What if there was a NEW vb6

Don't they already have that? I can't make myself into a novice again, so I can't be certain, but VB.NET sure seems as easy as VB6. The only thing that it is really lacking is that I would expect that a lot of VB6 programmers started with VBA, and no longer have that route. For my part, I think I would have picked up .NET faster than VB6, because I learned C++ early on, and really liked the OO model. I was always trying to get VB6 to appear more OO, though you could only go so far with that, since the language didn't allow much.

What I think will bring in novices the quickest is gratification. The ability to create a Hello World application rapidly is a real plus. That's not so easy to do with C/C++, but is equally easy to do in VB6 and VB.NET (and C#, for that matter). The problem is that it may be even easier to do in HTML. The point is that there are sufficiently simple tools to draw in novices, but MS no longer dominates 90% of computing devices out there and that has nothing to do with the presence or absence of any particular language or suite of languages. There is no threat to Windows on the desktop. There is no success for Windows off the desktop. No language is changing that.

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Originally Posted by MikiSoft

In fact VB6 enabled the client to also be the programmer. A tool like that was clearly a threat to the programming community.

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I find this an absurd statement. First - when my clients start giving me programming suggestions I'm in trouble. Second - it's paranoid to think this was a real world concern/strategy!

Matter of fact you are giving MS way too much credit for the state of programming in the world. PC's and VB2-3-4-5-whatever were ignored by the business community for years. There were minicomputers and mainframes around for decades with us programmers already aware of how to solve problems for clients with code.

Until real database capability came along (MS SQL 2000) I personally ignored the PC realm. And MS had to buy that product.

My clients are chomping at the bit to switch from my 15 year old VB6 UI to my new web based UI - we're talking tax collectors at town halls - payroll clerks - all kinds of municipal applications.

VB6 didn't do anything special for my customers.

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All I read currently is how MS needs a win for Windows 10 and for that they need a large user base to (thus the free upgrade) to inspire developers to make programs for Windows 10.

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It's not developers - it's everyone. I can serve up apps in browsers - I can serve up apps on Android devices. I'll eventually do ios stuff. That's what business is looking for right now - not some VB6 long-in-the-tooth solution from a decade ago. MS has to somehow stay relevant - that is what the free upgrade is imo - and VB6 does not give them any props in that game.

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Originally Posted by szlamany

I find this an absurd statement. First - when my clients start giving me programming suggestions I'm in trouble. Second - it's paranoid to think this was a real world concern/strategy!

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I didn't disagree with that statement as much as you. I think he has a real point there, though not stated quite right. There was a goal with macros, VBA, BASIC, and early VB that was to make it easier for the average user to do programming. That never happened, of course. What DID happen was that some subset of users dipped their toes into the pool and found it to their liking. Most clients didn't end up doing any coding because they were either afraid of the water or dipped their toes in and found it not to their liking. So, those languages kind of allowed the clients to be the programmers, but in practice they tended to act as sieves to filter out an interest in programming.

Secondly, there ARE people who would be threatened by this. Such behavior is seen in any even vaguely exclusive group. There will be some who want it to be more exclusive, and will be threatened by others joining. This can be seen in programming to some extent in certain cartoons and the like, so the feeling is there. I don't think it's either widespread or significant, but it does exist.

So, I don't think the statement is absurd, I just don't think it was stated quite right.

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Matter of fact you are giving MS way too much credit for the state of programming in the world. PC's and VB2-3-4-5-whatever were ignored by the business community for years. There were minicomputers and mainframes around for decades with us programmers already aware of how to solve problems for clients with code.

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As DDay would say: Pffft, you guys is OLD!!

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I'll eventually do ios stuff.

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You'll be sorrrrryyyyyyy.

Wow, people are still jiving over VB6 ? Jesus Christ!! :ehh:

What ELSE is there to do?

How about...

http://www.vbforums.com/showthread.p...sn-t-a-new-VB6

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Originally Posted by MikiSoft

A good comment by Chuck:

Lots of folks wonder why MS moved away from VB6 (or as they say moved on). I think the decision was partnered with the profession of programming. VB from beginning to VB6 made windows programming accessible to almost anyone. Not toss away programs but science and business all the way up to corporate and industrial type programs. A VB6 programmer didn't have to be a computer science graduate or have any MS programming certificates to make a living coding real world money making apps. In fact VB6 enabled the client to also be the programmer. A tool like that was clearly a threat to the programming community. MS would rather relegate "anyone programming" to useless programming using SmallBasic.

