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Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

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Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#161

Post by nekeo9jd »

ryanmarsh wrote: post #148
trent_lott wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quickly and easily design and make a GUI program with n real training? VB6 got me into programming as a kid. I mostly use python for stats stuff. I sorta understand how to run up a GUI using tkinter, but it seems like a huge pain in the ass. I'm sure Visual Studio offers the ability to do whatever VB6 could with a GUI, but it isn't obvious how to get there. VB6 was one nice thing - build 'a program' as you understand…

A whole lot of us got into programming as kids because of VB. What do young people have today like it?

No wonder so many programmers stick to boring business apps! ;-)

I got into coding qbasic (meh) & amiga (yeaaah) game engines in the 80s.

Currently teaching kids with Computercraft, to manipulate virtual worlds rather than boring spreadsheets.

IMO that sort of computer work will be obsolete by the time today’s kid are grown.

I’d probably avoid more than basic coding in general anymore and focus on math-y stuff. Just my take on where need will be, and discussing this with education researchers, and other thinkers.

I have a hard time believing we’ll carry as much code from the last couple decades as we had to from the previous few.

So much of it these days is web ui’s with a short shelf life relative to foundational code we shlepped forward in kernels, banking, and complex industry systems.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#162

Post by appleiigs »

bluedino wrote: post #128
pfarrell wrote: post #83

VB was a great and successful language. It empowered a lot of departments to create bespoke programs that, while not having been built on solid comp sci principles, were good enough and solved real business problems without having to involve the IT department. That’s a strength and a weakness.

VB is one of those things that let the determined create useful things. Not unlike Microsoft Access. Instead of actually learning principles and practices, and a 'good' language, they could just hack something together than managed to just barely work, armed with a $99 copy of Visual Basic and a 'Teach Yourself VB in 21 Days' books from SAMS publishing. And by the time they knew any better, they were up to their ears…

On the other hand:

* No need to write a business case with fake ROI figures. No IT committee meeting. No need to teach a “solutions architect” who doesn’t really care to learn.

* Easier to evolve as requirements change because the front line person is fixing it.

* Proof of concept done already when you need IT involved for version control, security, etc.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#163

Post by hoistbypetard »

trent_lott wrote: post #91
kjaftaedi wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think this too, but everything you can do in VB6 you can do in powershell, and do it better. Try/Catch, windows forms.. literally anything you can think of. You can even mix powershell and C# together in the same script. Once I realized I had a better version of everything I wanted, it became my new favorite.

Quickly and easily design and make a GUI program with n real training? VB6 got me into programming as a kid. I mostly use python for stats stuff. I sorta understand how to run up a GUI using tkinter, but it seems like a huge pain in the ass. I'm sure Visual Studio offers the ability to do whatever VB6 could with a GUI, but it isn't obvious how to get there. VB6 was one nice thing - build 'a program' as you understand…

I understand that nostalgia. You might enjoy playing with gambas: http://gambas.sourceforge.net/en/main.html

Or maybe Xojo: https://www.xojo.com/

I think Xojo was known as "RealBASIC" in the late 90s/early 00s and was really in the same spirit (but more cross platform) as VB6.

HyperCard occupies the same spot for me that VB6 seems to occupy for you. Today for stuff I'd have used that for in the 90s, I just stand up a quick little web app and text or email a link.

That's in no small part because nearly all of my wife's computing is done on an iThing and not on a computer that she could readily download and run something on. Unless I want to throw my cute GUI in an app store, it needs to be web-based now.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#164

Post by kjaftaedi »

trent_lott wrote: post #91
kjaftaedi wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think this too, but everything you can do in VB6 you can do in powershell, and do it better. Try/Catch, windows forms.. literally anything you can think of. You can even mix powershell and C# together in the same script. Once I realized I had a better version of everything I wanted, it became my new favorite.

