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Microsoft

Visual Basic Developers Revolt Against Microsoft 253

Posted by Hemos from the the-battle-of-the-programmers dept.
daria42 writes "More than 100 Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) developers have signed a petition demanding the software company reconsider plans to end support for Visual Basic in its "classic" form. Developers claim the move could kill development on millions of Visual Basic 6 (VB6) applications and "strand" programmers that have not trained in newer languages."
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Visual Basic Developers Revolt Against Microsoft More

Visual Basic Developers Revolt Against Microsoft

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  • Oi. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:37AM (#11931511)
    I'd revolt too, given that their motivation is a sweaty man who seems to have a single word vocabulary.

  • What's the fuss about? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by KevinKnSC ( 744603 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:41AM (#11931540)
    Does VB6 not work, all of a sudden?

    • Re:What's the fuss about? (Score:5, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:13AM (#11931718)
      No, it's been a gradual thing .. since the begining.

    • Re:What's the fuss about? (Score:5, Funny)

      by isorox ( 205688 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:18AM (#11931750) Homepage Journal
      Does VB6 not work

      Correct

      all of a sudden

      Incorrect
    • I a software engineer with a honor degree in computer science, I have come to the conclusion that VB6 has some unique features that are not found in other language, which allow the creation of professional applications in an industrial setting. Because objects in VB6 have a COM interface, VB6 can be used to implement inter process communication with great ease. Also the event mechanism in VB6 is rather unique in sense that I have not seen an implementation in another program language. It is a very powerfull

      • Re:What's the fuss about? (Score:4, Interesting)

        by arkanes ( 521690 ) <arkanes.gmail@com> on Monday March 14, 2005 @10:54AM (#11932699) Homepage
        The "event mechanism" in VB is identical to the event mechanism of pretty much every other event-based system out there, except that it's weaker. VB does enable very simple authoring of COM, and I have recommended it in the past for that reason, but since learning about PyWin32 and it's amazing COM support I would no longer do that. And, in fact, it is perfectly reasonable to judge a language based on what the average user does with it.
        • Yes. The main thing about Microsoft has done with VB6 (and MFC in VC) is take an rather mediocre system and put an astonishing amount of work into an IDE to make using that system easy -- at least for some things. Which goes to show you can polish a turd.
        • The nice thing about events in VB6 is that any variable that references an object that can generate event, automatically responds to these events when an event handling method has been defined. This is a very simple and elegant mechanism, because it works automatically. In many other languages you have to do many things yourself.
    • Well, I'd say it doesn't work for Microsoft, but it works fine for people who are using it for simple applications that can be build using a two tier architecture. The fact that those applications are out of fashion doesn't concern them in the least. The fact that you can do Y and Z better using a web services architecture is irrelevant to people who are doing X.

      There is a tremendous pressure from vendors to overengineer applications. Whereever the the next arena of competition is, they're going to try
    • No, it's great. VB6 supports all your Windows 98 programming needs!

  • stranded (Score:5, Funny)

    by Apreche ( 239272 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:42AM (#11931544) Homepage Journal
    "strand" programmers that have not trained in newer languages.

    Listen, if you're a programmer who is only proficient in VB 5 and 6, its time to think about moving into another occupation. I suggest becoming a cab driver or farmer.

    • Re:stranded (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I think you need greater inteligence to become a farmer.

    • Oh well. I guess that if you only know VB6 then you are SOL. TIme to sign up for some classes at the local community college then. So what if MS is going to stop support for this "classic" form. I have always thought that VB and Office Macros were the cause of more security problems anyway.

    • Re:stranded (Score:5, Interesting)

      by tacocat ( 527354 ) <`tallison1' `at' `twmi.rr.com'> on Monday March 14, 2005 @12:08PM (#11933576)

      They do have a valid point despite your vitriolic rantings.

      Consider this: How long has VB6 been around? Given the they will no longer be promoting VB6 as a viable language, how would you feel if $SOMEONE were to declare your favorite language (perl, python, java, bash, C, C++) was no longer a viable language and that you would have to learn a completely new one.