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I take beef with this statement. I'm not a CS major or certified in MS technology. I started with vba and eventually moved into vb.net. I was the "client" that you speak of. I write code every day now (outside of IT) to supplement mainframe systems. I used to do this with macros in excel, then vba in access databases, and now vb.net. All I care about is delivering a solution, and vb.net has enabled me to quickly and easily do that. The control, functionality, and scalability offered far surpasses anything else I have used including VBA.

Microsoft has in no way made it more difficult to get the job done. The language is just an end to a means.

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Originally Posted by jayinthe813

I take beef with this statement. I'm not a CS major or certified in MS technology. I started with vba and eventually moved into vb.net. I was the "client" that you speak of. I write code every day now (outside of IT) to supplement mainframe systems. I used to do this with macros in excel, then vba in access databases, and now vb.net. All I care about is delivering a solution, and vb.net has enabled me to quickly and easily do that. The control, functionality, and scalability offered far surpasses anything else I have used including VBA.

Microsoft has in no way made it more difficult to get the job done. The language is just an end to a means.

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This would fall on deaf ears. All this whining over VB6 is not actually about how "perfect" it was, its about some misguided feeling of betrayal over the decision to halt development of VB6. More practical people would stew for a while and simply move on but the less mature people would make threads like this and continue to cry about it for decades after. This thread is really nothing more than a childish response to the cold pragmatism of the world. No true professional would actually waste time on a ridiculous venture to revive dead tech for no other reason than their own personal discomfort.

<Edited ... Dont know how to delete it >

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Originally Posted by MikiSoft

A good comment by Chuck:

Lots of folks wonder why MS moved away from VB6 (or as they say moved on). I think the decision was partnered with the profession of programming. VB from beginning to VB6 made windows programming accessible to almost anyone. Not toss away programs but science and business all the way up to corporate and industrial type programs. A VB6 programmer didn't have to be a computer science graduate or have any MS programming certificates to make a living coding real world money making apps. In fact VB6 enabled the client to also be the programmer. A tool like that was clearly a threat to the programming community. MS would rather relegate "anyone programming" to useless programming using SmallBasic.

All I read currently is how MS needs a win for Windows 10 and for that they need a large user base to (thus the free upgrade) to inspire developers to make programs for Windows 10. I think MS fails to realize what made Windows great (in in many cases indispensable) in the past (and even now) was the vast world wide use of VB6 and the many "novice" and professionals programming windows apps because of not only the RAD but the ability to scale from RAD all in the same VB6 IDE.

MS needs an active novice to professional development platform again and it would do well to bring back VB6 with some enhancements to work in 64bit and with the new OS 7-10.

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Too late.

Billions of small beasts (smartphones) are out there , and they are hungry for data.

And somehow they are feeded.

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Originally Posted by Niya

More practical people would stew for a while and simply move on but the less mature people would make threads like this and continue to cry about it for decades after.

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I agree. The only thing we should point out is, however, what we mean by "moving on". To me, today's developers cannot ignore the proliferation of operating systems on the market. So, moving on actually means being able to develop applications for the major OSs: Windows and OS X for desktop computers (Linux has very little commercial potential), and Android and iOS for tablets and smartphones. The only programming languages that should be taken into consideration are the ones which allow the programmer to develop software for all of the platforms. Personally, I'm happy to have abandoned VB6 and switched to Delphi as the ecosystem of my apps has now expanded considerably.

I think that we can ignore proliferation on the desktop. Linux and OS X both seem to have a perpetual small share, but nothing huge. The growth area is mobile.

I actually heard somebody on the news yesterday try to suggest that Microsofts goal with Win10 is to get people to come back to the desktop!! Does anybody think that MS believes a desktop OS could "bring people back" from mobile? That just seems like a ludicrous idea. I think they can coexist, but the only way I see MS destroying mobile is not via software, it's via hardware. When we get to the point that the power of the desktop is found in the form factor of a phone, then doing away with mobile OS would be possible, but not until then.

The little bit most people ever do can be done on a mobile device. Most phones have grown to a size that lets them serve as canoe paddles in a pinch, cannibalizing much of the tablet market as well.

This means desktop computers as we know them will probably become speciality devices, and the same might be true for dedicated non-phone tablets. Laptops will probably really become niche products since they have most of the disadvantages of a desktop with few of the advantages.

IMO Microsoft Lightswitch is a far easier-to-use RAD environment than VB5 (then VB6) ever was.
If you want to throw together business applications, that is the way to go.

Ugh. A weird IDE designer, an ad-hoc "framework" that has radically changed at least once, old ASP.Net 4.0, and the shambling nag of the deprecated Silverlight.

