem
for $295 a pop <I think of it as $300, then they give you $5 back. Watta deal.>)
a new subject.
VB.net is probably the moniker for VB7. VB.net isn't perfect, neither are any of the earlier VB's - that's
what WE'RE for. (But MICROSOFT Help will solve any problem
for $295 a pop <I think of it as $300, then they give you $5 back. Watta deal.>)
>And the logo...
strongm(/b]
Right you are...But I think that is just a logo design issue.
Other companies do the same.
But, then again, with MS, maybe it does have something to do with them being internally undecisive.
THOMASNG
>I think we're getting off-topic here.
I think that is the whole issue of many posts here, initially caused by the (your) first response. [/i][/u][sub]*******************************************************
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TheVampire
>One person's *progress* may be another persons hell....
That may be true. In some of the earlier versions of VB, porting your existing code from one version to the next may have been much less difficult. It would have been nice if the transition to VB.NET was more fluid. Oh well.
Something to consider. . .
Since its beginnings, computers and computer programming have been constantly changing as technology and the means to use it is improved.
For better or worse (for better, I think), this trend will continue. Technology will continue to progress as will programming and programming standards.
Programmers who find themselves unwilling, or unable to progress with it might be doing themselves a favor by finding another field of endeavor, because they will soon find themselves left behind in the dust wondering where everyone else went.
CajunCenturion
Programmer
That's true, technology is constantly improving and we ourselves must keep pace.
However, when "advances" in technology, which have not been properly tested and verified, are thrust upon the masses by a monopolistic business rushing the technology to market with the sole purpose of increasing the bottom line, then problems arise.
Why would a company want to "upgrade" (convert) all of its application software, which is working just fine, at a cost of how every many dollars in conversion/testing costs, to a "new" and improved, yet relatively unproven, technology/framework? Its hard to convince a company to spend this money with little or no increase/improvement in functionality.
And I have no proof, but have heard that such advances may be, in some cases, at the expense of performance.
Where is the return on this investment?
I have yet to be convinced that its a good business decision to spend the money to engage is this conversion effort. The only arguement that holds water, from the business perspective, is the dropping of vendor support for VB6.
So I ask you, who is paying for this "progress", and who is benefitting from this "progress"?
There is an old adage that makes as much sense today as it always has "If it ain't broke, don't fit it" Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein
However, when "advances" in technology, which have not been properly tested and verified, are thrust upon the masses by a monopolistic business rushing the technology to market with the sole purpose of increasing the bottom line, then problems arise.
Why would a company want to "upgrade" (convert) all of its application software, which is working just fine, at a cost of how every many dollars in conversion/testing costs, to a "new" and improved, yet relatively unproven, technology/framework? Its hard to convince a company to spend this money with little or no increase/improvement in functionality.
And I have no proof, but have heard that such advances may be, in some cases, at the expense of performance.
Where is the return on this investment?
I have yet to be convinced that its a good business decision to spend the money to engage is this conversion effort. The only arguement that holds water, from the business perspective, is the dropping of vendor support for VB6.
So I ask you, who is paying for this "progress", and who is benefitting from this "progress"?
There is an old adage that makes as much sense today as it always has "If it ain't broke, don't fit it" Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein
mattKnight
Programmer
>"If it ain't broke, don't fit it"
Is this CajunCenturion admitting to deploying buggy software? Or is (s)he just a dodgy plumber?
![[poke]](/data/assets/smilies/poke.gif "[poke] [poke]")
Take care
Matt
Is this CajunCenturion admitting to deploying buggy software? Or is (s)he just a dodgy plumber?
Take care
Matt
CajunCenturion
Programmer
good catch mattKnight - guess I need to publish a new Service Pack for my previous post. Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein
CajunCenturion
It is unfortunate when technologies that are “thrust” upon us are not properly tested. It is even more unfortunate that certain corporations see fit to do this rather consistently.
I am also rather pragmatic when it comes to the cost and effort that companies must expend to keep up with technology (see my second post).
