LET MS know you are using VB6

[VB6 Programming]

Originally Posted by VB6 Programming
The reasons Microsoft don't update or open source VB6 are not 'technology' reasons, despite some posters (and Microsoft) trying to find such reasons.

Do you have any evidence to back up that claim? Aside from that, everybody has said that it was a business reason.

Olaf Schmidt answered that in post #35 and I covered some of it in post #18
It isn't technological reasons that prevent the updating or open sourcing of VB6.

You suggest that 'everybody' has said that it was a business reason.
Not so.
Microsoft's Program Manager for VB6, Paul Yuknewicz, stated in June 2014 when declining to update or opensource VB6...

To address the modern needs we would need to go far beyond updating the language. We have to remember that VB6 is not just a language. VB6 is a language, a runtime, a platform library, a tool/IDE, and an ecosystem tightly packaged together in a way that made all of them work well together. We’ve worked with many customers on migration from VB6 to .NET and found that while yes, there are language changes, the dominating factor in migration difficulties isn’t the language differences. Even open sourcing the language/runtime wouldn’t solve the fact that VB6 was thought for a different set of problems, and the fact that its strength came from the end-to-end solution provided by all these five pieces working together. Take a change like 64bit, the complete runtime, tools and ecosystem chain would need to be retooled.

No mention of a 'business reason' there.

Just pseudo-technological "reasons" why VB6 can't be updated or open sourced.

[Shaggy Hiker]

I was only talking about people in this thread. I certainly haven't surveyed everybody in the world, everybody at Microsoft, or anybody else. I doubt anybody here has felt that there wasn't a technological means to update VB6 to 64-bit. That would be absurd, especially for people on a programming forum. How many of us have EVER said "it can't be done."

When people in this thread have been saying it can't be done, it's a business reason, not because it's physically impossible. MS is a business, not a charitable institution. They WERE working on the next version of VB. It would have been called VB 6.5, but they made a business decision to end that because they didn't feel the cost of doing both was justified. If you want something to change, you need to change their mind on that business decision, and this isn't doing it.

Personally, I agree with MS. Whenever people talk about this, they either want it to come back EXACTLY as it was, or come back just like it was...plus this one extra thing. That one extra thing then differs from one person to the next. There are likely a few people who really WOULD like a new version of VB6 with the only difference being that it could be moved to 64-bit. Most people don't want to stop there, though, so what they really want is that the VB6 team be resurrected in Redomondland with perpetual improvements that are always backwards-compatible.

The alternative would be to give it away and wash their hands of it. They don't seem inclined to do so, and I'm not surprised. I'm still suspicious whenever MS does anything open source, though they are doing enough I'm starting to believe...a bit. What do they gain from giving away VB6? In the constellation of critics surrounding MS, losing a few won't do a thing to dampen the chorus. Still, that's the only thing that seems like a possible route.

[fafalone]

@Shaggy Hiker... companies can and do make money on FOSS. Whether the enterprise support would be lucrative enough to justify the costs is an open question, but everyone seems to think it's impossible for it to be profitable. The 'business issue' seems to be that it would take away from the likely more profitable .NET.

==
It's also worth remembering, the resistance to change afaik isn't simply being stubborn for the sake of laziness, it's that there's substantial drawbacks to moving to .NET. What I liked about VB6 was the ease for beginners combined with the power to easily move up through advanced techniques in a straightforward manner; and .NET attacks both ends of those tails. Then there's the runtime hell. And on. If MS had produced something that was as good as VB6 for the types of programs VB6 is still useful for, I suspect there wouldn't have been nearly as much opposition and VB6 would have died out by now.

[VB6 Programming]

I was only talking about people in this thread. I certainly haven't surveyed everybody in the world, everybody at Microsoft, or anybody else. I doubt anybody here has felt that there wasn't a technological means to update VB6 to 64-bit. That would be absurd, especially for people on a programming forum. How many of us have EVER said "it can't be done."

It isn't the people in this thread who make the decision.

It's Microsoft.

And they (or their Program Manager for VB6, Paul Yuknewicz) didn't give a business reason for their 2014 refusal, they gave faux technical reasons.

[VB6 Programming]

They WERE working on the next version of VB. It would have been called VB 6.5, but they made a business decision to end that because they didn't feel the cost of doing both was justified.

Do you have any evidence to back up that claim?

[DataMiser]

Maybe we can get them to give us a new version of DOS and VBDos to go with it

[Shaggy Hiker]

Do you have any evidence to back up that claim?

Yeah, if I looked around, I might be able to find some archived something from those days. Still, I shouldn't have said that, though. My source is more solid than you might imagine, but also a close relative, who I leave out of this, as they don't really have any interest in this debate. I've heard the tale of the demise of VB6 on more than one occasion. It's interesting because of the banality of it all. People here are passionate, the decision was largely not. A group of people took their best guess, fully aware that it would leave some people abandoned, and fully aware that their decision was a guess.