It’s 2015, and LightSwitch is dead… Now what?

Yep, hitching my career to that star... not!

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Originally Posted by dilettante

The little bit most people ever do can be done on a mobile device. Most phones have grown to a size that lets them serve as canoe paddles in a pinch, cannibalizing much of the tablet market as well.

This means desktop computers as we know them will probably become speciality devices, and the same might be true for dedicated non-phone tablets. Laptops will probably really become niche products since they have most of the disadvantages of a desktop with few of the advantages.

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I agree with that, but I also think things could be different when a mobile phone has the computing power of a desktop (you know it's coming, it just hasn't gotten here, yet).

We have yet to use a tablet for a canoe paddle, but we do have some tablets that would work fairly well for that, and now that you mention it, it's not a bad idea. We have some iPads in LifeProof cases for use in the field. For some reason, Apple designed the iPad with a crazy-low maximum operating temperature. At 90 degrees (F), it will shut down. That's not an unreasonable temperature to reach even in Idaho, so sometimes we have to dunk the tablets regularly to keep them operating. Using them as paddles would therefore serve double duty.

Nothing like making lemonade out of lemons, huh?

On a personal note:

I represent the aging segment of technological users.

I do not have microscopic vision or teeny tiny fingers.
cell phones are useless for me as a web portal.

Tablets unless they are huge are also difficult for me to use.

With diabetes I have numbness in my extremities, so I am constantly mistakenly swiping bad information with touch interfaces.

These are a few of the reasons I stick to a desktop.

Carp, Carp, Carp... and get off my lawn you dang kids.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

I agree with that, but I also think things could be different when a mobile phone has the computing power of a desktop (you know it's coming, it just hasn't gotten here, yet).

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I think we've already crossed that bridge.

If we use Apple as a model (which is easy since they have very predictable mobile and desktop hardware), their mobile chips are consistently competitive with mid-range Apple laptops from 3-4 years previous. If you want hard numbers, the A7 in the iPhone 5s (September 2013) was comparable performance-wise to the Core 2 Duo in the fall 2010 MacBook Air. The gap between mobile and desktop CPUs actually decreased with the iPhone 6, thanks to a combination of Apple's aggressive hardware development and Intel's delayed rollout of new CPUs.

What makes the comparison even more incredible is remembering that a laptop/desktop CPU and a mobile CPU have totally different thermal constraints. If you look at the far more relevant performance-per-watt metric, mobile CPUs already outperform desktop CPUs in many usage scenarios. GPU performance is also remarkably similar for the average phone vs average integrated-GPU desktop, given that most smartphones already drive desktop-class displays.

Sure, there will always be a group of desktop CPU users (gamers, etc) who need the latest and greatest that Intel has to offer, and for them, mobile hardware may never be competitive. But for the average user, their phone/tablet already matches - or possibly even exceeds - the Windows 7 PC they're likely using.

IMO, mobile computing power is no longer a problem for the average consumer. The form factor is, which is why owning a laptop/desktop is still a "necessity" for most.

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IMO, mobile computing power is no longer a problem for the average consumer. The form factor is, which is why owning a laptop/desktop is still a "necessity" for most

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You might be right. If so the only thing stopping us using our phones as desktops is the docking technology.

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Originally Posted by Gruff

On a personal note:

I represent the aging segment of technological users.

I do not have microscopic vision or teeny tiny fingers.
cell phones are useless for me as a web portal.

Tablets unless they are huge are also difficult for me to use.

With diabetes I have numbness in my extremities, so I am constantly mistakenly swiping bad information with touch interfaces.

These are a few of the reasons I stick to a desktop.

Carp, Carp, Carp... and get off my lawn you dang kids.

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Same here... which is why I went with the Nexus 6 when getting my most recent phone. It's got the larger (6" diag) screen... the OSK is subsequently larger ... I type with a lot fewer mistakes, and I can make stuff larger when I need to w/o sacrificing screen real estate.

-tg

I am still using a Samsung Galaxy S2.
About all I can do with it is make calls.
I use the voice translator to text to avoid having to thumb type.

On a side note I have my kindle font set to about 1/4".
Less text per page, but I can read it.

I was on the Galaxy III - for three years - it was the first and only phone I've owned that went the full distance of the contract and then some... the only reason I moved to the N6 was because I was starting to have battery & performance issues with it.


-tg

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Originally Posted by FunkyDexter

You might be right. If so the only thing stopping us using our phones as desktops is the docking technology.

