List of drawbacks to Visual Basic.

[lee1sa]

Please can i have a list of drawbacks to Visual because I have to write an evaluation on how this was and wasn't effective.

[RhinoBull]

... how this was and wasn't effective.

What exactly do you mean by "this" ? VB as the entire product or some program of yours or some of your colleagues?

[baja_yu]

I think he means the entire programming language.

Do you maybe need it in comparisons to other languages?

[Hack]

As this is more a discussion question as opposed to a VB programming specific question, I have moved it to General Developer.

[timeshifter]

Not to sound off topic, but.... VBForums... we're all here because we know and love VB...

[Kasracer]

Not to sound off topic, but.... VBForums... we're all here because we know and love VB...

I don't love VB..... so I'll make the list

Since you don't want any advantages, here are some disadvantages (I am, however; not going into detail and am not going to make a comprehensive list since it's either homework or for your job and you should do your own research):

• VB is slower than VB.Net, which is still much slower than most other programming languages. Sure it's good for RAD, but if you need performance, you stay far away from VB.
• If we're talking VB6 and earlier, then you don't have the goodness of an OOP language. VB6 and earlier are event driven languages. Sure you can make modules (and I think classes, don't remember the exact terminology), but they have no where near all of the features an OOP language.
• You have to distribute a runtime with all of your applications (or install it to the computer before you use the application). This adds to a larger download (not all versions of windows have the VB6 runtimes and even less have the .Net framework).
• VB.Net is slower than C#.Net. Both languages get compiled into MSIL, however; many operations like IO gain a good amount of performance just by converting the project from VB to C#. Because of the way VB.Net's syntax is, it can't produce exactly the same MSIL as C# can.
• The syntax, IMO, is horrible. You have languages like C, C++, Objective-C, C#, PHP, Java, J#, etc... that have similiar syntax. This makes code easier to understand when you go from one language to another. This also helps you learn a new language. VB, however; is supposed to be more like our everyday spoken language. Computers use 1s and 0s. Higher than that is ASM working directly with registers. Computers were not built on modern english, hence why the VB language is awkward in programming (at least for most, this is more of an opinion).

There, I got a few of them. I'll leave it up to you to do research to come up with your own disadvantages and understand the points I've made.

[jmcilhinney]

I don't love VB

Security... Security! Escort that man from the building.

[Jacob Roman]

[*]VB is slower than VB.Net, which is still much slower than most other programming languages. Sure it's good for RAD, but if you need performance, you stay far away from VB.

Wrong. VB.NET on average executes 3% slower than VB6. It was proven.

If we're talking VB6 and earlier, then you don't have the goodness of an OOP language. VB6 and earlier are event driven languages. Sure you can make modules (and I think classes, don't remember the exact terminology), but they have no where near all of the features an OOP language.

The only thing missing was inheritance to make it a fully OOP language.

You have to distribute a runtime with all of your applications (or install it to the computer before you use the application). This adds to a larger download (not all versions of windows have the VB6 runtimes and even less have the .Net framework).

Not true. The only Windows OS that didn't come with VB runtime files was Windows 95. I've been there myself, and know from experience. MSVBVM50.DLL is only 1.29 megs and MSVBVM60.DLL is 1.32 megs. So it was no biggie for 95 users.

[Kasracer]

Security... Security! Escort that man from the building.

Can you honestly say you do?

Wrong. VB.NET on average executes 3% slower than VB6. It was proven.

I've seen many benchmarks where VB.Net wins and a few with VB6 winning. It probably depends on what you're doing, though VB 2005 and the 2.0 framework supposedly improved performance and memory usage by a lot. It could be interesting if someone does benchmarks with the latest version.

Btw, you said approx. 1% in another thread.

The only thing missing was inheritance to make it a fully OOP language.

Inheritance is a requirement to make an OOP language. Also, don't forget about overrides.

Not true. The only Windows OS that didn't come with VB runtime files was Windows 95. I've been there myself, and know from experience. MSVBVM50.DLL is only 1.29 megs and MSVBVM60.DLL is 1.32 megs. So it was no biggie for 95 users.