That's the point, though. If you want something to change, a dozen of the same names signing petitions isn't going to do it. It was a business decision to abandon VB6, it would be a business decision to do anything else with it. You have to make the business case, because you've tried the petitioning, and it hasn't done a thing. You tried a fund raiser and it just showed how little support there really is. If this changes, it will be because of direct contact by people who want this to people who can make it happen.

By the way, they didn't give faux technical reasons, they just weren't quite straight. I have no idea who Paul Yuknewicz is, other than that he was the person whose name was on some response to the UserVoice thread. We never do ANYTHING just because it is easy. We only do things because we perceive the benefit to outweigh what we perceive to be the cost. Olaf might say the change to 64 bit is easy, but the cost is non-zero. If MS doesn't perceive the benefit to outweigh that, then even that "easy" thing is too hard. What you got in that response was just a simplified condensation of exactly that. MS perceives a cost, which IS there, though the size is debatable. What wasn't really stated, though implied, was that MS also doesn't perceive the benefit to be greater than that cost. You have to move that needle. You can't reduce the cost, so what is left is to increase the benefit. That's the business case.

[Shaggy Hiker]

@Shaggy Hiker... companies can and do make money on FOSS. Whether the enterprise support would be lucrative enough to justify the costs is an open question, but everyone seems to think it's impossible for it to be profitable. The 'business issue' seems to be that it would take away from the likely more profitable .NET.

I don't see that as the business issue at all. I would say that MS would LOVE to go back to a time when dominating the desktop was good enough. All their recent moves seem to be in recognition that they are doomed if that's all they do. They're out of the mobile market, currently, but trying to worm their way back in. That seems to be the underlying principle behind Xamarin, .NET Core, and so forth. If that's really their focus, then VB6 doesn't play a role one way or another. So, I see their business issue as: We need to find a way to be relevant in the future. VB6 doesn't do that, unless they put in the effort to make it at least as meagerly cross-platform as VB.NET. I don't see them creating a new business unit to support something that is essentially a look backwards.

It's also worth remembering, the resistance to change afaik isn't simply being stubborn for the sake of laziness, it's that there's substantial drawbacks to moving to .NET.

Yeah, that's the business case that has to be made. Converting large projects isn't so easy. Petitions don't do that, though, essentially when they are laden with mis-appropriated studies, strange bot behavior, and the like.

What I liked about VB6 was the ease for beginners combined with the power to easily move up through advanced techniques in a straightforward manner; and .NET attacks both ends of those tails.

I'm not sure what that means. I find it hard to believe that you'd be saying that .NET is better in both regards, though I would say that it is. I used both, and still have programs in both. The one advantage that VB6 offered was the clean path from VBA, which is how I moved to VB6. If you worked in VBA (and even if you work in it now), then both the language and the IDE of VB6 would be very familiar to you.

Then there's the runtime hell.

You mean like dll hell? There is no runtime hell. I suppose there might be for people running XP, or earlier, as they may not even be able to use the more recent frameworks. I don't really know, though. Installation of .NET programs is pretty trivial. It's one checkbox to include a check for, and auto-install of any necessary framework, but the recent OS have gotten the frameworks automatically, so it's generally about as hard as VB6 installs...though you can't use floppies.

If MS had produced something that was as good as VB6 for the types of programs VB6 is still useful for, I suspect there wouldn't have been nearly as much opposition and VB6 would have died out by now.

Had they produced a means to automatically upgrade from VB6 to VB.NET, there likely wouldn't be this conversation. When the upgrade wizard was so miserable, those who had large VB6 projects became trapped. Instead of getting better, the release of 2005 made things worse, and the deficient upgrade wizard was dropped after 2008. The introduction of generics meant that a conversion, if it could happen at all, wouldn't be particularly efficient. Before that, though, it does seem like they might have been able to do a better job with the conversion for simple forms. I realize that the languages are pretty dissimilar, but a better conversion tool does seem like it might have been possible.

[VB6 Programming]

Yeah, if I looked around, I might be able to find some archived something from those days. Still, I shouldn't have said that, though. My source is more solid than you might imagine

If you have some evidence, please provide it. The truth deserves to be heard. Others here will tell you there never was any attempt to update VB6.

By the way, they didn't give faux technical reasons, they just weren't quite straight. I have no idea who Paul Yuknewicz is, other than that he was the person whose name was on some response to the UserVoice thread.

It's surprising that you haven't heard of Paul Yuknewicz in connection with VB6. Here is a Channel 9 video https://channel9.msdn.com/blogs/funk...pport-strategy of Beth Massi (hopefully you've heard of her) interviewing Paul Yuknewicz about VB6. Yuknewicz is described as "the guy in charge of Visual Basic 6."

Yuknewicz states that the number one reason he heard for people not migrating (to VB.Net) was that there was simply no business need or reason to undertake such an effort.

