VB 6 and VB .NET

[kiwis]

What is the difference between these two?

[<ABX]

in short, alot

A Programmers Introduction to Visual Basic .Net by Craig Utley has a full chapter dedicated to this.


Chapter Outline:

General Changes ....................................................................................49
Default Properties ............................................................................49
Subs and Functions Require Parentheses ........................................50
Changes to Boolean Operators ........................................................51
Declaration Changes ........................................................................52
Support for New Assignment Operators ..........................................52
ByVal Is Now the Default ................................................................53
Block-Level Scope ..........................................................................53
While...Wend Becomes While...End While ..................................54
Procedure Changes ..........................................................................54
Array Changes ..................................................................................57
Option Strict..................................................................................58
Data Type Changes ..........................................................................59
Structured Error Handling ................................................................62
Structures Replace UDTs ................................................................64
IDE Changes ....................................................................................66
New Items ..............................................................................................66
Constructors and Destructors ..........................................................66
Namespaces ......................................................................................67
Inheritance ........................................................................................69
Overloading ......................................................................................69
Free Threading..................................................................................70
Garbage Collection ..........................................................................72

[kiwis]

I have a copy of VB 6... is this ok to work with or should I get VB.Net???

I guess VB.Net is newer? more advanced?

[Memnoch1207]

Personal preference. Like ABX said there are vast differences between them.

[LITHIA]

Before I went to vb.net, I thought "I am going to stick with VB6, I can't see how VB.NET can offer anything extra I need..." but how was I wrong.

I decided to try VB.NET out of curiosty, and ever since, I havn't used VB6 once to create a program - I only keep it installed to use vb6 project files.

VB.NET is ALOT better in my opinion, however alot has changed in the coding. I have found it to be alot more advanced, and there is a quick period when you begin the change where you really have to get familiar with whats different.

The coding environment is alot better than VB6, it makes VB6 look like some pre-dated program made for Windows 95 (alot like the programs I make haha). Some of the best features I have found already are the fact where each time you get an error in your code, you don't get a dam MsgBox saying it. All it does is underline the part of the code (alot like Microsoft Word with the spell check) and display the error in a Task Box at the bottom which will not interfer with your coding.

I also really, really like the way it automatically formats your code for you (Indents etc). You don't ever need to press the Tab key. Depending on what code you are writing, it will indent or reindent according - thats really cool because now my code is alot more readable, I never got the hang of doing that in VB6.

But those changes are just fancies, the reall stuff is behind the code itself - something I am working on now would have taken me 3 times longer in VB6 and I woudln't have known where to start.

So, I recommend you have a go at VB.NET (keep VB6 installed tho) and see what you think. When I first tryed VB.NET, I hated the fact about all the change in code, but I have got used to that and find the "Upgrade VB6 Code" function very useful, you just type in some VB6 and press upgrade, and it will convert it to VB.NET if there are any changes, and if there are - it will probably also include a quote telling you about the change and where to find out about it (a link to the MSDN library). I don't have the library installed myself, so I cant click the link; but if you copy the code in the url and paste it into a search engine, you only get one result and thats straight to the page correnspoding in the MSDN library.

Give it a try, you should'nt be disapointed!

[kiwis]

well mate you have almost sold it for me!! What does VB.Net cost???

[LITHIA]

I don't know, I didnt buy it lol

I never pay for anything unless I have to - VB.NET is not something I would think of paying for.

Good luck finding it, I don't think its worth buying unless you think its worth it - download it and if you like it alot, buy it.

If you need any help of finding where to download, give me a pm

[kiwis]

Originally posted by LITHIA
I don't know, I didnt buy it lol

I never pay for anything unless I have to - VB.NET is not something I would think of paying for.

Good luck finding it, I don't think its worth buying unless you think its worth it - download it and if you like it alot, buy it.

If you need any help of finding where to download, give me a pm

Send me a email [email protected] better talk via that form

[sw_is_great]

the sdk u can download from MS site for free

[DevGrp]

Originally posted by kiwis
Send me a email [email protected] better talk via that form

You guys kill me

[kiwis]

well I'm not wanting to spend money on it unless I like it!!

I guess if I looked around I could find it on the net

But if somone could help me out I would like to get an email from you!!

[wengang]

A Programmers Introduction to Visual Basic .Net by Craig Utley has a full chapter dedicated to this.

This book is a MUST READ for anybody making the switch from 6 to .NET. You could probably muddle through a lot of the IDE on intuition, but you'd never guess out all the new implements and coding changes. It's well written and doesn't go over anybody's head!

Also, the foreword says the book was Free ( ) I don't know how it was distributed, though. I downloaded a PDF of it

Agree with Lithia. I'm currently a .Net newbie, but I like what I've seen so far.

[wossname]

Kiwis is probably an expert in VB.Net since the last time this thread was replied to

[wengang]

oh I was just saying for anybody who might search the topic, since I was looking last week for any kind of tutorial on the switchover topic, and this book really targets that very thing.