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Well, I think it isn't so much that as a mental shift. I'm mostly in agreement with Tanner_H, but not entirely. Apple is a pretty good example, but their share of the desktop is a stagnant minority. The majority of desktop users are still using Windows, and since Windows phone is...pretty much a joke, the comparison isn't quite there, yet. The CPU power of a phone is really impressive, but you can't run Windows on a phone because the CPU is a different architecture that is focused on low power. The code won't load and run.

What I expect is that, as chips improve, we will have a device that CAN run Windows (and not because MS ports the code to some other chip architecture). We already have that, to some extent, in tablets. What I'm not sure that we have is the mindset that your tablet IS your desktop. At a recent conference, lots of the presentations ran off of Surfaces, so people are coming around, but I want to have one device. One device at the office, which I then unplug when I leave the desk. One device that allows me multiple monitors when I plug it into a docking station and a tablet (or light laptop, really) when I'm on the road. One device so that when Gruff swipes information, it isn't JUST bad information, but ALL of it (he may mistakenly swipe bad information, now, but if you had one device he could swipe the whole thing and decide later what was good and what was bad).

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

One device so that when Gruff swipes information, it isn't JUST bad information, but ALL of it (he may mistakenly swipe bad information, now, but if you had one device he could swipe the whole thing and decide later what was good and what was bad).

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No clue as to what you mean by that. I was speaking about the interface. With a touch screen phone I do not get the correct feature in many cases when tapping on the screen or conversely just handling the phone will accidentally launch features or apps I don't want when making a call.
Trying to use the virtual keyboards is an ugly experience. Press B I get V, Etc...

Granted it has to do with my health and age but even so...

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No clue as to what you mean by that

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Racoons are famous for swiping stuff. Don't come over all innocent now.:D

I know what you mean about touch screen, though, and I said in another thread that I think it's being marketed beyond it's actual capability at the moment. It's certainly better than the various control mechanisms for mini-devices that came before (you'd be hard pressed to operate a modern smart phone with an old school d-pad) but it's still far from a perfect experience.

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The CPU power of a phone is really impressive, but you can't run Windows on a phone because the CPU is a different architecture that is focused on low power.

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Yeah, the docking technology argument felt wrong when I made it (it would be such an easy gap to close) but it did seem the obvious conclusion to draw from Tanner's post. Power's an interesting point in that our capacity to store energy in a solid state is still a limiting factor on so much we do and may still be causing us to use the "wrong" hardware technology on devices if we're hoping for a unified experience.

I'm not sure I buy the psychology argument, though. I never cease to be amazed at how readily people will switch their mental position in order to consume a useless gadget so I don't see why we'd be so reticent to do so for a useful one.

All of which begs the question: why aren't we there yet? I do wonder how big a factor the lack of a unified OS is. MS are the only people offering one and it took a pretty good drubbing on the desktop and barely even got noticed on mobiles. Win10 might gain more traction but I'm not convinced it's going to be enough.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

I think that we can ignore proliferation on the desktop. Linux and OS X both seem to have a perpetual small share, but nothing huge. The growth area is mobile.

I actually heard somebody on the news yesterday try to suggest that Microsofts goal with Win10 is to get people to come back to the desktop!! Does anybody think that MS believes a desktop OS could "bring people back" from mobile? That just seems like a ludicrous idea. I think they can coexist, but the only way I see MS destroying mobile is not via software, it's via hardware. When we get to the point that the power of the desktop is found in the form factor of a phone, then doing away with mobile OS would be possible, but not until then.

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I believe that desktop computers will never disappear, simply because they are ideal for office work. In the school I work for, we make large use of iPads in the classrooms, but when it comes to preparing exercises for our students, filling in application forms or writing any documents in MS Word, we go to our offices and use our PCs or Macs. Don't be so sure OS X only has a small share on the desktop. A couple of years ago, the vistors to my Web site who had a Mac were less than 5%. This year they are about twice as many.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

What I'm not sure that we have is the mindset that your tablet IS your desktop. At a recent conference, lots of the presentations ran off of Surfaces, so people are coming around, but I want to have one device. One device at the office, which I then unplug when I leave the desk. One device that allows me multiple monitors when I plug it into a docking station and a tablet (or light laptop, really) when I'm on the road.

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Originally Posted by FunkyDexter

All of which begs the question: why aren't we there yet? I do wonder how big a factor the lack of a unified OS is. MS are the only people offering one and it took a pretty good drubbing on the desktop and barely even got noticed on mobiles. Win10 might gain more traction but I'm not convinced it's going to be enough.

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IMO, the more relevant question is: why do you assume that unification is a better thing than specialization? Why is "one OS to rule them all" better than "separate OSes with separate strengths"?