...they just weren't quite straight.

That neatly sums up Microsoft.

[dilettante]

.Net is the handbasket Microsoft is riding into Hell. It was why Vista had to be rushed out, and it was why Microsoft died in the Mobile game.

Will .Net Core ever be meaningful? I have serious doubts. Azure is headed into Linux territory on an escalating basis. The .Net folks continue desperately tap dancing to keep themselves employed, but I suspect Java and scripting are Azure's future.

And don't get me started on the Laugh Bag known as Xamarin. Even when it works the crap it pinches out is a bloated pig.

Of course all of that pales next to the status of VB6. I don't expect this to change until Windows is finally gone, and that might not be too far out. With Windows 10 you don't even get the "5+5 years" support guarantee. All you get for any version of Windows 10 is 18 months (aside from some classes of business and education users who get 30 months):

Windows lifecycle fact sheet

[fafalone]

I don't see that as the business issue at all. I would say that MS would LOVE to go back to a time when dominating the desktop was good enough. All their recent moves seem to be in recognition that they are doomed if that's all they do. They're out of the mobile market, currently, but trying to worm their way back in. That seems to be the underlying principle behind Xamarin, .NET Core, and so forth. If that's really their focus, then VB6 doesn't play a role one way or another. So, I see their business issue as: We need to find a way to be relevant in the future. VB6 doesn't do that, unless they put in the effort to make it at least as meagerly cross-platform as VB.NET. I don't see them creating a new business unit to support something that is essentially a look backwards.

The tools for going after the mobile market et al. shouldn't have been the same tools as that of the desktop. They're just too different, and trying to merge them compromised both. That's a familiar lesson for Microsoft, Windows Phone was a spectacular failure. Mobile is extremely important, but so much business requires productivity on the desktop that mobile isn't capable of, and it's not going away any time soon.

Yeah, that's the business case that has to be made. Converting large projects isn't so easy. Petitions don't do that, though, essentially when they are laden with mis-appropriated studies, strange bot behavior, and the like.

Well, it would be fun to track down Nadella and scream at him and wave signs... "VB7 NOW!!!". Do you think that would be effective?

I'm not sure what that means. I find it hard to believe that you'd be saying that .NET is better in both regards, though I would say that it is. I used both, and still have programs in both. The one advantage that VB6 offered was the clean path from VBA, which is how I moved to VB6. If you worked in VBA (and even if you work in it now), then both the language and the IDE of VB6 would be very familiar to you.

Well I can't possibly see how anyone would find it easier to pick up as a first language from VB6. Then on the other end... its classes cover a whole bunch of advanced stuff, but as soon as you need to do something advanced that isn't covered by them, and/or drop down to lower level stuff, that's what's more complicated than it was in VB6.

You mean like dll hell? There is no runtime hell. I suppose there might be for people running XP, or earlier, as they may not even be able to use the more recent frameworks. I don't really know, though. Installation of .NET programs is pretty trivial. It's one checkbox to include a check for, and auto-install of any necessary framework, but the recent OS have gotten the frameworks automatically, so it's generally about as hard as VB6 installs...though you can't use floppies.

Maybe Windows 10 has improved on this, but I can't count the number of times I installed a program that crashed on execution, had to go lookup the error, find out it was because there was yet another .NET Framework version I had to go install, because Needy.NET.exe only runs with 3.5, and I only had 3.4, 3.6 and 4.0 installed.

Had they produced a means to automatically upgrade from VB6 to VB.NET, there likely wouldn't be this conversation. When the upgrade wizard was so miserable, those who had large VB6 projects became trapped. Instead of getting better, the release of 2005 made things worse, and the deficient upgrade wizard was dropped after 2008. The introduction of generics meant that a conversion, if it could happen at all, wouldn't be particularly efficient. Before that, though, it does seem like they might have been able to do a better job with the conversion for simple forms. I realize that the languages are pretty dissimilar, but a better conversion tool does seem like it might have been possible.

Better? Sure. Good enough for a complex project? Doubtful. It was just too different. If they had I do agree we wouldn't be here, but that would have been because they had produced something that could do what VB6 could in a fairly straightforward manner.

[TTn]

Do you have any evidence to back up that claim?

In post 7. Reference: Upgrading Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 to .NET, by Ed Robinson, Michael Bond, and Robert Ian Oliver, Ms Press, Page 9.
The section is titled: "The decision to break compatibility".

[TTn]

Olaf, thanks for the reply.

Judging from the Video you've posted - all your current development-efforts are based on .NET *.sln Files,
and your GUI-framework of choice (Menu-System, Editor-Handling) is based on .NET-Winforms.
And that's exactly the parts - which MS does *not* provide "opened sources" for.
(and thus a "backporting" to VB6 - only of the Classes in the WinForms-Namespace - that's next to impossible in less than 3 years or so).