      In ten years, how many people do you think will still be writing code in Perl 5 instead of Perl 6?

      I think they are entirely justified in their revolt. It's not about them and their lack of willingness to learn a new language. I am willing to give them some credit. Rather this is indicative of the common historical practice of turning everything over every 5 years.

      When I worked in MS Access I started on Access 2.0. When everthing migrated to Access 95/98 it was a complete rewrite of everything that we had done. With the Access 2000 it's another complete rewrite of the applications involved and we are finding some bugs that simply cannot be circumvented.

      The point I'm hoping to make is that even Fortran code can still be run under Unix if you have no need to change it. But to simply drop a programming language and move on is an unnecessary cost to the company and society.

      Look at the mousetrap. How long has that thing been around without a design change from Victor? Sure, there are other newer methods and mousetraps that have come along, but the old tried and true model is still around and doing well. Similarly, VB6 applications, if they work well and do the job, should not be forced into obsolescence in this manner.

      • In ten years, how many people do you think will still be writing code in Perl 5 instead of Perl 6?
        My guess is all the people who aren't using the Perl 6 alpha release. ;-)

      • Re:stranded (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Ridgelift ( 228977 )
        I think they are entirely justified in their revolt. It's not about them and their lack of willingness to learn a new language. I am willing to give them some credit. Rather this is indicative of the common historical practice of turning everything over every 5 years.

        Microsoft is within their rights to do whatever they want. It's THEIR language. Remember the previous rant on Slashdot about sharecroppers? [slashdot.org]:

        "A farmer who works a farm owned by someone else. The owner provides the land, seed, and tools exch

      • Re:stranded (Score:4, Interesting)

        by npsimons ( 32752 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @03:55PM (#11936435) Homepage Journal

        Given the they will no longer be promoting VB6 as a viable language, how would you feel if $SOMEONE were to declare your favorite language (perl, python, java, bash, C, C++) was no longer a viable language and that you would have to learn a completely new one.

        I would suck it up and learn a new language. That, or get a job with someone who still thought that $MY_FAVORITE_LANGUAGE was still viable (if the language was *that* good, which I haven't tried one yet that is).


        It's part of being a professional. How many carpenters are still around who scoff at electric drills because they like the hand crank ones better? Granted, one of my favorite quotes is "a bad carpenter blames his tools, but even a master carpenter cannot make a house out of rotten wood"; however, I think that the rotting wood in this case *is* VB.


        If these people can't even hack being a real software engineer, perhaps it is time for them to consider a new vocation. Those of us who are computer scientists will appreciate the breathing room and the fact that there will be one less brain dead language to have to dissuade the PHB's from using.


        The point I'm hoping to make is that even Fortran code can still be run under Unix if you have no need to change it. But to simply drop a programming language and move on is an unnecessary cost to the company and society.

        True, but I think that the company and whoever else use that language accepted that cost when they chose a closed, proprietary programming language. If Larry Wall suddenly decides to stop working on Perl, that won't stop it being used.


        If this sounds rambling, it's only because your original post was (and maybe because of the benadryl; I hate allergies). You're arguing two points: that the programmers shouldn't have to learn a new language (false, IMHO), and that old but working programs shouldn't be dropped (true, IMHO). Compounding that, both of these are over generalized opinions, which could easily change whether they are right or wrong based on the circumstances.


      • In ten years

        That's roughly how long I go between learning new languages, although it can speed up some with scripting languages, like VB or Python.

    • Re:stranded (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Bastian ( 66383 )
      Any programmer who complains of being stranded because his old language has died or fallen out of favor and he's unwilling to learn the new language needs to get the hell out of my industry.

      Geez. Some of us actually want jobs, and now we have a bunch of VB programmers or their managers or whatever suddenly screaming that the sky is falling because their jobs might have to involve actual work in the near future.

