Re: VB6, VB2005, or Something Else?

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"Robert Conley" <robertsconley@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1141916711.271025.16450@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Paul Clement wrote:
On Wed, 8 Mar 2006 10:08:05 -0800, "Karl E. Peterson" <karl@xxxxxxxx>
wrote:


Can't miss what ain't there. If you have something a bit more
substantial that indicates GoSub was
widely used in Visual Basic feel free to provide it. Otherwise, you
might want to indicate who else
was complaining that actually used it, absent of any "poster child"
references of course.

This is esstentially an unprovable point. You could look on
http://www.qb45.com/ or any number of qb and vb code libraries. We know
that Microsoft focused only on most common use of VB6 as a database
front end using crystal reports for their test cases . But to get a
true X uses this feature of a language figure is near impossible
because people are not going to give up source for a survey.

So we look at other langauges handle matters like the C or C++
standard, Java and so on. And we find they don't pull this kind of
crap. That they are cautious about breaking changes from one version to
the next.

There are breaking changes but they are in the order of the UNICODE
mess or the lost of DATA and the changes in Graphics, File I/O, and
Printing in VB 1. Changes that are managable rather than breaking the
whole damn base at once.

We look what what happening in other .NET langauges and see that they
are moving to nested procedures. In C# they have anonymous delegates
that in scope with the procedure they are defined. Plus when examine
the IL you find that compilier rearranges the code to make it work. The
VB version looks like more a straight forward delegate delclaration.


Your point about Java and C++ is not a fair test. Both of these languages
have a published or submitted 'standard'. Visual Basic never had one.

It is also interesting to note, that VC++ is still not 100% ANSI and J++
looked like it was about to receive a load of 'extensions' until Sun headed
MS off.

However, gentlemen, I believe our deliverance is at hand.

One of my students had a copy of Wrox's "Visual Basic 2005 Express Edition
Starter Kit". I borrowed it and was astonished to discover the following (In
a box the author calls "important, not-to-be-forgotten information")...

"Visual Basic 2005 Express is part of the latest release of Visual Basic
from Microsoft and can automatically convert projects developed in previous
versions of Visual Basic, often with minimal human intervention required."

I thought he was refering to earlier dotnet versions. But No! Reading on I
found that this also included VB6 applications, but the author admitted the
converter might encounter "unknown problems" and they "can be a pain to
fix". He goes on to say "You will not encounter many of these, and rather
than being strickly language-specific problems, they are usually related to
the way the original code was written."

Doh! The light went on!

It is now obvious I have been looking at this from the wrong direction.
Instead of complaining about Microsoft - I need merely to refactor my VB6
applications until they present 'known' solutions to the Converter. Ta-Da!

Boy do I feel silly.

-ralph


.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: VB6, VB2005, or Something Else?
    ... that Microsoft focused only on most common use of VB6 as a database ... true X uses this feature of a language figure is near impossible ... There are breaking changes but they are in the order of the UNICODE ... found that this also included VB6 applications, ...
    (microsoft.public.vb.general.discussion)
  • Re: Why the VB6 versus VB.NET contest is baloney
    ... unmanaged C# code then the VB.NET and the VB6 code should allowed to ... language is marginal at best. ... Because it shouldn't be forgotten that with a single release Microsoft ... Microsoft's decision on VB.NET's backwards compatibility left us with ...
    (microsoft.public.vb.general.discussion)
  • Re: Why to use VBA?
    ... The fact is that VB.NET is sufficiently incompatible with the previous version of VB (VB6, from which VBA is derived) that for all practical purposes an upgrade wasn't possible, you had to rewrite the code more or less from scratch. ... The automated code converters provided by Microsoft were next to useless, and the fact that Microsoft went and changed lots of names of objects and properties meant that late-binding code wouldn't work without rewrite because it couldn't be automatically converted at all. ... Lots of people asked Microsoft what that reason was, with regard to that and dozens of other changes to the language. ...
    (microsoft.public.word.vba.general)
  • Re: Why to use VBA?
    ... MS can not keep VBA for 20 years no technology will remain more than 5 or 6 years in computing field! ... The fact is that VB.NET is sufficiently incompatible with the previous version of VB (VB6, from which VBA is derived) that for all practical purposes an upgrade wasn't possible, you had to rewrite the code more or less from scratch. ... The automated code converters provided by Microsoft were next to useless, and the fact that Microsoft went and changed lots of names of objects and properties meant that late-binding code wouldn't work without rewrite because it couldn't be automatically converted at all. ... Lots of people asked Microsoft what that reason was, with regard to that and dozens of other changes to the language. ...
    (microsoft.public.word.vba.general)
  • Re: What are the needs of Visual Basic Express?
    ... >that VB6 can be much easier for a beginner to learn than .NET because there are ... >Microsoft assures us that VB.NET is not a new language, it is merely an upgrade, ... >change whenever Microsoft so dictates. ...
    (comp.lang.basic.visual.misc)