No, the IDE currently opens vbp project files. The backporter function opens .vb files individually to be converted. In later updates, it will open vbproj and .sln solution files. However, getting the backporter to covert an entire project is a big undertaking that can't be done easily. I don't plan on doing this anytime soon.

The choice to use vb.net to design the IDE is something that works right now (near future), not at some indeterminate time. Then I will have a good tool to design and work out any new ideas quickly. It will be a fast way to sketch out and test new IDE features, that can be optimized later. Support may increase once people see that this really is possible.

Once this version is polished up and optimized, I can convert the IDE written in vb.net to a vb6 version, ironically using the very software that we will be converting the project with.

Once that is polished and proven to work well, the IDE can be optimized visually with your graphics, and a proper forms designer can be made. I can follow up on that later. There is some code logic in the IDE that one would not initially realize until building it. Abstract code ideas can built and cultured without relating tightly to the graphics. The steps above aren't taking as long as I thought initially either, so I would be more optimistic about the timeline.

Here is a good metaphor. To build a house, you start with the foundation, then build the framework of the walls, and roof. Among the last things, you paint the house.

[VB6 Programming]

In post 7. Reference: Upgrading Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 to .NET, by Ed Robinson, Michael Bond, and Robert Ian Oliver, Ms Press, Page 9.
The section is titled: "The decision to break compatibility".

That doesn't refer to an updated VB6 (or VB6.5 as Shaggy describes it). It refers to VB.Net 'dropping' backward compatibility with VB6.
But it was never possible that VB.Net could be VB6 compatible - those who suggested it could were either naive or duplicitous.

[ChrisE]

Uservoice has moved. Let MS know if you are still using vb6:

https://developercommunity.visualstu...grade-vb6.html

I don't think we have to let M$ know, I think M$ knows, and I also think M$ didn't expect
that Devs. would still (2018 .. open end) use VB6.

my 2 cents

regards
Chris

[TTn]

That doesn't refer to an updated VB6 (or VB6.5 as Shaggy describes it). It refers to VB.Net 'dropping' backward compatibility with VB6.
But it was never possible that VB.Net could be VB6 compatible - those who suggested it could were either naive or duplicitous.

I guess, but it did compile vb6 applications to native code, perhaps with some extra .net ability built in. I would say that a pure vb6.5 must of pre-dated the December 1998 era, when the first NET prototype was created, or shortly thereafter.

[Schmidt]

Once this version is polished up and optimized, I can convert the IDE written in vb.net to a vb6 version, ...

No.
See, the whole point of "stressing that" in my prior reply to you was, that you can't (anymore, from a certain point onwards)...
(convert a complex .NET-project back to VB6, when it includes a whole lot of "visual Elements and Event-interaction")

...ironically using the very software that we will be converting the project with.

... and it will be exactly at this point, where the whole idea of yours falls apart...
(when it comes to "backporting" all the stuff from "System.Drawing and WinForms-based Ctl-Handling + it's Event-System").

I also don't understand your logic... (in terms of "eating ones own dogfood")...
First you initiate and drum-up support for a "backporter-project", so that:
".NETers can easily backport their stuff to the more powerful and better VB6" -
...and then you start developing a "new IDE for VB6" not in VB6, but in .NET?
What the...? Why not use the IDE and language you were writing your "backporter for".

Again - no, "fast prototyping of the easier things" (as e.g. filling a TreeView with the Project-FileNames - and showing code in tabbed Editor-Controls)
that's not convincing enough - not at all (everyone can do that).

If you want to get the more skilled developers "on board", you should not tackle the easy stuff first.
For my part, I'd want proof, that the whole approach will carry through, also for the more difficult parts.

So, when you say that your approach will later be able, to convert "a complex .NET-written IDE-Project (including a .NET-implemented Form-Designer)" -
then you could give such proof (on a much, much smaller scale) - by showing the conversion-result, when you "backport" e.g. this little project here:
http://www.vbforums.com/showthread.p...esize-and-more
or that one here (if you prefer VB.NET over C#):
http://www.vbforums.com/showthread.php?588199

A flawlessly working VB6-code, automatically converted by your "backporter" - which does the *exact same thing* (visually),
as one of these tiny little .NET-projects above... this would go a long way, to convince me (and others I suppose),
that your approach is a sound one.

In fact, you shouldn't do that little exercise, "just to convince us" - but to "give proof to - and convince yourself first",
before continuing with the prototyping of an "orders of magnitudes larger, in the end" new IDE-Project.

Olaf

[Shaggy Hiker]

Well, it would be fun to track down Nadella and scream at him and wave signs... "VB7 NOW!!!". Do you think that would be effective?

Yes. It would certainly be better than threads like the one linked to in the first post of this thread. It isn't quite what I was talking about, but it's along the same lines. What came before was posting comments to a declined thread in an infrequently visited UserVoice forum. Pretty nearly ANYTHING had to be better than that, and the thread in the link isn't more likely to matter.