      I bet these are the same people who were pulling their hair out over the replacement of MS-DOS

      • Re:stranded (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Nykon ( 304003 )
        Do you think the code will just convert itself for free? Many of the people complaining are justified. They are developing and/or running enterprise VB programs for a company. This means many many man hours to re-write,test, implement the new code just to get it back to where it was prior to MS dropping support. To Joe home user, it's easy to say "who cares, learn a new language and get a new job" but with comments like that you lose focus at who has the most to lose. The companies using VB6. It will most l

  • In other news... (Score:5, Funny)

    by lexarius ( 560925 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:45AM (#11931565)
    MS-DOS programmers upset that QBASIC will no longer be supported under Longhorn, afraid of being stranded since they never learned any other languages. Rest of programmers glad to see them gone.

  • Breaking news (Score:4, Insightful)

    by zeath ( 624023 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:47AM (#11931576) Homepage
    Stuff gets old as time goes by and tends to be replaced. This is just a testament to the way those VB developers have been educated - they have been handed a series of recipes for developing applications without any theory or background information, and now their recipes are outdated. They're trying to swim in the wake of a new language (or, in the case of VB.NET, a new interface and toolset for the same syntactical language), and all they can think of doing is scream for help and flail around wildly hoping someone else will fix the situation. Languages evolve. Life goes on. It's the nature of the industry.

    • Re:Breaking news (Score:5, Informative)

      by shufler ( 262955 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:43AM (#11931948) Homepage
      Actually, that's not the point at all. The language itself has changed drastically from 6 to .NET. The problem with applications created in VB6 is that they will not compile using the VB.NET compiler. These developers speaking out are talking about how Microsoft is dropping support for these people. Helping port code from legacy VB to VB.NET probably fits under the category of said support.

    • Re:Breaking news (Score:4, Interesting)

      by shadwwulf ( 145057 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:50AM (#11932001) Homepage
      It's not just knowledge of theory. While the they made their bed and now must lay on it by trusting a Microsoft as the provider of their development platform, it's important to point out that it's not just a knowledge issue.

      One of the major issues is not that they don't know how to port their application, but that the compiler won't be around in a supported form. Without an available compiler the apps need to be ported. Now for anybody that has ever been in the hellish position of having to code a VB app, you will know that you are facing a full rewrite if you want to move to VB.NET

      MW

    • VB6 isNot VB.Net and VB.Net is C# (Score:4, Informative)

      by Frans Faase ( 648933 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @10:16AM (#11932287) Homepage
      In this case they are right to object. VB.Net is not the successor of VB6. VB.Net is simply C# with a different syntax. There is no smooth transition from VB6 to VB.Net. It is not a matter of learning a new syntax, it is a matter of having to a total new semantic. Companies that have invested 50 man year in the development of VB6 applications are now faced with the fact that they will require to trow in another 10 man year just to make the transition to VB.Net. It is simply the arrogancy of Microsoft here, I guess, that they think what is better for their customers than their customers do. It seems that only MS thinks that the .Net framework is a great success.

      • Re:VB6 isNot VB.Net and VB.Net is C# (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 14, 2005 @10:27AM (#11932402)
        This is correct. I have managed to pry my company's flag ship product out of the cold dead fingers of VB6 and move it to VB.Net.

        It constitutued a complete rewrite and rearchitecting (made up word?), as VB.Net is really an entirely new language with a similar syntax to VB6.

        The best thing about VB.Net is that it has the words "Visual Basic" in it's name which causes managers to think that it is the same thing, allowing people like myself to rewrite dying applications in a somewhat better language. (It is *MUCH* more difficult to push for a port from vb6 to java or c++ or something similar)

        However, this is typical Microsoft behavior in the whole "ummm ya... it's time for you to upgrade. no, we don't care if you are still doing fine with your old technology, we need some more money" tradition.

        The really sad thing is that there are many MANY people who earn their living writing VB6 code that either do not have the ability or just don't care to learn a new development paradigm. These are the people that will be left out in the cold. On a personal level I'd love to see VB6 die a quick and merciless death, but on a professional level i think it is stupid to throw away years of investment in a reasonably mature platform because it isn't fashionable anymore.