I have a different perspective on this. Before I went all-in on the Apple ecosystem, I was mainly a Linux user. Between 2009 and 2013, my phone was a Nokia N900, a phone that I adored not just for the typically great+eclectic Nokia hardware (slide-out keyboard! stylus! weird built-in features like FM and infrared transmitters!) but because it ran Maemo, a full-blown version of Linux.

Even on its 2009-era phone hardware, the N900 could run just about any desktop Linux software. Whipping out the full version of something like OpenOffice was a neat parlor trick, but within 30 seconds, you realize something obvious: there's not actually much point to running desktop software on a phone. Even if an alternate or adaptive interface is available, the usage models are so completely different that it's obviously preferable to have two versions of the software, versions that emphasize the strengths of whatever form factor you're using.

To stick with OpenOffice as an example, on the desktop an install takes something like 400 mb, 390 of which is niche features that you use every once in a blue moon. On a phone, I'd much rather have a 10 mb version that emphasizes battery life and brevity over "everything and the kitchen sink", even when the phone is physically capable of running the full version. Same for everything from a media player to a photo editor to a web browser.

So for me, convergence is a red herring. It's no different from the way we all have toasters and microwaves and blenders in our kitchens, specialized devices that do specialized jobs just fine, instead of an all-in-one magical kitchen gadget that does all those tasks equally poorly.

With my current Macbook / iPhone / iPad assortment, if I get a text message or phone call, it pops up on all devices and I can use whichever one is convenient to answer/reply. I can use the stripped-down mobile version of Numbers (Apple's Excel) to read and review spreadsheets, or I can pop onto the laptop to do hardcore editing or revisions. Fundamental tasks like web browsing are handled by browsers that emphasize different things: on the phone, battery life + readability, vs performance and extensibility on the laptop. But my passwords and bookmarks and settings are all happily synched across all devices. I can keep my full music collection on the laptop, which has a nice big hard drive, but on my phone I prefer to use the cloud to stream whatever music I'm in the mood for on a given day, to avoid bogging down the device with albums I may only listen to once a year.

Anyway, after trying both models, I prefer the Apple model: different devices that do different things well, but they share relevant information via a mix of local networking and the cloud. I honestly don't want my laptop/desktop constrained by mobile device limitations, regardless of how powerful mobile hardware gets. (There will always be different constraints in a passively cooled device vs an actively cooled laptop/desktop, let alone the advantages offered by a larger physical size. Think of it this way: however powerful mobile hardware gets, you'll always be able to cram 20x of that hardware into a box the size of a desktop!)

Now if Apple could just give me a phone with the iPhone's CPU+GPU+screen, and the hardware keyboard and weird niche features of my 6-year old Nokia, I'd be a truly happy man. (grumble touchscreen keyboards are the worst grumble grumble)

The so-called "unified Windows" both is and isn't unified. And it has nothing at all to do with the CPU architecture.

The ill-fated Windows RT was nothing more or less than plain old Windows NT with the desktop restricted so that only "Microsoft blessed" desktop applications could be installed there. Most Microsoft and nearly 100% of 3rd party software was only allowed for the WinRT subsystem.

The fact that it was only released on ARM-based systems was nothing but a marketing choice. Windows RT for x86 and x64 was perfectly possible, you just couldn't buy it because Microsoft never released it.


The claimed "unification" just means that Windows Phone (Windows CE based) was killed off. It was replaced by "Windows Phone 8" which was really just Windows RT offered for both ARM and x86 phones... with almost every application running in WinRT because Microsoft finally rewrote their Office, etc. applications for WinRT.

Windows 10 is the same thing, renumbered. Windows 10 Mobile is just a Windows NT operating system with the desktop locked down so you can only run WinRT applets. Just as before it can run on ARM, x86, and x64. The only thing new is that Microsoft makes it available for all 3 architectures.

However you can only install and run desktop applications in the desktop editions of Windows 10. Everything else is WinRT/Metro, which sadly hasn't been discarded yet in order to keep the vain hope of Windows-based phones alive.


This can all be confusing if you don't realize that Windows RT and WinRT refer to two entirely different concepts.

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Originally Posted by esposito

I believe that desktop computers will never disappear, simply because they are ideal for office work. In the school I work for, we make large use of iPads in the classrooms, but when it comes to preparing exercises for our students, filling in application forms or writing any documents in MS Word, we go to our offices and use our PCs or Macs. Don't be so sure OS X only has a small share on the desktop. A couple of years ago, the vistors to my Web site who had a Mac were less than 5%. This year they are about twice as many.