Well I can't possibly see how anyone would find it easier to pick up as a first language from VB6.

I can't see how it would be easier or harder. I only know my experience, and understand at an intellectual (though not visceral) level that others have different experiences. From my perspective, ANY language is easy to pick up as long as you have references you can go to when you get stuck. What MS does really well is document things, so VB6 was excellent in that regard, as was VB.NET. I barely remember learning VB.NET. I think it took a week to be productive. Javascript wasn't any different (nor could it be, as I had a horrid deadline for going from 0 to published on that one). That's also my objection to Xamarin. The language is buggy, but it wouldn't matter so much if it were documented...and it isn't.

So, they all seem pretty similar to me, as long as they are well documented.

Maybe Windows 10 has improved on this, but I can't count the number of times I installed a program that crashed on execution, had to go lookup the error, find out it was because there was yet another .NET Framework version I had to go install, because Needy.NET.exe only runs with 3.5, and I only had 3.4, 3.6 and 4.0 installed.

Not sure what you are talking about, as there never was a 3.4 or 3.6. Generally, you can run things with any version beyond the target version of the framework, but there were a couple breaks in that chain early on, so I'm not quite certain that 3.5 requirements would be satisfied by 4.0. That was a long time ago, but the big breaks were 1.1 to 2.0 and 3.5 to 4.0, so perhaps not.

[Shaggy Hiker]

If you have some evidence, please provide it. The truth deserves to be heard. Others here will tell you there never was any attempt to update VB6.

Sorry, shouldn't have brought it up. That's a side of things I try to leave out of here.

It's surprising that you haven't heard of Paul Yuknewicz in connection with VB6. Here is a Channel 9 video https://channel9.msdn.com/blogs/funk...pport-strategy of Beth Massi (hopefully you've heard of her) interviewing Paul Yuknewicz about VB6. Yuknewicz is described as "the guy in charge of Visual Basic 6."

Yuknewicz is described as "The Principle Group Program Manager for Azure Cloud Tools". Perhaps he's changed jobs? That video was made ten years ago.

[VB6 Programming]

Yuknewicz is described as "The Principle Group Program Manager for Azure Cloud Tools". Perhaps he's changed jobs? That video was made ten years ago.

He is now. Back then, and in 2014 when he posted faux technical reasons why VB6 couldn't be updated or open sourced, he was program manager in charge of VB6.

[TTn]

No.
See, the whole point of "stressing that" in my prior reply to you was, that you can't (anymore, from a certain point onwards)...
(convert a complex .NET-project back to VB6, when it includes a whole lot of "visual Elements and Event-interaction")


... and it will be exactly at this point, where the whole idea of yours falls apart...
(when it comes to "backporting" all the stuff from "System.Drawing and WinForms-based Ctl-Handling + it's Event-System").

I also don't understand your logic... (in terms of "eating ones own dogfood")...
First you initiate and drum-up support for a "backporter-project", so that:
".NETers can easily backport their stuff to the more powerful and better VB6" -
...and then you start developing a "new IDE for VB6" not in VB6, but in .NET?
What the...? Why not use the IDE and language you were writing your "backporter for".

Again - no, "fast prototyping of the easier things" (as e.g. filling a TreeView with the Project-FileNames - and showing code in tabbed Editor-Controls)
that's not convincing enough - not at all (everyone can do that).

If you want to get the more skilled developers "on board", you should not tackle the easy stuff first.
For my part, I'd want proof, that the whole approach will carry through, also for the more difficult parts.

So, when you say that your approach will later be able, to convert "a complex .NET-written IDE-Project (including a .NET-implemented Form-Designer)" -
then you could give such proof (on a much, much smaller scale) - by showing the conversion-result, when you "backport" e.g. this little project here:
http://www.vbforums.com/showthread.p...esize-and-more
or that one here (if you prefer VB.NET over C#):
http://www.vbforums.com/showthread.php?588199

A flawlessly working VB6-code, automatically converted by your "backporter" - which does the *exact same thing* (visually),
as one of these tiny little .NET-projects above... this would go a long way, to convince me (and others I suppose),
that your approach is a sound one.

In fact, you shouldn't do that little exercise, "just to convince us" - but to "give proof to - and convince yourself first",
before continuing with the prototyping of an "orders of magnitudes larger, in the end" new IDE-Project.

Olaf

If you can make an IDE so easy, then you should prove it. Hard to ignore that contradiction. You are saying it's easy and trivial, and yet we see no IDE progress from you in years. No offense, but let's keep it real here. Then suggest that my attempt is bound to fall apart because forms are hard. Sorry to disappoint. What do you think is hard about Windows Forms designer? As if, I have not already converted simple form examples to see if it is feasible. My word is generally trusted as an article writer.