Windows 98 and 98SE had some but not the complete VB runtime (at least in my experience. I was helping someone release a VB6 application many years ago and found it didn't work on most 98 and 98SE machines we tried it on until we installed the runtime. I've also heard of many issues with the runtime versions included with Windows XP, though I haven't messed with VB6 on XP so I don't have a way to test or anything.

[yrwyddfa]

If you think that inheritance is cool, and overloading functions is cool, why didn't you write your software in Ada?

[Merrion]

The syntax, IMO, is horrible. You have languages like C, C++, Objective-C, C#, PHP, Java, J#, etc... that have similiar syntax. This makes code easier to understand when you go from one language to another. This also helps you learn a new language. VB, however; is supposed to be more like our everyday spoken language. Computers use 1s and 0s. Higher than that is ASM working directly with registers. Computers were not built on modern english, hence why the VB language is awkward in programming (at least for most, this is more of an opinion).

A high level programming language is designed for the programmer, not the computer. The more like natural language a concept is the easier it is for the human brain to assimilate and process it - because human brains do not use 1s and 0s, and the most expensive and important part of the IT process is the human brain(s) involved.
For this reason VB (and more recently VB.Net) is a far superior language to anything else out there.

[Harsh Gupta]

my few words, please.

The syntax, IMO, is horrible. You have languages like C, C++, Objective-C, C#, PHP, Java, J#, etc... that have similiar syntax. This makes code easier to understand when you go from one language to another. This also helps you learn a new language...

IMO, it does not make any sense. if you can learn one language having specific syntax, then you should not face any difficulty in learning a new language irrespective of its syntax.

but to add in the drawbacks of VB, i think one major flaw is with the String data-type. String in VB is not like a regular data-type. it works more like a pointer and has no specified length.

example, Integer in VB is 2-bytes long, Long is 4-bytes long, but String has no such specified length and may cause memory leakages (and other problems) if not used efficiently.

[yrwyddfa]

but to add in the drawbacks of VB, i think one major flaw is with the String data-type. String in VB is not like a regular data-type. it works more like a pointer and has no specified length.

Perhaps you haven't heard of boxing (etc) in .Net.

Perhaps you haven't heard of making sentences unilaterally intl?

Perhaps you haven't heard of Unicode.

Nevertheless, there is nothing wrong with pointer types, and pointer arithmetic.

[Harsh Gupta]

Perhaps you haven't heard of boxing (etc) in .Net.

Perhaps you haven't heard of making sentences unilaterally intl?

Perhaps you haven't heard of Unicode.

Nevertheless, there is nothing wrong with pointer types, and pointer arithmetic.

sorry, didnot get your point. plus i have no relevant experience of .Net.

and what the poster wants is Drawbacks of VB and not how far better other languages are over VB. thats why i posted my view.

[Jacob Roman]

Btw, you said approx. 1% in another thread.

That wasn't a percent. That was times. I was mistaken mathematically in the past after reading an article which said 3%, and I tried saying it by times. Someone corrected me on that later on.

[yrwyddfa]

sand what the poster wants is Drawbacks of VB and not how far better other languages are over VB. thats why i posted my view.

VB6 is one of the only languages that avoids pointer arithmetic, and at the very least hides it from it's users.

So being specific, then, why is a BSTR such a downfall of VB6, then?

[jmcilhinney]

Given the way the original post was worded, it doesn't sound like the poster was looking for a comparison of VB6 and VB.NET, but we're most of us zealots for our preferred flavour so it was bound to degenerate into that. Given that they are so different it is difficult to compare VB6 and VB.NET as a unit against other languages, but they do also have many similarities, so I'll give it a bit of a go.

