Which Basic?

I developed a building bidding system on 8086 PC computers using QB. The system that I developed is very large and can be customized by the customer for their individual requirements.

When the 80286 and later systems came out, most had no parallel ports and the programs would no longer print.

I tried to revise the software and or provide a parallel port printer port but to no avail.

I have received requests to update my system to a compatible system. There are many "NEW" Basic Development Systems available and I am confused as to which is most adaptable.

My QB system consist of many programs that communicate with each other.
The system is quite math intensive.

I want to "re-develop" the system and add many graphical and custom techniques, such as drawings based on custom end user requirements.

Is there a technical person.person that could advise me as to which Basic is most adaptable to these requirements, and what would that person advise.

I had VB5 but by the time I had started migration, MS killed VB5 and I don't intend to have MS repeat their actions.

Thank You,

Terry Morris
WashSoft Inc.

Hello Terry,
I recall having the same difficulty with my lab software. I had to migrate from QB to VB6 (I think) and then on up. If you think about this in terms of work flow, you may want to think about using a different front end, like excel, for setting up data etc., then use VBA or VB to do your computations. Probably best to compile the VB if it is compute-intensive.
There may be other ways to upgrade the system.
I'm a Civil Engineering prof and would be glad to take a look at it.
Rich Ray

Thank You for the advice Rich.

I tried to go the VB6 way but immediately after I bought VB6, MS discontinued their support for VB6 and went to the new system.
At the time of their decision I was developing my system in VB6 with a programming entity in Eastern Europe. It turned out to be a mistake because they were very poor programmers.

At approximately the same time, the computing hardware people went away from the IDE PC and my system was not designed for 32 bit computers so the printing functions were not compatible. Those factors caused me to pursue other endeavors and shelve my system.

With the current permutations of basic it would be quite east to transfer my system to something like
BBC Basic for Windows. It may be that VB is overkill.

I would appreciate your opinion.

THank You,

Terry Morris

Why aren't you considering VB.Net.

The .Net framework WILL NOT be abandoned by MS - it's got a large future and many of us VB6 (and prior) programmers have embraced it.

Thank You, I will consider that. I suppose that the learning curve is steep.

Sincerely, Terry Morris

There really is no ".Net" but many ".Nets" since it goes through as much or more churn as VB did. There is basically no support for anything older than VB.Net 2005 anymore, much as VB6 "has no support" in the sense of updates. Even 2005 goes off extended support in 2013.

While VB5 is pretty dead, VB6 still has excellent support in Windows. Even better starting with Vista actually, since numerous controls install as part of the OS now as the "Extended Runtime." It will also be vastly easier to move QB code to VB6 than VB.Net, by a long shot. Even the Win8 Developer Preview contains the VB6 runtime and "Extended Runtime."


However, even all that considered...

This is very late in the day to undertake the effort of learning how to use VB6. I consider it viable, but not something to start using so late in its life cycle.

I am a little confused by the statement in the first post about most 80286 cumputers not having parallel ports. I've never saw an 80286 without this port, nor an 80386 or 486. In fact the first system I have ran across that did not have this port was much newer than these and had a multi core cpu.

Not that it has anything to do with the language but I find it very odd to see such a statement. Given that most PCs up to and including the 80486 did not have USB and pretty much all of them had 1 db25 port for the printer and 1 or 2 db9 RS232 port for serial communications.

As for redeveloping the app. VB6 would be closer to being able to support more of the old code but Vb.Net would be the better choice.

I did. Saw alot of those systems without parallel ports or com ports. Sold a ton of them. There used to be a multi support board commonly called a daughter board that was installed on a ISA slot to provide COM1 and COM2 and Parallel port also a joystick game port.

Really? I have never saw one without a parallel port until USB printers started to take over. I have saw plenty without a game port but never one without some sort of printer interface.

Yeah, there were two ways you could buy the motherboards. One way had everything jammed together kinda like todays boards and the other way was stripped down boards for those building custom systems. Reason being not everyone wanted to pay for the default stuff on their board and also buy the custom pieces they wanted. I sold alot of turtle beach sound boards and LOL the top of the line Cirrus Logic 128K Video Boards. The I/O board was needed for the ports since you had a stripped M/b. Later on some things were built in with no option. I still sold alot of parallel port cards with a serial port on it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by tjmnewkneeVB

Is there a technical person.person that could advise me as to which Basic is most adaptable to these requirements, and what would that person advise.

I had VB5 but by the time I had started migration, MS killed VB5 and I don't intend to have MS repeat their actions.

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I would advise you to give FreeBasic compiler a close look. It has QB (Quick Basic) mode that will allow you to compile most of your QB code as it is. I am playing with is and have to say that is it demands serious close look at it!

I have also tried KBasic and I like it a lot. It also has got QB support. It is commercial but is affordable.

HTH

Yogi Yang

QuickBasic is still available from Microsoft.
Microsoft did not kill VB5, VB6 will build pretty much any VB5 project and VB6 is also still available from Microsoft.

Of course VB.Net is currently the best choice to develop windows apps that will need to be supported into the future.