That said, however, I must also reiterate that, whether we want it to or not, technology moves on. The software that works just fine right now will, very likely, break in some future popular operating systems.
I find the adage “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” to be rather inapt when applied to the advancement of technology. If everyone went by that philosophy, we’d still be back in the dark ages. For example: before electric lights were invented there was nothing wrong with the candles and oil lamps that were being used. They weren’t “broke”. But they were something that could be improved upon.
Respectfully,
wcprog
CajunCenturion
Programmer
I agree, technology moves on, as it should. It is also quite true that as professionals, we have an obligation to keep up with the advancements. And yes, software does outlive its usefulness both in terms of the applicability to the business process that it addresses, and to the underlying foundation and/or technology upon which its based.
When I said "if it ain't broke", I am looking at the issue totally from the business perspective, not from a technology perspective. From a purely business standpoint, businesses will have to upgrade for a variety of reasons, but one of those reasons should not be the result of an unfair monopolistic business practice that forces companies to spend money on technology issues (licenses, conversions, equipment, availability of support, etc) before the business needs require. IT is an expensive proposition to companies, and managing those costs is difficult enough without being dictated to by monopolistic vendors. Its unfortunate, that in IT, companies are forced to upgrade before their existing systems are broke. Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein
When I said "if it ain't broke", I am looking at the issue totally from the business perspective, not from a technology perspective. From a purely business standpoint, businesses will have to upgrade for a variety of reasons, but one of those reasons should not be the result of an unfair monopolistic business practice that forces companies to spend money on technology issues (licenses, conversions, equipment, availability of support, etc) before the business needs require. IT is an expensive proposition to companies, and managing those costs is difficult enough without being dictated to by monopolistic vendors. Its unfortunate, that in IT, companies are forced to upgrade before their existing systems are broke. Good Luck
--------------
As a circle of light increases so does the circumference of darkness around it. - Albert Einstein
I doesn't seem to me that any of the other responses really answered your question well.
First, learning to program is a thought process & not necessarily language dependent. You should be able to transfer your knowledge of one language to most others.
VB6 is great in many situations, and I use it everyday. Its great for creating applications that link to databases & require a GUI.
However, in terms of a programming language VB6 is quite inferior. If you are really serious about learning to program, you will be missing some vary important programming constructs by not taking a Java or C++ class. I would recommend starting out with Java.
In order to create VB.NET, Microsoft took VB6 and added to it all the things that a good programming language must have. VB.NET works conceptually like Java and C++ and a class in the language may teach you many of the things that you would learn in a Java or C++ class.
Anyhow, hope that helps.
First, learning to program is a thought process & not necessarily language dependent. You should be able to transfer your knowledge of one language to most others.
VB6 is great in many situations, and I use it everyday. Its great for creating applications that link to databases & require a GUI.
However, in terms of a programming language VB6 is quite inferior. If you are really serious about learning to program, you will be missing some vary important programming constructs by not taking a Java or C++ class. I would recommend starting out with Java.
In order to create VB.NET, Microsoft took VB6 and added to it all the things that a good programming language must have. VB.NET works conceptually like Java and C++ and a class in the language may teach you many of the things that you would learn in a Java or C++ class.
Anyhow, hope that helps.
Just feel the love in this thread!!!!
GrowingHaze: speaking as a person who has NEVER had a programming lesson EVER (Probably explains some of my posts) i would say for the moment stick with VB6 and as LeanneK says try and learn a lower level language.
(i started with c++, did a little perl and html, now i use VB [still cant get my head around assembly though])
So as a whole: VB7 is not vb.net?? (i got confused at around the 30th post) does VB7 even exist?? If vb.net(or should that be .NET) is a "JIT" language that can be decompiled easily would that not pose security problems onto an allready dodgy security OS or does the new ?Framework? solve that problem?!?
GrowingHaze: speaking as a person who has NEVER had a programming lesson EVER (Probably explains some of my posts) i would say for the moment stick with VB6 and as LeanneK says try and learn a lower level language.