There will be some work to do with the graphics, since controls will now be simply code classes that can be loaded visually. Loading the properties from the designer file is trivial, so it will just take time to duplicate the rest of the element/control classes and their event handlers. That's also easy but a little time consuming, so perhaps a couple of months or more just for me to duplicate the main controls, plus the extra time to learn your graphics implementation and pack it together well.

You seem confused about the purpose of the backporter. It will help convert smaller files, not entire projects, and I never claimed %100 compatibility for complex projects. Just saving 9x% of the tedious work for the bulk of standard project examples found online, or for example on msdn. Used more for copy/pasting snippets, but will also handle code files. Not project solutions.

Having the namespaces included as a template, will facilitate the backporter, since most snippets of code can be copied and pasted directly without the backporter. Upon compile time, the unused classes are removed. That will be a nice trick option to seamlessly use net code in a vb6 IDE.

I found that writing the initial release in VB6 is kind of silly, since the whole point is that we are updating it. Since it's not updated yet, it is harder to program in for someone like me that is familiar with VB.NET and VB6 throughout the years. I know what you are missing, you probably don't. Threading was a huge factor, among many other little features that are actually quite an improvement in the Visual Basic language. So far, in just 2 weeks of development in my spare time (i work in security field) the majority of the IDE is up an running with full functionality.

[Schmidt]

You seem confused about the purpose of the backporter. It will help convert smaller files, not entire projects, ...

I admit - I'm thoroughly confused by now...

Because I was asking you earlier, what sense it'd make - to develop VB6-Code within a new IDE, which was developed for "Win-only" -
and on top of that as a VB.NET-Solution (with all the .NET-framework dependencies that come along with that still questionable decision).

You answered, that the VB.NET-code this new IDE is based on, could later be "backported":
"Once this version is polished up and optimized, I can convert the IDE written in vb.net to a vb6 version, ironically using the very software that we will be converting the project with."

So, I take it that your back-paddling now (to "shorter code-snippets only") means, that we would be stuck with a "new IDE", which:
- runs on Win-only
- is heavily dependent on the .NET-framework - and especially on classes which are "closed" and Win-only (like System.Drawing and the creaky old .NET-WinForms-Namespace)
- the Compiler it is using, is a "shelled VB6.exe"
- the Code-Editor it is using for VB6-code, is not supporting any debugging-features (not even Break-Points)
- there will be a long time, until the IDE will support a Form-Designer
- what Controls or Widgets this potentially new Form-Designer will feed into the shelled VB6-compiler, is so far entirely unclear
- VB6-CodeSnippets are (preferrably) written .NET-style - using deeply nested Class-Hierarchies (which most VB6 devs dislike BTW)
- these new deep Class-Hierarchies will be covered by a ClassLib (written in VB6), which will try to reimplement only certain NameSpaces 1:1 in VB6-code

As for the last point (which is related to the "backporter"-part) -
since you now say, that only "a few, easier to implement parts" of the whole .NET-namespace
will be supported by the 1:1 reimplementation (hosted in a VB6-Dll)...

What's the point of the whole "backporter-idea", if there is no "full decoupling" from .NET-framework-dependencies?

I mean, when most of the ("non-Hello-World") VB6-executables produced by your new IDE will later depend (in their more complex parts)
on the .NET-framework anyways, (and the VB6-code had to be written in .NET-Namespace-style) - why not develop directly in VB.NET in the first place?

Or is that perhaps "the whole point" you were trying to make...?

Olaf

[baka]

lets be civil about it.
i wish that both of u succeed, im interested more of a new IDE, but im also interested in what this backporter project can do.
but, its better to start a new thread. or those projects are intended for MS to know?

[VB6 Programming]

Back to the OP's post...

Uservoice has moved. Let MS know if you are still using vb6:

https://developercommunity.visualstu...grade-vb6.html

Yes, we should let MS know we are still using VB6 programming. Don't assume they already know, most Microsoftees only know what is in the latest press release.

Here's 3 reasons to tell Microsoft:

1. There is a chance Microsoft will update VB6 (admittedly a slim chance while Anders Hejlsberg is still at MS, but he won't be there for ever). There are no technical reasons they couldn't add the same updates to VB6 that they have already added to VBA.
2. There is a better chance they would open source VB6. Lower cost to MS and they always like to show they support open source (even if MS's open source seems to favor Linux rather than MS users).
3. Even if they don't do either of the above, we need to keep a continual pressure on them to ensure that Windows 10 (and its successors) still support VB6. https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/pre...support-policy

[dilettante]

I suspect that anyone at Microsoft who wants to know how many people have the VB6 development tools installed can easily get the information. If nothing else Windows Update tracks this sort of thing to know when it has to install a corrected runtime and other component libraries from the "just works, supported and shipping" list.

At the same time I doubt any of them would request such stats for anything older than Windows 10. Remember, within Microsoft itself Windows 10 is already quite old and their thinking is further down the road than anything released yet.