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I agree that there is a lot more OS X out there today than a lot of people living under the Microsoft Dome realize.

What I'd add is that two of my newer clients are small municipalities. While my work isn't in their schools, they have combined IT groups into one and this has had a spillover efect. At this point nearly all of their servers are Linux-based or in the Cloud, tablets are overwhelmingly Android with iPads here and there, and a lot of ChromeBook and ChromeBox devices have replaced their old desktops aside from a few Mac machines and a very few Linux desktops.

The only Windows left in these places are a few legacy servers and a small number of desktops used by software developers.


Today on the radio some Wall Street guy said Windows was on 97% of computing devices in 2000 and that has dropped to 20% today. I'm not sure it isn't an exaggeration but I believe it is the trend.

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Originally Posted by Tanner_H

With my current Macbook / iPhone / iPad assortment, if I get a text message or phone call, it pops up on all devices and I can use whichever one is convenient to answer/reply.

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This is one benefit of a centrally-controlled device ecosystem.

Since Microsoft long ago lost the mobile market when they killed off Windows Mobile 6.x they will never have the ability to offer this. That doesn't mean it isn't possible to cobble something similar together with the viable mobile platforms, but it can't be as graceful because they don't have the necessary level of control.

Part of this can be cobbled together yourself, with limitations. See View Android Notifications On PC With Desktop Notifications App.

Microsoft could improve on this by building compatible infrastructure into Windows. It won't have the elegance of a centrally-planned model but it would be less of a hack and easy for users to set up. Almost all of the limitations are on the Microsoft side though, and unless it helps them sell struggling products like Azure they have little motivation.

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Originally Posted by Gruff

No clue as to what you mean by that.

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I was simply interpreting your previous post in the way that made it most interesting, rather than in the way that you intended it. After all, "mistakenly swiping bad information" could have two meanings, depending on whether you take "swiping" out of context.

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Originally Posted by Tanner_H

To stick with OpenOffice as an example, on the desktop an install takes something like 400 mb, 390 of which is niche features that you use every once in a blue moon. On a phone, I'd much rather have a 10 mb version that emphasizes battery life and brevity over "everything and the kitchen sink", even when the phone is physically capable of running the full version. Same for everything from a media player to a photo editor to a web browser.

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I agree with most of what you said, but this paragraph stands out. Why do you not want an "everything and the kitchen sink" application on the mobile? You mentioned three things: Size, battery life, and "brevity" (that last one might be size, though). This is the point I was making. You care about size and battery life because they are currently limiting factors on lots of mobile devices. These are externally imposed hardware limitations. I have long held that the greatest shift in technology would come if we could come up with a battery with radically better energy density. Whether or not this will happen remains to be seen, but the situation is certainly improving all the time. Furthermore, the power consumption is declining, which makes existing batteries last longer. We could reach a day when "everything and the kitchen sink" didn't mean sacrificing significant battery life, and we are very likely to reach a day when application size doesn't matter. After all, I thought I was stylin' when my first computer had a 44MB HD (most people only had 20 or 30 MB drives, at the time).

The point is that you are deciding on what to do with the phone at least in part because of the limitations imposed by the hardware. Those limitations are what I envision going away.

I don't see how the problem of teeny/on-screen keyboards and touch-screen pointing as a mouse substitute goes away.

Note that there are tons of external Bluetooth, USB, etc. peripherals on the market and lots of HDMI adapters and so on. But none of these are very effective to use. Look at Microsoft's laughable "touch cover" concept, worth only "points for trying" and being "somewhat better than the rest."

There's a reason why laptop docks exist too. Hint: laptops have really low usabiity due to the physical constraints of portability.

That doesn't mean they're useless. It just means for serious heads-down work they leave a lot to be desired.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

I agree with most of what you said, but this paragraph stands out. Why do you not want an "everything and the kitchen sink" application on the mobile? You mentioned three things: Size, battery life, and "brevity" (that last one might be size, though). This is the point I was making. You care about size and battery life because they are currently limiting factors on lots of mobile devices. These are externally imposed hardware limitations...

The point is that you are deciding on what to do with the phone at least in part because of the limitations imposed by the hardware. Those limitations are what I envision going away.

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I guess my assumption is that most improvements in technology are matched by our ability to max out those improvements.

Take storage, for example. In 10 years, maybe a terabyte of storage will be cheap and commonplace for phones. But I imagine we'll also have 3D photos, holographic videos, and 40-point surround-sound audio that quickly fills that space the same way our meager mp3s, h.264 videos, and JPEGs do now.

