VB.NET Product Lifecycle

[HeMan]

Hey Guys,
One consultant mentioned in a Meeting that Microsoft was planning to Phase
out VB.NET and wanted us to convert all VB code to C#. I don't rememeber
reading about this anywhere. Do you know of any such plans or did he confuse
VB.NET with the product lifecycle of VB6.

Thanks.

Marc

 

[Guest]

Hey Guys,
One consultant mentioned in a Meeting that Microsoft was planning to
Phase out VB.NET and wanted us to convert all VB code to C#.

That is one clueless consultant! I hope you didn't pay for the guy.

VB.NET 9.0 is part of VS.NET 2008 and will be one of the included .NET
programming languages for a long time to come!

I don't
rememeber reading about this anywhere. Do you know of any such plans
or did he confuse VB.NET with the product lifecycle of VB6.

Hmmm that's probably one way to justify his comments

 

[Rory Becker]

One consultant mentioned in a Meeting that Microsoft was planning to

That is one clueless consultant! I hope you didn't pay for the guy.

Agreed. consultants are supposed to bring expretise in order to save you
time. this guy would have you waste time on a pointless exercise.

VB.NET 9.0 is part of VS.NET 2008 and will be one of the included .NET
programming languages for a long time to come!

VBx in already in the planning too

Hmmm that's probably one way to justify his comments

It speaks volumes about the value of those comments.

You might want to check his (employment) references (again)

Microsoft have a vested interest in keeping both c# and Vb.net very much
alive.
As long as people are arguing over which of them is best, they will spend
less time looking at alternatives.

 

[Herfried K. Wagner [MVP]]

One consultant mentioned in a Meeting that Microsoft was planning to Phase
out VB.NET

That's complete nonsense and makes the consultant's incompetence evident.

 

[The Frog]

Was the consultants name Aaron per chance?

 

[Guest]

Next time, ask the insultant to cite sources if something sounds odd. Either
your managers, if they are at the meeting, will commend you, or they are not
worth working under.

 

[Cor Ligthert[MVP]]

HeMann,

One consultant mentioned in a Meeting that Microsoft was planning to Phase
out VB.NET and wanted us to convert all VB code to C#.

Even Microsoft does not have money enough for that, maybe enough for the
other way around, do you know how many companies are using VB?

Microsoft is a commercial company, are you working in a kintergarten?

I completely agree with Herfried.

Cor

 

[Number 11950 - GPEMC! Replace number with 11950]

HeMann,


Even Microsoft does not have money enough for that, maybe enough for the
other way around, do you know how many companies are using VB?

Microsoft is a commercial company, are you working in a kintergarten?

I completely agree with Herfried.

Cor

I agree with "Family Tree Mike". The practical thing to do is ask for
reference, but I would emphasise that you ask for *specific* references.
Vague classifications such as "industry figures" do not reflect due
diligence in the advice. It is not the exercise to judge the consultant, but
rather the reliability of her/his information so you are sure you are not
jumping into a tar pit, and to use the foreign-sounding perspective to
multiply the options.

I completely disagree with Herfried and others who have criticised the
consultant. Ad Hominem arguments achieve and prove nothing more than to
expose the source's emotional state. Aside from the fact that the consultant
is entitled to express a personal opinion just as much as you or I are
entitled to take her/him to task and ask for specific citations and
elaboration.

If we were to be moved to C++, I think it would still be called "VB". That's
just typical short-term sales tactics. Some could and do argue that VB.NET
is closer to C# than to VB6. VB.NET is different, and the differences do
make it frustrating for me, but at the end of the day, we all have to do the
best we can with the best we have.

The same goes for consultants. You don't pay a consultant to be right,
otherwise it means you are in the wrong business. You pay a consultant for
an alternative perspective, and to rattle the cages of your people. It's not
about the right opinion, but about more options. In business you need plenty
of choices, just in case something unexpected happens. This is where a
little brainstorming can go a long way.

I've been taking occasional contracts in the petroleum industry for ten
years now, and of particular note is the visit of a safety consultant who
waited for the mudlogger to leave the logging shack to deliver a report,
before pulling a pit drill. Everyone thought the safety consultant was an
idiot because everyone was too focused on judging others and not looking for
practical ways to improve the work environment. The upshot of the
consultant's "idiot-syncrisies", was the admission that in land based
operations, sometimes the mudlogger is not in the shack (like when catching
a sample) and that therefore, while keeping an eye on pit levels was
primarily the mudlogger's responsibility, it was a good idea if the derrick
man, the driller, the drilling supervisor, and even the well site geologist
made sure they were aware of pit levels as opportunity allowed and always
asked if something didn't seem quite right, because the consequences of an
uncontained gas kick are usually not recoverable.

