You owe it to yourself to use WPF

[RobDog888]

I agree, I just personally dont see why the UI needs to be separated from the VB code. I mean surely a large percentage of code that we all write is done to update the UI so it makes sense that you need to be able to work with the UI directly from the programming language... After all, for pretty much any windows forms app the whole purpose of it is to show someone data and manipulate that data based on what they click and press, so why try and distance the things that they click and press from the programming logic. Dont get me wrong, I know you can do things like change a label's text or whatever from VB code in a WPF project but the whole "separation" thing just seems unnecessary to me.
I guess it might be good for huge enterprise level business apps but for people like myself it doesnt seem to provide any benefits.

Actually separating the UI from the rest of the program is a design of n-tier.

An example...

UI
Business Rules
Data Layer
Database

So separating the UI from the business rules and even other apps like Fat Clients can have big improvements in many areas if separated.

[dilettante]

Actually separating the UI from the rest of the program is a design of n-tier.

But wasn't he whinging about the "code behind" concept here?

We keep hearing about how liberal arts majors will whip up the UI and then troglodyte programmers will add code "behind" that. Farce!

Just to start with you end up dealing with UI elements with default names created by the GUI designer tool (bleh). I also can't see how one can create the "form" of an application with little concept of its "function."

And as stated (maybe overstated) above, much of the time you need to micromanage the UI elements in code to get the required behavior anyway. At least I seem to see lots of code and questions here indicating that default control behaviors just aren't enough for many people.


However I have no quarrel with tier separation. I think a lot of people here only write monolithic single user desktop applets though. They may never have had to deal with the kinds scalability and information security issues tiering addresses.

You might have a hard sell among those folks. It can be a bit like explaining color to a blind person.