And even if we do eventually reach inflection points where technology outpaces our ability to max it out, I still think there's the question of "why try to make a phone do something a laptop can do better?" I think we've seen this same "everything and the kitchen sink" approach tried elsewhere, for example Smart TVs, and the overwhelming response from consumers seems to be that they're fine with a TV being a TV, and a phone being a phone, and a PC being a PC.

These technologies ultimately end up sharing certain features, but at least in our lifetimes, they've never really converged. They coexist. But I'm willing to admit that perhaps I'm just not imaginative enough about the benefits of convergence!

(Also, by "brevity" in mobile software I mostly meant UI. If a program (like Office) does a million different things, I don't know how you expose those million different features on a tiny phone screen, regardless of how advanced the screen or processor or flash storage is. Human hands need a certain amount of space to accomplish things - but maybe the answer is a different paradigm, like voice commands? idk)

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Originally Posted by Tanner_H

Also, by "brevity" in mobile software I mostly meant UI. If a program (like Office) does a million different things, I don't know how you expose those million different features on a tiny phone screen, regardless of how advanced the screen or processor or flash storage is. Human hands need a certain amount of space to accomplish things - but maybe the answer is a different paradigm, like voice commands? idk

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Ahh, you just haven't seen the successor to the wildly popular Office Ribbon, the 3D holographic Office Cheeseshop. It pops out from the screen and you twist your head around, following virtual corridors of sights and smells, winking and tapping selections with your tongue.

Attachment 128769

Bonus: you'll never share a seat again on a bus or train. For some reason everyone gives you your space.

Oops!

Apologies to anyone who looks up "Cheese Shop" in the Urban Dictionary. I plead old guy here, not up on all the hip slang.

I've been looking at several technologies that when joined might make for a more desktoppy experience for powerhouse cell phones.

I think wearable eyeglass tech has come a long way and it wouldn't be difficult to provide the equivalent of a large screen monitor in eyeglass form.
NOT the heads up see through google glass, or virtual world gear but an immersive 2D high res screen experience.

For input large strides have been made in keyboard/mouse gloves.
Here is an interesting keyboard simulator.

Attachment 128771

The thrust would be to provide an interface to a phone that would look and feel like a desktop.

I guess I won't look it up then. The only thing I know about it refering to is Monty Python...which doesn't make sense, either.

I didn't get into what I thought you meant by brevity, but I figured you meant exactly what you did mean. That really is an issue with small devices, because the interfaces are constrained. However, the rest of what you said put me in mind of a Dilbert comic that ended with the line: The test group preferred the virtual reality to the real thing, and they all starved to death.

Attachment 128773

I was going to say: When I was a lad, anybody wandering down the street alone talking, was somebody you steered clear of. These days, it's common.

What technology is doing is making us oblivious to our environment. We act and behave not as if we were invisible, but as if the world around us was. Lord help us if we ever get to the point of virtual sex.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

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What technology is doing is making us oblivious to our environment. We act and behave not as if we were invisible, but as if the world around us was. Lord help us if we ever get to the point of virtual sex.

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It's on its way, you know it.

I recall a movie where everyone went to work in a 'virtual' world - but it was robots/androids they were controlling that looked like them. Just looked it up 'Surrogates' with Bruce Willis.

Indeed, at work people are calling all the data flow and information network 'The Matrix'. Truly, talking to some of the technology guys, they have no idea how it works, the clueless clowns.

(Edit: searching for a movie, just typing in a few things you know about it and it brings up that movie).

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Originally Posted by SJWhiteley

It's on its way, you know it.

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Quite honestly, I'm shocked that it isn't already here. How long was the internet around before it became clear that the major use of the internet would be the dissemination of porn (and cat videos)? People talk about automating things and virtual reality. Furthermore, these are geeks talking. Why haven't we gotten further with this? It may be lack of real-world experience from which to derive, but the motivation should surely be there.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

...How long was the internet around before it became clear that the major use of the internet would be the dissemination of porn...

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The internet wouldn't make sense without the ability to get porn easy.

Porn tech still has a way to go doesn't it?

Last I heard anyway you still can't upload a photo of a celebrity, old flame, etc. and have a search return... er, "models," having a facial match.

Or am I simply out of touch, as usual?

One should never be out of touch with porn. That would be missing the whole point.

More vb6 “haters” than vb6 “lovers”. In a vb6 thread !!!

Now I could explain that with 2 options.

1. No much porn out there.

2. Vb6 was tooooo sexy.

http://visualstudio.uservoice.com/fo...-edition-to-al

They've declined again suggestion about VB6...