For all the hostility this safety consultant stirred up, he also revealed
the need for people to judge less and cooperate more. He earned his money
that day precisely because he played the "idiot". If he had simply said that
the company man and others should keep an eye out too while citing endless
statistics after my particular style, nobody would listen, because nobody
would have taken ownership of the ideas resulting from the veritable joke he
played on the mudloggers. It may not be a perfect world, but that's how
people are, and we all have to get used to it, or get cast aside.

The comment about VB being phased out may well sound silly to some, but I
wonder if it has stirred up some focus on the changes that have been
occurring and the more important business questions of how such changes can
lead to more entrepreneurial opportunity...? If it has, then I think the
money spent has paid off already.

All the best...

 

[Herfried K. Wagner [MVP]]

I completely disagree with Herfried and others who have criticised the
consultant. Ad Hominem arguments achieve and prove nothing more than to
expose the source's emotional state.

Well, as I said, I cannot see any evidence of what the consulting is saying,
so I must assume that he doesn't base his recommendations on hard facts but
on personal opinion.

Aside from the fact that the consultant is entitled to express a
personal opinion just as much as you or I are entitled to take
her/him to task and ask for specific citations and
elaboration.

I expect that a serious consultant would base his recommendations on more
than just his personal, non fact-based opinion. So, yes, I critisize the
consultant's style.

 

[Cor Ligthert[MVP]]

I agree with you, as I understood it well from you do you see this the same
as that the car industry have made the decission to stop making cars who use
petrol in future. However that is not my proffesion.

 

[Giovanni Dicanio]

One consultant mentioned in a Meeting that Microsoft was planning to Phase
out VB.NET and wanted us to convert all VB code to C#.

I don't buy this thing. It would be just *stupidity*, and the consultant
should instead be aware that in Microsoft there are *stellar* Software
Engineers working and developing great software!

I come from C/C++, and C/C++ are still my strongest languages. However, I
like a lot VB, too.

There are some things that VB is great for.
For example, I sometimes used to do code like so in C/C++ (it would be
similar in C#, of course):

if (... )
{
} /* if */

while ( ... )
{
} /* while */

int SomeFunction(...)
{
} /* function */

It was exspecially useful in nested structures, e.g. several if's inside a
while, etc.
I found the } just too low-expressive in those contexts, so I needed the
extra manual comments /* ... */ to better document the code.
On the other hand, I've found that VB has the End If, End While, End Sub,
etc. statements.
I love them.
And I exspecially love the fact that I don't need to type the whole
statement E-n-d-space-W-h-i-l-e, because the *great* IntelliSense suggests
the completion quickly, so I can just press RETURN! It's superb!
(One of the reasons to use the "}" in C/C++ was that typing a single "}" was
fast, but this would be true without IntelliSense support; but with such a
smart helpful VB IntelliSense I do prefer the more readable VB statements
like "End <something>" to just the "}" [also because I tend to specify the
additional /* ... */ comment after the "}".)

Another good thing about VB syntax is that when I need a variable, I first
think about variable name and then about its type.
So, I find more natural to write the sequence: <name> <type> (typical of VB,
e.g. Dim <name> As <type>) than <type> <name> (typical of C/C++/C#).

And in these days, with powerful hardware and the great MSFT .NET framework,
I think that the domain of use of VB can be greatly extended (while in the
past VB6 could have been considered sometimes a good option to develop just
fast tools, and e.g. C++/MFC the platform for professional applications, I
belive that things have changed a lot in these modern days).

Of course there are domains in which C++ is a winner (I think that the same
VB is developed and compiled using C++

But I belive that both VB and C++ are great tools, we have to choose the
best for the particular job to be done.
It is great that Microsoft provides both.

As for C# and VB, I think that both target the .NET framework, so I think
the performances of VB and C# - after the compilation to .NET assembly -
should be equivalent, so maybe it is just a matter of personal preference
about language syntax (if one prefers the C/C++ syntax, he could use C#).
But I don't master C# and VB deeply, so I don't feel comfortable in doing
more deep comparisons between these two.