With all of the effort to move so much onto Linux in Azure for the upcoming "Microsoft 365" leased cloud service and their work experimenting with "platform agnostic" client software (PWAs) to access it... Windows as we know it may be gone soon. The current support policy means at best we'd get 30 months' notice.

Nutty Nadella:

But then Nadella lost half his audience in four sentences.

“We need an operating system, we need a platform, that abstracts the hardware in that level, that creates an app model at that level,” Nadella said. “Single devices...will remain important, but this meta-orchestration is what we need to do. We need to up-level even our concept of what an operating system is. So that’s what Microsoft 365 does.”

Meta-orchestration? Up-leveling an OS?? What does all that even mean?

We know that Windows isn’t going away. But that’s where the conversation largely ends. The Verge walked into a face-to-face interview with Nadella, asked him point-blank about Windows and its future, and received this abstract answer: “So what is conceptually Windows: it’s always about managing a bunch of hardware resources, whether on the server or on the client, and creating an application model on top of it. We have that now a lot more than ever.”

We all understand that Microsoft might not want to reveal its roadmap, or that it wanted to focus on innovations like AI. But it had a perfect chance to reassure developers and users alike that the platform Microsoft was built upon, Windows, was still the foundation for its future—or that something even better was waiting in the wings. And Microsoft fumbled the ball.

[FunkyDexter]

I've deleted a post because it just descended into a petty insult but some of the ones I've left behind are headed in wrong direction.

There are contentious topics in this thread and people are going to disagree. That's fine but there's no need to insult each other, either explicitly or by passive aggressive sniping. Disagree, but keep it civil.

[VB6 Programming]

I suspect that anyone at Microsoft who wants to know how many people have the VB6 development tools installed can easily get the information. If nothing else Windows Update tracks this sort of thing to know when it has to install a corrected runtime and other component libraries from the "just works, supported and shipping" list.

At the same time I doubt any of them would request such stats for anything older than Windows 10. Remember, within Microsoft itself Windows 10 is already quite old and their thinking is further down the road than anything released yet.

Microsoft almost certainly have more information than they release to us.

Sometimes some of this is released (or escapes?). Such as the recent revelation that VB.Net has only around one tenth the number of users that C# has (after years of telling us VB.Net and C# had broadly the same number of users). We can only speculate whether such revelations have any political reason behind them (from Microsoft or factions within Microsoft).

[FunkyDexter]

On whether the reasons for MS abandoning 6 were technical or business, who cares? I'd personally categorise them as "business informed, at least in part, by technical complexity" but it really doesn't matter. MS decided, for whatever reason, that upgrading VB6 wasn't a viable business option for them. Nothing they have done or said since gives any indication that that has changed.

I definitely agree with Shaggy that these petitions are a waste of time and effort, though. Microsoft simply aren't listening. You can rail against the injustice of that position as much as you like and it won't make a jot of difference except to salve your egos. The better alternative is to do something about it. I'm not sure how feasible Shaggy's suggestion of networking your way into Bill Gate's inner circle (I might have exaggerated his suggestion a tad ) is but at least is something different to try. Or support the likes of Olaf and TTn in developing alternatives. Or learn a new language.

The one thing I can say that you absolutely should not do is to carry on shouting into the void. You've tried that. It hasn't worked.

[jmcilhinney]

Haven't they sussed out that VB6 developers aren't going to move to VB.Net now if they haven't done so in the last 15 years?

I had to chuckle at that being posted in a thread discussing trying to get Microsoft to resurrect a language that they have refused to for those same 15 years.

[TTn]

I've deleted a post because it just descended into a petty insult but some of the ones I've left behind are headed in wrong direction.

There are contentious topics in this thread and people are going to disagree. That's fine but there's no need to insult each other, either explicitly or by passive aggressive sniping. Disagree, but keep it civil.

Let us also not post quotes that are completely fabricated to misrepresent someone's words, such as Olaf does. In order to quote someone, the person being quoted must of actually said it in the first place.

[FunkyDexter]

Let us also not post quotes that are completely fabricated to misrepresent someone's words, such as Olaf does. In order to quote someone, the person being quoted must of actually said it in the first place.

The only quote Olaf attributed to you in that post was taken verbatim from your post 53. I honestly don't know whether the manner in which he quoted you miss-represents your position or not and, if it does, I honestly don't know if that's deliberate or down to miss-understanding. What I do know is this:-

At present you're both slinging mud at each others proposition, which is a stupid thing to do if you're genuinely motivated to extend VB6's life. I worked in sales before I got into IT and one of the first things I learned is that you NEVER criticise the competition. It just makes you look petty and small minded and it turns off your potential customer base. Instead you push the positives in your own offering and rise above any sniping that comes the other way. Believe me, if your offering is strong then people will adopt it, particularly if the competition is coming across as a butt head that they're going to struggle to work with.