  • Ah, the joys... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by TuringTest ( 533084 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:48AM (#11931581) Journal
    ... of a proprietary-source based community.

  • Unbelievable (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:48AM (#11931583)
    I am so used to Free Software that such problems seem almost unbelievable. It must be really frustrating to be so dependent on one company who can render your skill set irrelevant by one decision. You might say: isn't it possible for FSF to stop supporting GCC? Of course it is. But the point is that they cannot make it illegal for others to support. Just imagine how much more productive the time spent by those revolting developers would be if they were allowed to support that project themselves. But they are not. They have to beg or threaten Microsoft to support it for them. And that is just not a good business strategy in the long run, when eventually all of the products meet the end of line time. Sad.

  • No surprises (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ross_winn ( 610552 ) * <ross@winn.gmail@com> on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:50AM (#11931597)
    Like MS cares. They have spent a huge amount of money developing .net and c#, and now thay want cash to try and staunch the bleeding. Not that they cannot afford to lose money, but they don't want to lose money if they can help it. besides, if visual basic is the only language you know, can you really call yourself a programmer? I don't think so.

  • VB6 People Whine Too Much (Score:5, Insightful)

    by nberardi ( 199555 ) * on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:50AM (#11931600) Homepage
    This is a problem with some developers they get too comfortable and don't want to learn anything new, and they don't want to loose their job. I have a friend who works with many people like this. They are horrible developers and don't want to learn .NET, because it scares them. From stories that he has told me they shouldn't be programming VB6 code much less programming a VCR. So I am not sure if putting these guys out of work is such a bad thing.

    Also why should Microsoft continue to support a language that they are no longer developing, or using, or plan on using. They have moved into a new area of development, over 3 years ago. The developers that use VB6 had plenty of time to learn .Net or move into PHP, Java, Pyton, etc.

    Stop whining...
    • Also why should Microsoft continue to support a language that they are no longer developing, or using, or plan on using. They have moved into a new area of development, over 3 years ago. The developers that use VB6 had plenty of time to learn .Net or move into PHP, Java, Pyton, etc.
      They should continue to sell and support VB6 because there's a market for it. They should also develop new things that they think are better, and if there's a market for them, then they will sell. Maybe both can sell well eno
    • "This is a problem with some developers they get too comfortable and don't want to learn anything new"

      Given that many Unix types won't use any other type of OS, insist on using only their favorite editor (such as VI or emacs) or favorite language (usually "C") and still love the command line, this inclination is not limited to VB programmers.

  • I'm sure there are people who want support for NT6 (Score:4, Insightful)

    by datastalker ( 775227 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:52AM (#11931607) Homepage
    ...but to be realistic, Microsoft can't continue to support everyone forever. They've added an EOL for VB 6, and they have an upgrade path (yes, it will be difficult) to the better languages they're using now.

    • (Note: I hate VB, but...) One problem is that VB integrates well with COM applications that are not EOL. For example:

      + If your shop is automating MS Office 2000 or XP, VB6 is usually the easiest way to do it.

      + If you have an ASP-based web applicaiton, it likely uses VB6/COM for backend components. For example, you may have purchased Microsoft Commerce Server for $$$

      Yeah it's possible to do COM stuff with .NET, but it's not nearly as integrated and can be rather clumsy. So it is suprising that VB6 would b
      • You're right about legacy COM components and ASP, but for new web applications, ASP.NET usually eliminates the need for using COM on the backend.

        Since all ASP.NET pages are compiled into a class that can call anything in the FCL, there's no performance advantage in using COM components (except for any overhead related to the CLR, although COM can add overhead too).

        As you suggest, however, if you want to take advantage of existing COM components, it's easier to do that from outside .NET.