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Originally Posted by JackB

More vb6 “haters” than vb6 “lovers”. In a vb6 thread !!!

Now I could explain that with 2 options.

1. No much porn out there.

2. Vb6 was tooooo sexy.

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No one here hates VB6, just the ridiculous notion that MS's decision to start from scratch rather than build on a shaky foundation was somehow a terrible mistake.

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Originally Posted by MikiSoft

http://visualstudio.uservoice.com/fo...-edition-to-al

They've declined again suggestion about VB6...

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I must commend them for being pretty nice about it. I'd be flaming and cursing if users kept asking me for the same thing over and over after I said no the first time.

Also, I feel a bit sorry for the people in that thread. They seem to want a new VB6 pretty badly. I don't think they even realize how far MS has come since abandoning VB6. They need to ground themselves in reality. MS is not going back. There is no compelling reason to do so. I don't get how these poor souls can't see that by now.

There's actually a pretty compelling business case NOT to go back, regardless of the qualities of the language. VB6 was a perfectly fine language, and could easily fill the roll of C to VB.NET's C++ (a non-OO language to an OO language, each with some advantages). However, it would be terrible for MS to try it now, and it's hard to believe they don't know that.

Doesn't matter, .Net's days are numbered anymore too. It'll probably be dead even before Windows is, and that might not be too far off.

All the real action seems to be around JavaScript, sometimes front-ended by preprocessors like Hejlsberg's current hobbyhorse TypeScript:

Announcing TypeScript 1.5

TypeScript is a step in the right direction, as far as Javascript is concerned, but I don't see where you got the idea that .NET was going anywhere. Of course, if Windows DOES die, then I could certainly see .NET going away. Otherwise, it fills a role that no other language does. JS is a perfectly functional language, up to a point, but there is lots that it does very badly or not at all. As long as there are loads of mobile devices running on different OS/platforms, then JS will always have a place because the web will always have a place. Beyond that, why would anybody bother with it?

Given the investment so many businesses have in Active Directory it's unlikely Windows will be joining CP/M in OS Heaven any time soon. Something better that makes it worth the pain and expense of switching will have to come along first and there's nothing on the horizon. It won't be the OS To Rule Them All but it won't be dead.

The same applies to .NET. Enterprises aren't going to rewrite all their LOB applications in JavaScript.

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Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker

...VB6 was a perfectly fine language...

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I humbly disagree. VB6 was a terrible language for any kind of serious application development. I always thought so, even when I was using it. The reason I never bothered to move to a better language was that VB6 was unmatched in the speed at which you could write a fully functional application. Being a lone developer, such a thing was more valuable than having a well engineered language.

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I humbly disagree

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Pah! You've never been humble in your life! I call Shinanigans:p

I actually think VB6 was a fantastic language for it's time. It did have a few foibles and annoyances but most of the C and Java packages that were floating around at the time were every bit as flaky. One of the things that I think gets missed is that a language is really nothing but a collection functional packages with a bit of syntax thrown in to allow you to call them. And it's not the syntax that's the important bit, it's the packages.

When folks remember VB6's failings they're usually remembering failings in the packages but they miss the fact that Java and C's packages were every bit as flakey unless you rolled your own - but you half expected to roll your own in Java and C whereas you generally didn't in VB6. It wasn't the quality of what was on offer that was different, it was the expectation.

That's one of the reasons I don't understand why VB6 developers say that VB.Net is slow to develop in. Both are just a collection of packages and all the packages that were avilable in 6 have an analogue available in .Net. You just need to spend a small amount of time learning where your old favourites are to be found and then you're every bit as productive (at least for RAD stuff) as you ever were with 6. As you learn some of the newer packages you're actually considerably more productive.

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That's one of the reasons I don't understand why VB6 developers say that VB.Net is slow to develop in

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Subjectivity is a funny thing, i think that many people just put there personal subjective use forward as the truth.

Many of those who say VB.Net is slow to develop in haven't really spent any time developing in it, all they have spotted is that there old ways which they liked are no longer there which now makes it slower for them to develop in. What most of them have not done for varying reasons is spent time in the language learning the alternate ways to achieve the same thing.

I find that i am actually slower at developing in VB.Net over C# as i now spend most of my time developing in C#, but this does not make VB.Net a slow language to develop it, but its slower for me and many people then see that as the language being slow full stop rather than just there own subjective use.

Talking about development , the personal subjective feeling is the most important point.

If the tool in hands does not ispire you , you aren’t to be productive.

Isn't that like saying if my shovel doesn't inspire me I am not going to be productive digging holes?

If your relying on your tool for inspiration you've got problems.