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VB didn't die. It got reborn as VB.NET. Still supported, still used. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/visual-basic/gettin... The classic VB you probably remember got end-of-lifed in 2008, but MS still supports classic VB apps.
And when VB.NET came out came out in 2002, that was exactly when all the types of GUI-database projects VB6 was used for professionally, started being built in PHP/MySQL/HTML/CSS instead. The switch would have happened anyways, but the fact that VB.NET wasn't backwards-compatible made it really easy to switch since you were going to have to learn/build something new anyway -- otherwise there probably would have been a somewhat longer transition period. Microsoft really shot themselves in the foot (but the web benefited).
And then on the hobbyist/personal side, that's also basically when casual developers switched from building fun Windows apps to building fun websites.
So I'd mark it up entirely to web programming replacing it on both sides.
As for what a replacement might look like, Google had created App Maker (2016-2020) that got replaced by AppSheet (2020-present), which is the closest I've found for the drag-and-drop GUI/database aspect of VB6. But those have been very much geared towards business development, not kids learning programming. Maybe some parents here can chime in on what their kids are learning to program in?
There's still no better GUI toolkit out there than VB6 that I have used. It was amazing. Problem is a lot of apps that would have been traditional LOB apps written in VB/C# have moved to the web so demand isn't there's clear advantages to C# as a language over VB.
Linguistically, I think the successor to VB is Powershell. It's the same mashup of inconsistent flags that let you swap between "this is a serious language" and "I'm smashing crap together" with tons of unexpected weird behavior, but instead of being a quick-and-dirty GUI app maker, it's a Shell. Hardcore focus on being easy and productive but unforgivably warty.
As for VB itself, VB.Net just didn't offer much value distinct from C#, so most people who were coding in VB switched to C#.
So if you're an old longbearded MS LOB programmer who started before .NET, and you're still working in Microsoft LOB shops, you're probably doing similar stuff but with C#. But realistically, you've probably also switched to Web.
And the lack of the VB-level ease-of-use in web technologies is a whole other story. All the hoary mess of using a document-engine for a cross-platform application server makes it pretty untameable.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think that’s the sense in which it died in that if you were going to switch to .NET you would probably also switch to C#. The original VB had A GUI builder better than almost anything (even today!) but the UI builders in today’s visual studio support C# as well if not better than VB.
And everything in that IDE was fast and super responsive. Today's IDE are more complex than ever and yet they lack in functionality that was present in VB6.0
Visual Basic's popularity peaks in late 2001. Exactly when VB .NET was launched. Then it drops like a rock. In my memory, .NET overcomplicated VB and yet still felt like a kids toy.
Of course in .NET VB has nearly all of the OO capabilities that C# has, but I think most developers just decided to go “all-in” on object oriented programming and learn C# and graduate from their procedural past.
A lot of colleges taught Java and moving to it or C# in the workplace was a much more natural process.
There are BASIC alternatives and they are fairly strong offerings, but I think OO and functional programming are the standard today.
That means python, Rust, Golang, Ruby, C#, and Java are the mainstream languages.
Does VBA for Excel count? Because if it does then VBA for Excel has reached the"nuclear resistant cockroach" level in finance. You wouldn't believe what sort of processes in very big banks/financial institutions are built using 10 year old VBA macros. In fact, VBA consulting for finance is a very juicy cottage industry at least in Europe to this very day.
On a serious note, I dread excel. If your PC is set to german, excel will translate the VBA keywords to german. But if you want to type them, you have to do that in english and then have excel translate them.
I don't want to accept that crap like this is the standard.
Does VBA for Excel count? Because if it does then VBA for Excel has reached the"nuclear resistant cockroach" level in finance. You wouldn't believe what sort of processes in very big banks/financial institutions are built using 10 year old VBA macros. In fact, VBA consulting for finance is a very juicy cottage industry at least in Europe to this very day.
I once had to update it to optimize (minimize) front-line staff working hours so the company didn't have to pay health insurance for those employees. A real nightmare of a task in more ways than one!
VB (and BASIC in general) has a legacy of being a procedural language. In the late 90’s and early 2000’s, there was a massive push to leverage object oriented programming and design. The births of Java in the 90’s and then C# in the 2000’s were clear catalysts to abandon procedural programming. Of course in .NET VB has nearly all of the OO capabilities that C# has, but I think most developers just decided to go “all-…