  • In MMO terms... (Score:3, Funny)

    by keiferb ( 267153 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @08:54AM (#11931615) Homepage
    Can I have your stuff?
  • More than 100 Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) developers have signed a petition demanding the software company reconsider plans to end support for Visual Basic in its "classic" form.

    Sounds to me like Microsoft refuses to kill off VB, and those who know its horrors best are demanding that it be extinguished so that another generation of programmers will not have to endure what they have gone through.

    I can respect that.

  • This just in (Score:5, Funny)

    by Fr05t ( 69968 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:01AM (#11931653)
    Slashdot readers have even less sympathy for whiny VB programmer than Microsoft!

  • Cry babies (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LordNimon ( 85072 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:03AM (#11931665)
    Any decent programmer should be able to pick up a new language quickly. Not only that, but change is part of the industry. If you can't deal with changing technologies, then you shouldn't be a programmer.

    Besides, we're talking about Visual Basic! VB programmers who complain about having to do more work and learn more stuff deserve to have their jobs outsourced.

    • Re:Cry babies (Score:5, Insightful)

      by daviddennis ( 10926 ) <david@amazing.com> on Monday March 14, 2005 @11:10AM (#11932882) Homepage
      I think the main complaint, which I think is reasonable, is that millions of lines of code have already been written in VB 6.0.

      These millions of lines constitute already running applications, many of which have taken years of work. True, they will continue to run as long as people still have copies of VB 6.0 to use. But when Microsoft adds new technologies for, say, interacting between VB programs and Word, the old software won't be able to take advantage of this.

      Products are indeed eventually end of lifed, but generally they are replaced by new, comparable products. I've owned Mercedes-Benz cars for all my life, and the same basic driving techniques I've used on the ancient 1972 280SEL 4.5 work now on my 1991 420SEL. If I walk into the showroom tomorrow and buy a 2005 S500, I can drive out without an extensive retraining course. I might want to learn the new features, but the core driving techniques don't change. All my old skills and habits will still work fine.

      In many respects, VB is actually a very nicely designed environment. The concept was brilliant, despite what all you code snobs say today. I loved VB and then I grew to loathe it, because bugs and bloat made the product I wrote in it much less than it should have been. As a direct result of my VB experience, I grew to loathe Microsoft with a passion, and became an all-Macintosh kind of guy.

      I remember in particular how awful the change from VB 3 to VB 4 was. Every SQL statement in my program - and there were hundreds - had to be found, tracked down and recoded. It was a real nightmare. I can only imagine what today's VB programmers are doing trying to imperfectly convert 6.0 to .net. Even though I no longer use VB, I shed a tear of pity for them and their present fate.

      So I would not be so harsh on VB developers, because converting thousands of lines of code into an all-new environment with completely different designs and challenges is a tough, thankless job.

      No wonder a lot of them switched out of the Microsoft domain. Clearly, you can't trust Microsoft. And doesn't that make most of us, well, actually agree with them for a change?

      D
      • I don't think your argument would apply in this case. Notice that it is VB developers (if you can call them that) that are complaining. Not businesses. The developers can always learn VB.NET (or, god forbid, a language that is actually halfway decent.) It's the companies that will have these problems.
  • VB6 is crap. Not a truly OO language. Your hands are tied to a bunch of high level commands and if you want more features you need to download - sorry BUY - a lot of nonsensical components.

    ... or you can write your own components. But unfortunatly the average VB6 programmer doesn't know how to do that.

    ... and if they did know how to do that, then they'd use C to write those components.

    ... which would kill any reason why you should use VB6.

    So VB6 is crap.

    VB.NET rules. Why? Because it's a wrapper arou

  • Artificial Jobs? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by GeckoX ( 259575 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:10AM (#11931697)
    I'm sorry, but if you're a programmer and you're worried about your ability to program outside of VB6, you deserve to lose your job.

    Sheesh, pleading with MS to prop up your job via the only thing you've ever bothered to learn.

    There is no thing as a programmer who can only work in one language. People who can only use VB6 exclusively, I hate to break the news to you but, you're not programmers.