(i started with c++, did a little perl and html, now i use VB [still cant get my head around assembly though])
So as a whole: VB7 is not vb.net?? (i got confused at around the 30th post) does VB7 even exist?? If vb.net(or should that be .NET) is a "JIT" language that can be decompiled easily would that not pose security problems onto an allready dodgy security OS or does the new ?Framework? solve that problem?!?
mattKnight
Programmer
LeanneK
>In order to create VB.NET, Microsoft took VB6 and added to it all the things that a good programming language must have. VB.NET works conceptually like Java and C++ and a class in the language may teach you many of the things that you would learn in a Java or C++ class.
I agree that there are many features in VB6 that could be improved on! to name but one, structured error handling.
However, The major question is does .NET offer significant improvement in both technological and commercial areas.
Technology:
Improvements include structured error handling, OOP (yes VB6 supports but not true OO) etc
on the downside, it requires a 20MB framework to run and it is a JIT language which IMHO will incur a penalty in terms of execution time. (not that any of my code would really suffer cos its so ineffecient anyway) It also can be easily decompiled to source - not good for security
Commercial
Upgrade, upgrade upgrade to OS, SW and HW. It does have the ability to cross platform (but doesn't Java...) Is there any commercial imperative to upgrade? I haven't seen one yet ( OK limited experience I know..)
This is an interesting thread which I have enjoyed reading! Thanks all
Just my 2 Pence worth!( after upgrade to .NET it will be 45 pence worth)
Take care all
>In order to create VB.NET, Microsoft took VB6 and added to it all the things that a good programming language must have. VB.NET works conceptually like Java and C++ and a class in the language may teach you many of the things that you would learn in a Java or C++ class.
I agree that there are many features in VB6 that could be improved on! to name but one, structured error handling.
However, The major question is does .NET offer significant improvement in both technological and commercial areas.
Technology:
Improvements include structured error handling, OOP (yes VB6 supports but not true OO) etc
on the downside, it requires a 20MB framework to run and it is a JIT language which IMHO will incur a penalty in terms of execution time. (not that any of my code would really suffer cos its so ineffecient anyway) It also can be easily decompiled to source - not good for security
Commercial
Upgrade, upgrade upgrade to OS, SW and HW. It does have the ability to cross platform (but doesn't Java...) Is there any commercial imperative to upgrade? I haven't seen one yet ( OK limited experience I know..)
This is an interesting thread which I have enjoyed reading! Thanks all
Just my 2 Pence worth!( after upgrade to .NET it will be 45 pence worth)
Take care all
>In order to create VB.NET, Microsoft took VB6 and added to it all the things that a good programming language must have
VB.NET (originally known as VB7) is more-or-less a new language written from the ground up that happens to exhibit certain features that look vaguely similar to 'classic' VB6.
VB.NET (originally known as VB7) is more-or-less a new language written from the ground up that happens to exhibit certain features that look vaguely similar to 'classic' VB6.
Well, from what I've read by Alan Cooper (who got a "Genius" award from MICROSOFT for pioneering VB),
the concept of VB was to make programming a "non-issue"
for the artistic "interface designer" types - who
don't wish to get tied down by programming ("Apple MacItosh" types?). He formerly worked for MS as a programmer, I think.
It was not (and still isn't) a super tool for serious programmers. But it's good enpugh for most GUI.
Mr. Cooper's book, THE INMATES ARE IN CHARGE OF THE ASYLUM, documents some of his arguments and philosophy.
the concept of VB was to make programming a "non-issue"
for the artistic "interface designer" types - who
don't wish to get tied down by programming ("Apple MacItosh" types?). He formerly worked for MS as a programmer, I think.
It was not (and still isn't) a super tool for serious programmers. But it's good enpugh for most GUI.
Mr. Cooper's book, THE INMATES ARE IN CHARGE OF THE ASYLUM, documents some of his arguments and philosophy.
russellbcopeland
Programmer
I've been using VB6 for years now and its been great.. For the last several month's I've been doing VB.NET and have found that it is in fact far superior to VB6. The learning code is steep but the nature of it lends it to be used in a larger system than is practival in vb6.