Like many things, VB's greatest strengths are also its greatest weaknesses. Two that have been mentioned previously are the syntax and the lack of pointers. VB was originally designed as a programming language for non-programmers. To that end, the syntax was designed to read more like natural language sentences than instructions to a computer. This has the effect of making VB code more readable to the less technical, but can make VB feel like a toy language to the more technical, kind of like playing with Lego, or even Duplo, when you're used to Mechano. I'm sure many VB users will be outraged at this statement but it's a fact that that's how many C/C++, etc. programmers felt/feel about VB in all its flavours. As for the lack of pointers, that is an absolute god-send for the beginner, but it does limit what you can do with VB. Pointers are a common source of errors in code even for the experienced programmer, but there are certain things that are much easier to do and/or perfrom much better when done with pointers. Finally, VB is also quite lax when it comes to things like type-safety. Again, this was done to make it easier for less technical people. The fact that you don't have to worry about specifying the type of a variable, or even declaring the variable itself, means that you can whip up an app quickly without having to worry about, or even knowing about, many of the details. This makes VB easier and quicker to use in many cases, but it also increases the risk of run time errors. This is another reason that VB has been ridiculed by many users of more technically oriented languages like C/C++.

[conipto]

You know, the biggest drawback I see to VB, and the BASIC language in general, are the number of different implementations of it. You have VB, VB.NET, RealBasic, QuickBasic, QBasic, GWBasic, etc, etc.. Fortunately most are not taken too seriously any more, but it can be frustrating to go from one version to the next, as this type of discussion will usually show you

Bill

[szlamany]

I started on Digital mini computers back in 1980 - doing BASIC programming. Digital was big-time back then - #2 company - life was good.

IBM was the big boy - no BASIC on that machine - COBOL, RPG - who knows - not what I did.

We were looked down upon at that time for doing BASIC programming - but DEC promoted BASIC - and we loved it.

The VAX hardware came along - BASIC was still the DEC language to use - who cared who dis'd us for using a baby-language. We made real $$'s selling software to real clients all over North America.

So it was natural that when I started migrating my customers from the dead-Digital world to MS-PC world that VB would be the choice.

Silly differences in how MID and RIGHT worked - who cares - syntax is syntax - you get used to. In T-SQL CHARINDEX does what INSTR does in VB - the arguments are in a different order - but you live with it.

But in general the BASIC language (not VB, not VB6, not .NET) - the BASIC syntax that's been around since 1970's Altair ThinkerToys BASIC (and before!)

http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki...mming_language

STRINGS are great. That datatype is exactly what every business programmer needs. Try writing COBOL programs were everything is fixed and mapped - what a nightmare - I've done it.

On digital machines we had system functions (like API's) and we could call them from BASIC - so every feature of the hardware was available to the BASIC language. We developed software that interfaced with machines that talked and called parents (might not be impressive now - but was bleeding edge back in 1989!). All from baby-BASIC.

VB has API's that expose the same functionality.

VB.Net has wrapped them up in even more approachable ways - that's great.

It's all about having a syntax that's easy and common - and also able to perform the biggest tasks given to you.

[szlamany]

If I didn't make myself clear - there are no drawbacks - only comparisons - and those are just opinions

[Kasracer]

For this reason VB (and more recently VB.Net) is a far superior language to anything else out there.

That does not make it superior at all. Yes a more natural language may be easier for a human to understand, however; you are developing applications that run on machines, not humans. Using a more natural language requires the compiler to work more when converting to a language the computer can understand.

In my opinion, it's best to work with the language of a society and not try to use your own with a translator.

Then again, both of our responses are opinions so it doesn't really matter anyway.

[Merrion]

That does not make it superior at all. Yes a more natural language may be easier for a human to understand, however; you are developing applications that run on machines, not humans. Using a more natural language requires the compiler to work more when converting to a language the computer can understand.

Computer power (and by inference compiler power) doubles every 18 months. At the same time the cost of skilled developers increases at above the rate of inflation therefore whatever makes the job easier for the human is more important than whatever makes the job easier for the compiler.

[yrwyddfa]

A bit corporate based, but a good article: http://www.bitwisemag.com/copy/byteg...ytegeist7.html