    Besides, there are way better options now for new development, and any legacy support can still be done with existing tools. MS is not coming to your door to remove all VB6 tools from your machines for christ sakes.

    Damned, if any of my programmers came to me bitching about this I'd likely fire them immediately.
    • Its not the issue of programming in a language other than VB6, its the issue of porting existing internal VB6 and VBA (especially within Excel) applications to VB.NET. This problem is compounded by the fact that many of the 3rd party libraries in use aren't being ported to VB.NET either.

      Microsoft will probably start ripping VB6 runtimes from future versions of MS Office & Windows -- so it is a big issue.

      Similar issues happened during the Perl4 -> Perl5 transition on a smaller scale. It was painful
    • Just taking a guess here, but it could be less about programmers propping up their job, and more about the companies they work for having to deal with a whole lot of clients who are now faced with no support for the applications they've been given. I'm not saying VB is at all superior to more modern languages out there, but I've been involved in a lot of contracts where this kind of thing has happened and it's not pretty, especially when clients are told they might need their applications redeveloped.

    • Re:Artificial Jobs? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by ralphdaugherty ( 225648 ) <ralph@ee.net> on Monday March 14, 2005 @10:56AM (#11932728) Homepage
      Damned, if any of my programmers came to me bitching about this I'd likely fire them immediately.

      The people complaining are owners of a lot of code that won't work under .NET. I am quite sure they don't give a damn whether you think you can fire them or not, they probably employ a lot more people than you do.

      The knee jerks here go on and on about coding skills, but it's the code base that quits working natively unless rewritten that is what is being fought to protect, in other words, a lot of investment. Money.

      I don't code VB, but back in the day I wrote some big systems in DOS Compiled Basic, it's predecessor, which did the job well.

      Nevertheless I convinced a Fortune 200 when I was there to use Delphi instead of VB, which raised all kinds of havoc. The Microsoft Certifieds walked. But Delphi was the right choice.

      I guess Microsoft hired away the Delphi team, wrote C#, and now the Microsofties say C# rules.

      Go figure.

      rd
      • Man I am sick of hearing this freaking argument.

        You've got a codebase writtin in VB6 (or whatever older platform).

        That codebase is in production on whatever system it was originally designed to work on, and thus subsequently deployed on.

        Future support for VB6 is dropped from the current development platform. Longhorn is released and doesn't contain the older VB6 runtimes. (Aside from the fact that _this_ will NOT happen for a VERY VERY long time as MS has ensured release after release that even that anci
    • "Damned, if any of my programmers came to me bitching about this I'd likely fire them immediately."

      That should be "Damned IF I had any programmers working for me and one of them came to me bitching about this I'd likely fire them immediately."

      Seriously, if you really do have programmers working for you and you're not the president of your company, you'd probably face firing yourself for getting rid of your staff without any real justification.

      In most companies that have made it beyond the startup phase,

  • Here goes... (Score:5, Funny)

    by tclark ( 140640 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:29AM (#11931848) Homepage
    wait for it...

    wait...

    Nope, sorry, I just don't care. I tried my best, but I can't do it.

  • Perfect opportunity for Microsoft (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MobyDisk ( 75490 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:30AM (#11931857) Homepage
    Microsoft could open-source VB6. This is a perfect opportunity for them to show that they are truly open. The community could maintain VB6 for as long as they want, and Microsoft could be hands-free. You wanna code in our old dead language? Go for it. Just maintain it yourself.

    I suppose they won't do that because it would bring competition to Microsoft that they don't want. It would be interesting to see what someone would do with it. Maybe make a new language?
    • New language, as in 'a new one based on the old one'. I thik you meant 'Maybe eventually make a language out of it'.
    • Interesting thought, and I had to think about it for a bit, but it'll never happen. Think about it: What's one of the first and strongest projects that would build on it?

      That's right, VB6 for Linux.

      Suddenly, a lot of VB programmers have a migration path to Linux, the last people Microsoft currently has to worry about.