As for the 20 meg dload of the framework. The framework can be installed as part of the installation package if its not already on a user's system. You can include it with you install. It is a bit heavy if you're just doing a small app but lets face it.. 20mb just isn't very much these days anyway. Once its installed, if you do your app right you can even just copy your assemblies (the il files-think of as exe's) -that makes doing sw patches and updates real easy.
As far as speed, it is a little slow the first time a specific assembly runs on a new machine because it does the compile then. I'm not sure the logic they use but it keeps that same compile until it needs to remake it so after you run it once it seems to run just as fast as any other exe.
Also, when looking at pros/cons of C# vs VB.NET -They can really do the same stuff and they compile the same. Its really a matter of syntax style and personal preference. If you'r not used to C++/Java syntax but know VB6 then VB.NET is easier. Either way you wind up using framework classes more than anything else.
1 big thing to watch out for is 3rd party controls that are not 100% .Net controls. Many use COM and just put a wrapper around their COM objects to be able to access them thru .NET. Crystal reports v9 is an example of this. You can use them but installing the COM controls is just as painful as before.. still have to deal with registry etc.
Final thought- on porting VB6 to .NET -It is my opinion that forcing a re-write of a lot of code to move it to .NET is actually a good thing. A lot of garbage code gets cleaned up. Logical holes get filled as you rebuild it, and you're not just copying your old patched up code to a new language. Read up on re-factoring if you want to know more about why redoing code is a good thing. Managers tend to disagree as they see it just using up more resources but I contend that if it makes the code stronger, easier to support, and easier to extend it will pay back. Also -Please make sure you document you system/code etc properly this time! Recoding allows you to do this!
As for the 20 meg dload of the framework. The framework can be installed as part of the installation package if its not already on a user's system. You can include it with you install. It is a bit heavy if you're just doing a small app but lets face it.. 20mb just isn't very much these days anyway. Once its installed, if you do your app right you can even just copy your assemblies (the il files-think of as exe's) -that makes doing sw patches and updates real easy.
As far as speed, it is a little slow the first time a specific assembly runs on a new machine because it does the compile then. I'm not sure the logic they use but it keeps that same compile until it needs to remake it so after you run it once it seems to run just as fast as any other exe.
Also, when looking at pros/cons of C# vs VB.NET -They can really do the same stuff and they compile the same. Its really a matter of syntax style and personal preference. If you'r not used to C++/Java syntax but know VB6 then VB.NET is easier. Either way you wind up using framework classes more than anything else.
1 big thing to watch out for is 3rd party controls that are not 100% .Net controls. Many use COM and just put a wrapper around their COM objects to be able to access them thru .NET. Crystal reports v9 is an example of this. You can use them but installing the COM controls is just as painful as before.. still have to deal with registry etc.
Final thought- on porting VB6 to .NET -It is my opinion that forcing a re-write of a lot of code to move it to .NET is actually a good thing. A lot of garbage code gets cleaned up. Logical holes get filled as you rebuild it, and you're not just copying your old patched up code to a new language. Read up on re-factoring if you want to know more about why redoing code is a good thing. Managers tend to disagree as they see it just using up more resources but I contend that if it makes the code stronger, easier to support, and easier to extend it will pay back. Also -Please make sure you document you system/code etc properly this time! Recoding allows you to do this!
everyone here is incorrect....why learn VB.NET when there is C#. This is M$ choice as the .NET framework is written in it....the next version of office will be too. Just look at the documentation included with VS.NET....tell me does M$ want you to use VB.NET or C#.....I would have to say C#.
go mono go.
go mono go.
> It was not (and still isn't) a super tool for serious programmers
And you base this assertion on what?
>to make programming a "non-issue"
for the artistic "interface designer" types
And the relevance of this to VB5/6/.NET is what?
And chadt is trolling
And you base this assertion on what?
>to make programming a "non-issue"
for the artistic "interface designer" types
And the relevance of this to VB5/6/.NET is what?
And chadt is trolling
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