Quickly and easily design and make a GUI program with n real training? VB6 got me into programming as a kid. I mostly use python for stats stuff. I sorta understand how to run up a GUI using tkinter, but it seems like a huge pain in the ass. I'm sure Visual Studio offers the ability to do whatever VB6 could with a GUI, but it isn't obvious how to get there. VB6 was one nice thing - build 'a program' as you understand…

Most people who do windows forms in powershell design them in XML.

If you're interested in a GUI editor, this is the tool people are using these days:

https://www.sapien.com/software/powershell_studio

It's a paid product, but comparatively cheaper than VB6 was.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#165

Post by fortran77 »

mattmanser wrote: post #33
SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s definitely one of the ugliest languages (syntax wise) that enjoys widespread usage, at least in Microsoft land.

Is it widespread? I've never seen anyone else using powershell 'in the wild', admittedly for the last 3 years I've mainly worked alone, but I still see people using CMD scripts. I usually get frustrated with it and bash out a quick cmdlet instead.

I probably write a few lines of Powerhshell every day. All my automation is done in Powershell, including bringing up new Amazon AWS instances, etc.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#166

Post by [deleted] »

trent_lott wrote: post #91
kjaftaedi wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think this too, but everything you can do in VB6 you can do in powershell, and do it better. Try/Catch, windows forms.. literally anything you can think of. You can even mix powershell and C# together in the same script. Once I realized I had a better version of everything I wanted, it became my new favorite.

Quickly and easily design and make a GUI program with n real training? VB6 got me into programming as a kid. I mostly use python for stats stuff. I sorta understand how to run up a GUI using tkinter, but it seems like a huge pain in the ass. I'm sure Visual Studio offers the ability to do whatever VB6 could with a GUI, but it isn't obvious how to get there. VB6 was one nice thing - build 'a program' as you understand…

[deleted]

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#167

Post by orionblastar »

It is a shame that Microsoft never open-sourced cLassic Visual BASIC. Let the fans support it with donations. I made a lot of money by programming in Classic Visual BASIC.

VB.Net is not the same thing, it has C# features added to it.

Now I move to Python from Classic Visual BASIC.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#168

Post by asveikau »

SOLAR_FIELDS wrote: post #34
worldsayshi wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems that shell scripting languages tend to be quite ugly out of necessity? I mean bash is not a looker.

Possibly, though bash is from a much earlier time when shell scripting language design probably wasn’t a very well known topic and bash evolved more naturally from open source. Powershell is much more recent plus had much more complete control over the language to prevent the kind of syntax warts bash has. Even then I would still probably take bash over Powershell for scripting but that’s probably more because of fam…

The first release of bash was in 1989. Shell scripting was already a thing at that time. Csh and ksh were also around for roughly a decade at that time. I think you are confusing bash with sh with this kind of statement.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#169

Post by throwaway5752 »

hu3 wrote: post #153
dole wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“VB6 makes 95% of programming simple and the other 5% impossible.”

More like "95% simple and 5% possible". VB6 can call win APIs and C++ code for when some arcane functionality is needed.

Take https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/oaidl/ns-... and https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/api/winbase/n... and try to sensibly read a bunch of _EVENTLOGRECORD's of varying lengths. "possible" is technically true but charitable.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#170

Post by kungito »

roenxi wrote: post #144
jeswin wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an ex-VB6 programmer, my view is that Microsoft has been fairly supportive of VB users. - The IDE itself was supported for 10 years, till 2008 - The runtime is supported till 2024, which is like 26 years. I think you can get it to work on Windows 10 as well, though I haven't tried it myself. I still see people using VB apps. My view is that VB.Net should never have been created, since it was closer to C# than it w…

The typical working career is 40 years. If 10-26 years is considered an acceptable lifetime for a language all your experience in the languages you use will be forcibly reset fairly early in your career. It isn't going to be major in itself, but becoming known for being a specialist in a corporate sponsored language is a pretty catastrophic career error. Anyone who learned C on the other hand looks pretty clever.

To be honest it sounds pretty not clever knowing only 1 language and having your career depend on it
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