Even better, see if there are areas of synergy where you can collaborate and learn from each other. Heck, even MS and Apple can manage that from time to time. If you let personalities push you into silos the chances of any solution being forthcoming are reduced and we all lose out. But you two would lost out more than the rest of us.

[VB6 Programming]

At present you're both slinging mud at each others proposition, which is a stupid thing to do if you're genuinely motivated to extend VB6's life.

I agree. Plenty here would like to see what can be achieved.
Fighting between yourselves just puts people off.

[TTn]

The only quote Olaf attributed to you in that post was taken verbatim from your post 53.

Something odd is going on in this forum, the quote is now missing. I see that the post is edited, but I don't see "Last edited by.." Even my quote of him quoting me is now altered to misrepresent the truth.

His deliberate misquote, said that I claimed that the backporter will be able to convert 100% of a complex .net project. Never ever, have I suggested that even loosely. He had it directly quoted, among other false quotes in this thread. Nobody was fighting, he was just trying to defend his project, and the way to do that is to strike out. I will not be working with him for sure, now that I know is mental state and capability.

[FunkyDexter]

I deleted your post (which was 63 but the subsequent ones will all, now, have "shuffled up") and sent you a pm about it. I'm guessing that's what's causing the confusion. In it it you quoted his post 62.

His deliberate misquote, said that I claimed that the backporter will be able to convert 100% of a complex .net project.

I don't want to get in the middle of your row (except to tell you both to stop) but if I'm being pedantic he quoted you saying "Once this version is polished up and optimized, I can convert the IDE written in vb.net to a vb6 version, ironically using the very software that we will be converting the project with." which is taken from your post 53.

I think reading what both of you has posted probably reveals the misunderstanding here. In the second part of your sentence you're saying you can use your backporter to translate your IDE from .Net into classic. He's assuming that your IDE would represent a complex .net project in it's own right and that your backporter would do all the work for you but I suspect that's not really what you meant. Whether that miss-understanding was deliberate or not is debatable but I will say that it does look somewhat cherry picked. In truth, though, you're squabbling over a pointless minutia in a post and it isn't advancing either of your causes one bit.

Personally, I don't really understand the objections that either of you is raising. As an observer, both propositions seem viable to me but both will entail a huge amount of work. For the record I think it would have been more viable for MS to upgrade VB6 and they chose not to which should tell you a lot about how I view your chances of success. That said, I sincerely hope one or both of you gets to prove me wrong. There would certainly be a lot of takers if you produce something that works.

[TTn]

Nope, the quote/comment he made has been removed. It had the string "100" percent.

[FunkyDexter]

Then that I can't explain I'm afraid. All I can say is that Olaf's post doesn't show as edited and there's no deleted posts (other than the one I deleted). But we are getting some weird double posting problems on the forum so... maybe.

[Eduardo-]

...networking your way into Bill Gate's inner circle...

I don't know much about this guy (perhaps as most of the people) but sometimes I thought: Bill Gates has his foundation intended to help people in Africa... if he wants to do some good to humanity, why didn't he start with his clients?
It seems very hypocrite.

I do not know much about this guy (maybe like most people), but sometimes I thought: Bill Gates has his foundation destined to help people in Africa ... if he wanted to do something good for humanity, why didn't he start with his clients?
It seems all very hypocritical.

[FunkyDexter]

why didn't he start with his clients?

Because starving children need it more.

[Eduardo-]

Because starving children need it more.

I really don't believe much in what those organization do. Children in Africa will be starving anyway because the problem is not food but it has other roots. It does not help much to give a bread to poor people (only if it is accompanied with other solutions -to the root problems-).

I don't believe they could be doing any good, becuase I believe that the things works in this way:

Bible in Luke 16:10

He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much: and he that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much.

Even if you don't believe the Bible, it is logical.
If you don't care about the little, then you lie when you say that you do care about the bigger thing.
Then, start with the small thing, then you'll be ready to do well the more important ones.

I don't believe he could be doing any good in Africa while he is ruining other people's lives with his company decissions. Got the point?

PS: do you have to disagree in everything because we are VB6 supporters?

[FunkyDexter]

It does not help much to give a bread to poor people

I agree that it's more nuanced than turning up with large vatfuls of porridge. It's going to require tackling corruption, investment in infrastructure, tackling a variety of diseases, funding education... I could go on listing a bunch of other areas, all of which will require massive investment.

I'm not a Christian (I'm basically agnostic, tending toward atheism) but I really don't understand how you take that quote and twist it to arrive at the conclusion that a new VB6 is a more needful and deserving cause than tackling the suffering of the third world. I've seen some of the pro and con arguments around this get a bit crackpot at times but to compare your plight with that of the third world is a staggering new low.

PS: do you have to disagree in everything because I am a VB6 supporter?

No. I couldn't care less that you're a VB6 supporter and I haven't responded to anything you've posted except for the last two.