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Windows 7 for XP ProfessionalsUpdating Support Skills from XP to Windows 7by Bink.nu's Raymond Comvalius
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Microsoft Corp. is facing a revolt from some of its favored developers over the company's support for what the developers are calling classic Visual Basic, also known as VB6 (Visual Basic 6). More than 100 Microsoft MVPs (Most Valuable Professionals) have signed an online petition calling for the company to continue to support VB6.
At issue is that as of the end of March, Microsoft has said it will discontinue mainstream support for VB6; developers who have programs written in the language platform are up in arms.
When Microsoft moved to Visual Basic .Net in 2001 and stopped development of VB6, it offered developers a migration path to the new platform. But developers say the move is no easy one.
"Porting classic VB code to VB .Net is not a trivial task," said Jonathan Wood, founder of SoftCircuits, of Salt Lake City, a Microsoft MVP who signed the petition.
"In fact, in some cases, there are VB code statements will actually compile without error under VB .Net but produce different results." The online petition said: "We would like to suggest a path for the future development of Visual Basic 6 and VBA [Visual Basic for Applications] that helps Microsoft align its long-term strategies with those of its customers.
"This path will also help Microsoft reconnect with the Visual Basic developer community and continue support for the Office developer community."
So the petition asks that Microsoft continue to develop VB6 and VBA to preserve assets and applications written in those languages. Continue At Source
Brad, 10 out of ten to take the opportunity to post a plug for PowerBASIC. For the moment I would want to stay with the devil-I-know then the devil-I-don't-know.
I tried a junp of development platform some time ago which at first seemd the right thing to do, then learnt that I should have stayed where I was.
PowerBASIC seems to be going the same way as DataEase has already gone. I would rather stay with the larger community and use the impressive knowledgebase that saved me quite a lot of unnecessary calls, and saved money, calling technical support.
Sure, there are forums. My experience is that when you're on a very tight deadline then it takes too long for a peer-to-peer formum to be of help.
At the end of the day, the statement stands; "Horses for courses." What works for one may not for the other.