      It's not going to happen, and it's not going to happen precisely because Microsoft has its own best interests at heart, and not its customers.

    • Re:Perfect opportunity for Microsoft (Score:5, Insightful)

      by sahala ( 105682 ) <sahalaNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Monday March 14, 2005 @12:49PM (#11934136)
      Microsoft could open-source VB6. This is a perfect opportunity for them to show that they are truly open.

      This is probably one of the more constructive posts on this topic.

      I don't think VB6 programmers are upset about not being able to build new applications in VB. Since they're on the Microsoft train they'd probably love to take on .net projects since it's the sexy new thing for them. I think the main issue is the fact that they probably have a gigantic codebase built on VB6 to fit some gargantuan business needs.

      Someone mentioned that giving VB6 to the community would be a bad move for MS from a competitive advantage standpoint. This is only true from one standpoint: if VB6 is free, why use .net. Yes .net is probably orders of magnitude better of a platform, but free is free, and some customers would probably love to have at the VB6 platform, even sans MS support.

      So the question is whether the potential loss of revenue for releasing VB6 OS is greater than the value of goodwill and lowered support costs. Then again MS has every right to simply cut support.

      Honestly if I were a VB6 developer I'd consider this a good thing. I'd point my finger at MS discontinuing support then start writing up nice expensive proposals to my customers for migrating the existing VB6 codebase to .net. That's probably a good few years of consulting revenue. Money in the bank.

  • My first programming job (Score:3, Insightful)

    by BenjyD ( 316700 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:36AM (#11931898)
    My first paid programming work was to write an off-line chemical process schedule optimisation and inventory management application in VB6/VBA. I still shudder everytime I think about it.

    Why would anyone miss that language? Let alone bother to sign a petition to save it. If your job relies entirely on a language that your average 12 year old can pick up in a week or two, you're in trouble.

  • I remember guys in bad suits (Score:3, Interesting)

    by wonkavader ( 605434 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:38AM (#11931910)
    I remember sweaty, frightened, forty-year old guys in suits (really bad polyester suits) who were trying to get into microcomputer jobs when I was just starting out as a professional.

    The were mainframe people, and mainframes were drying up, at the time, and they knew nothing about microcomputers. They had been doing the same thing for years, and they didn't know what to do. They looked like a deer in headlights.

    Interviewing them, they kept trying to use mainframe concepts to answer questions about microcomputers. They were... not a good fit. I don't know what happened to those people -- we stopped seeing them after a few years.

    The VB folks seem like the same sort of problem. It's an object lesson on not getting tightly bounc to just one thing.
    • >The were mainframe people, and mainframes were drying up, at the time, and they knew nothing about microcomputers. They had been doing the same thing for years, and they didn't know what to do. They looked like a deer in headlights.

      And now they are in demand and making more than the micro people. Enough people retired that the demand is there, because the schools aren't training them anymore.

      As for VB6, well there are some good things for it. I don't care if MS EOLs it, just make sure that the progr

  • 100 MVP's signed? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by dtfinch ( 661405 ) * on Monday March 14, 2005 @09:41AM (#11931931) Journal
    That's an amazing feat. Microsoft's MVP directory lists only 111 in the VB section. http://www.microsoft.com/communities/MVP/MVP.mspx [microsoft.com]

    Maybe some are hanging out in the ASP (vbscript) or Office (vba) sections.

    • This has nothing to do with whether VB is good or bad -- pay your money and take your choice. What it has to do without is forced conversion of large numbers of apps for which VB.Net provides no added value. Cost of conversion is significant, since VB.Net is not backward compatible with earlier versions. VB.Net also requires .Net runtime, which is ~23MB -- adding to deployment issues. Dropping support for VB clearly benefits MS, but just as clearly does not benefit users -- since when is this a good thi
  • Obsoleting something that works so they can sell new things? It's another Microsoft innovation! And the plot of a recent movie [imdb.com].

