Ok - just for second - think about the creators of this .Net IDE we now use...

If you were given the perfect .Net library of Windows/PC/whatever-you-call-it API access that didn't require absurd variable declarations...

And the language gave you .xxx access to levels and levels and levels of methods and properties to work that API...

Why would you want some prior language that didn't have this access to hamper in any way what you could exploit of this new world?

Right now I can take a C#.Net function - visit a translation to VB website - and get perfect results (cut and paste-able code in VB.Net). That makes two coding communities meld in a way that speaks "marketing".

From an outsider - 20 years prior to 2000 in the Dec/Vax world - you PC coders have a nice platform.

I coded DEC PDP-11 Basic (and Fortran) in the 80's - DEC VAX-11 (yes - new hardware - argh) Basic in the 90's - and then that company (DEC - Digital Equipment) simply went away.

I lost my hardware again!!!

Grow up - it's just a language.

I can recall we had an "UNLESS-THEN" construct - kind of like "IF-THEN" (but different - if you know what I mean). As we moved from PDP's to VAX's they took that away (although not initially deprecated!!!!!!!). Had to write coder scrapers that would look for UNLESS-THEN and turn it onto a proper IF()=FALSE THEN statements.