Quote Originally Posted by sharpCode# View Post
Only thing I can see that is a considerable negative about .NET is that you need to install the whole framework even when most programs will barely begin to use a tenth of it. So I think as someone mentioned in another thread could be good to see it compile and include only the necessary stuff (could have my terms mixed up still learning).

Anyway I imagine VB6 development will still be quite prevalent for at least a few more years.
That would actually be a bad thing I think, The .Net framework is on most Windows machines already and lots of applications use it and have been doing so for quite some time. If each app compiled only the parts of the framework they needed and distributed it with their apps then all .net apps would be larger, some of them by huge amounts and the amount of disk space used would increase greatly.

What about VB6, most programs do not use most of the stuff in the runtime yet the entire runtime is required for all of them, pretty much the same thing with .Net just a different file set.

That's not the point. The point is: do you need .NET for most of that? I don't know about Windows Phone or XNA (whatever it is), but for all the rest you certainly don't need .NET. It's just, maybe,...easy to work with? but I don't think it's that easier than anything else as long as you know the right tools, and pure Win32/Win64 is still best, imho. The problem I see with VB6 dropping is that nothing is left from MS to create native binaries but C++.
XNA is a free product that allows you to develop games for Windows, Windows Phone and XBox 360 using .Net languages.

VB.Net also allows you to develop for Windows CE and Windows Mobile devices which I have been doing in VB.Net for several years now with much success.
Vb.Net is easy to work with once you have adjusted to it, and so is C# in many cases VB.Net can be easier to work with than VB6 and can do a lot more.

I have to say I didnt see any of this coming. I thought they were going to bring it back. Fatia said his petition has 7200 votes...
Which is a very small number to a company like MS.

What surprises me is that anyone is surprised that MS did what most expected them to do anyway. It really should have been clear to most a long time ago that VB6 was the last of the classic VB editions.