  • Wait a second.... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by wandazulu ( 265281 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @10:17AM (#11932300)
    I hope there are no OO purists armed with mod points reading this, but VB is actually pretty decent, at the end of the day, for things like rapid development, interface prototyping, etc. All things being equal, VB is *easy*, and sometimes you just want easy. Yes, you can be easy in any language, but to the non-programmer, VB was the ultimate double-click and get started tool. Learn a few concepts about forms and controls, and you're pretty much set (who here knows VB and hasn't seen an app where every single line of code was crammed into the form, narray a module in sight).

    VB allowed me to write my first app: a little one-screen program that calculated exposure times for pinhole cameras (in VB3). Knew zilch about programming at the time, but I was able to slap it together and it worked. The code was absolutely horrible and for such a simple thing, it had bugs simply because I didn't know what I was doing. When I gave it out to a few people (just the .EXE and vbrun300.dll) they came back with suggestions/bugs and before I knew it, I moved "up and out" and became a professional C++/Oracle developer. Not everyone who works with VB becomes a programmer with a capital P, but some do, and some are simply happy to have scratched that particular itch and glad it came off so easily.

    VB6, honestly, is the only tool I can think of that retains that ease of use with a very forgiving nature ("don't worry about declaring your variables...we'll trust you") to allow the uninitiated a chance to come up with something that may be only for him or her, or becomes the next killer app. If I were starting today, looking for something to write my little pinhole calc app, what would I use? VS.net? I wouldn't know what project to start with. Java? Sure, what IDE? Python/Ruby/Perl? All good, but if I only have Windowz, and am not a programmer, I may not know they exist. I knew VB existed because quickbasic was already on the machine, and the high school student working at Software etc. knew to point me at the VB box when I said "well, I know qbasic, but I'm looking for something to run under this Windows thing..."

    That is my only justification for really liking VB, even after all these years; sometimes you just want the functionality and don't care how it looks and it needs to be done fast (and hopefully with a minimal runtime if it's going to moved to another machine). MS is free to put the .net framework on every copy of windows forever, but try to wrap your head around the classes and concepts if you're not already familar with them. VB dispensed with all of that and was just what it was.

  • They've always been revolting (Score:3, Funny)

    by FullCircle ( 643323 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @10:24AM (#11932371)
    Now they're rebelling
  • VB programmers are revolting ?

    That's just mean....

  • I agree (Score:3, Funny)

    by legLess ( 127550 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @11:20AM (#11932999) Journal
    I find VB revolting as well.

  • I am glad I develop with free software tools. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Captain Rotundo ( 165816 ) on Monday March 14, 2005 @11:55AM (#11933406) Homepage
    I would find it terribly degrading to have to beg a company to please let me continue to be a customer. How totally absurd.
  • When was the last time they release a critical update? MSDN hasn't been touched in years, seems like they only thing they are fighting is the marketing of "You're a VB programmer? but VB is at its EOL. What else do you know?" Both sides are stupid from what I see. VB6 lasts 10 years, so plan for 2002 to be retired in 2012, thats not even that far away. Tell me how 2002 and 2004 are the same but I need the 2002 to compile with 1.0 framework.

  • I just don't get it (Score:2, Informative)

    by Ripley29 ( 644468 )
    So Microsoft is saying they are not going to support it... So what? I've used VB for years (As well as other languages like any programmer worth their salt does), and I've never had to call in a support case to Microsoft concerning bugs in the language... Not once.

    Any problems you would run into with VB are well documented on Newsgroups. Plus, the VB MVPs are complaining about not wanting to port existing code. So don't! If your application has been around for years, it's not going to stop working

  • Real Basic(tm) as an alternative (Score:3, Informative)

    by Tablizer ( 95088 ) on Tuesday March 15, 2005 @12:03AM (#11940707) Journal
    What about switching to Real Basic? [realsoftware.com] I have not used it myself, but some say it's pretty good compared to VB6. I don't know about full compatibility with VB either. But, it may be something to consider at least for new projects.

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