Quote Originally Posted by Sitten Spynne View Post
.... I don't know if I think telling newbies to always use Option Strict is as healthy as teaching them about writing code that doesn't look sensible when you make the errors Option Strict protects you from. But either way, we do have to teach them a lot about Integer vs. Double and how and when to go back and forth and it just seems useless.

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Who is teaching them, though? Certainly not the forums or the internet, although they may learn a few things.

All these proper (sic) coding techniques generally come from a formalized education. This is where Option Strict comes in. Yes, people should write explicit code right out of the gate, but they don't. No one does, because they don't know what they don't know.

Option strict should always be on for newcomers to VB. Once they understand what it is telling them, then they have the option of turning it off when appropriate. It's a poor substitute for proper education, but at least they should be writing less buggy code.

The fact that you have to 'teach' someone using a high level language the difference between an integer and a double demonstrates that they are a novice 'journeyman' and not a programmer. Because people use the internet as a source of education is why we end up with crappy, buggy, useless programs 90% of the time.

I think this is why VB6 programmers tend to linger on. While I wouldn't necessary go so far as saying that VB6 programmers are, by definition, good programmers, but they learned in an environment where there was no internet or readily available knowledge. They had to rely on books and publications (and not your 'everybody make a book which repeats the help' type books, or 'stupidity for dummies'). They had to actively learn. It's tough to throw that knowledge away, especially to move to a language where the average programmer is [perceived as] a stumbling retard who can't find their way out of room with the door open.