Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#261

Post by dr-detroit » Sat, Mar 14, 2020, 2:29 PM UTC

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…

Use electron then any skills you gain will be practical and you can use edge.js to run MS languages.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#262

Post by gwbas1c » Sat, Mar 14, 2020, 2:31 PM UTC

I started my career on a project that was 90% C# and 10% VB.Net. Most of the work in VB.Net was junk code that I had to refactor; ultimately, it didn't make any sense to use VB.net for that code.

I could never really understand why there was VB.Net. It had some language features that C# didn't have, but they were features I'd never use in an industrial strength program.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#263

Post by dr-detroit » Sat, Mar 14, 2020, 2:33 PM UTC

kjaftaedi wrote: post #164

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…

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.

Oof. I hate powershell studio. It weirdly splits up the files and none of them are .ps1 and they obliterate all good standards and practices forcing you to leave arbitrary code in the project so that theres no way to know what pieces fit with what. Youd sh*t yourself if you saw how the Sapien community handles not blocking the rendering thread that their GUI forms run on (so it doesnt literally freeze up and crash).

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#264

Post by goto11 » Sat, Mar 14, 2020, 2:45 PM UTC

kjaftaedi wrote: post #12

rkagerer wrote: post #6

I loved VB6. Of all the languages and IDE's I've ever used, I've never been more efficient in any other one. As long as MS doesn't break my workarounds to run that old IDE or its EXE's, I'm happy. VB.NET was a great stepping stone, but after switching to C# I never looked back. The only thing I miss is global functions that don't need a class qualifier in front of them. And I still find the Edit-and-Continue debuggin…

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.

Powershell is not an alternative to VB6.

The strength of VB6 was a simple and straightforward syntax and a great integrated GUI builder and IDE.

Powershell has none of that. The Powershell syntax is baroque due to the (necessary) compromise between command line syntax and scripting language and there is no IDE/GUI-builder.

Sure, Powershell is much more powerful in many ways, but that was not the draw to VB6 in the first place.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#265

Post by protomyth » Sat, Mar 14, 2020, 2:49 PM UTC

Microsoft started with BASIC, so this is pretty sad news. I made cash with VB and really liked the whole "buy some VBX/OCX components, hook the together, and ship app" economy. I cannot help but think that this is bad for other reasons.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#266

Post by galangalalgol » Sat, Mar 14, 2020, 2:57 PM UTC

gambiting wrote: post #228

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…

Yeah VB got me into programming as well, there was a book literally called "programming for kids", it came with a copy of Visual Studio 6 and it was a few simple things like making a calculator, making a simple pong clone etc....that was the best thing as a 10 year old. Now I'm a professional C++ programmer, so....yeah, thanks VB! We'll miss you.

I learned with turbo c++ compiler yellow on blue on dos. But quake c was my formative nostalgic experience.

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#267

Post by _bxg1 » Sat, Mar 14, 2020, 2:58 PM UTC

xmprt wrote: post #177

_bxg1 wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HTML/JavaScript. That has the shortest start-making-a-GUI story (plain JavaScript; React/Webpack/etc. absolutely do not have this level of accessibility).

I'd say Vue is a good stepping stone to other frameworks as well. I feel more productive using Vue than pure Javascript.

It is a good stepping-stone, but it still isn't on Visual Basic's level of accessibility

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#268

Post by coretx » Sat, Mar 14, 2020, 3:39 PM UTC

Does this include VBA, virtual basic for applications? If so, what would Microsoft's preferred alternative be ?

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#269

Post by bullen » Sat, Mar 14, 2020, 3:43 PM UTC

OT: Does anyone know the legal implications of redistributing the cl.exe compiler? Visual Studio is so clunky, but the compiler actually works well!

Re: Microsoft plots the end of Visual Basic

#270

Post by erel » Sat, Mar 14, 2020, 4:13 PM UTC

The spirit of VB continues to live and prosper in B4X. B4X is a cross platform, native, RAD tool for mobile and desktop apps. There is a large community of B4X developers and many of them were previously VB developers. Most of the tools, including B4A - native Android apps, are completely free and the framework is open source. You are all welcome to try it.