Just my two cents.
Giovanni

 

[Cor Ligthert[MVP]]

Giovanni,

I don't see you mention the Case statement in VB that is something usable
itstead of that unusable Switch statement in C...................

Cor

One consultant mentioned in a Meeting that Microsoft was planning to
Phase out VB.NET and wanted us to convert all VB code to C#.

I don't buy this thing. It would be just *stupidity*, and the consultant
should instead be aware that in Microsoft there are *stellar* Software
Engineers working and developing great software!

I come from C/C++, and C/C++ are still my strongest languages. However, I
like a lot VB, too.

There are some things that VB is great for.
For example, I sometimes used to do code like so in C/C++ (it would be
similar in C#, of course):

if (... )
{
} /* if */

while ( ... )
{
} /* while */

int SomeFunction(...)
{
} /* function */

It was exspecially useful in nested structures, e.g. several if's inside a
while, etc.
I found the } just too low-expressive in those contexts, so I needed the
extra manual comments /* ... */ to better document the code.
On the other hand, I've found that VB has the End If, End While, End Sub,
etc. statements.
I love them.
And I exspecially love the fact that I don't need to type the whole
statement E-n-d-space-W-h-i-l-e, because the *great* IntelliSense suggests
the completion quickly, so I can just press RETURN! It's superb!
(One of the reasons to use the "}" in C/C++ was that typing a single "}"
was fast, but this would be true without IntelliSense support; but with
such a smart helpful VB IntelliSense I do prefer the more readable VB
statements like "End <something>" to just the "}" [also because I tend to
specify the additional /* ... */ comment after the "}".)

Another good thing about VB syntax is that when I need a variable, I first
think about variable name and then about its type.
So, I find more natural to write the sequence: <name> <type> (typical of
VB, e.g. Dim <name> As <type>) than <type> <name> (typical of C/C++/C#).

And in these days, with powerful hardware and the great MSFT .NET
framework, I think that the domain of use of VB can be greatly extended
(while in the past VB6 could have been considered sometimes a good option
to develop just fast tools, and e.g. C++/MFC the platform for professional
applications, I belive that things have changed a lot in these modern
days).

Of course there are domains in which C++ is a winner (I think that the
same VB is developed and compiled using C++

But I belive that both VB and C++ are great tools, we have to choose the
best for the particular job to be done.
It is great that Microsoft provides both.

As for C# and VB, I think that both target the .NET framework, so I think
the performances of VB and C# - after the compilation to .NET assembly -
should be equivalent, so maybe it is just a matter of personal preference
about language syntax (if one prefers the C/C++ syntax, he could use C#).
But I don't master C# and VB deeply, so I don't feel comfortable in doing
more deep comparisons between these two.

Just my two cents.
Giovanni

 

[Giovanni Dicanio]

I don't see you mention the Case statement in VB that is something usable
itstead of that unusable Switch statement in C...................

Sure, Case statement in VB is a great improvement of what C offers.

Thanks for your pointing out.
Giovanni

 

[Number 11950 - GPEMC! Replace number with 11950]

Well, as I said, I cannot see any evidence of what the consulting is saying,
so I must assume that he doesn't base his recommendations on hard facts but
on personal opinion.


I expect that a serious consultant would base his recommendations on more
than just his personal, non fact-based opinion. So, yes, I critisize the
consultant's style.

I apologise for mis-characterising your criticism of the consultant's style
as criticism of the consultant. There is a difference, and I should have
been more considerate. While I'm busy justifying my opinion in the coming
paragraphs, maybe it would benefit you to consider how your opinion makes
you feel. It's not the only opinion you have to have, but I'd bet it invokes
your emotions. I like to think you can have an opinion that would invoke in
you yet happier emotions still - but that is really up to you and you do not
answer to me.

I'm not so sure we know everything the consultant recommended, although I'd
be inclined to think of your "serious consultant" as somewhat more of a
contractor than a consultant. There is, in my experience, a difference
between consulting and contracting. A contractor has to know his job
straight down the line and there is little room for lateral thinking because
everything a successful contractor does boils down to risk minimised
operating procedures based on saddle-point strategy. I think that one
doesn't call a consultant in, unless one faces a problem one cannot solve
without outside help that cannot be found in the literature.

By the way, sometimes when a contractor isn't so sure of her/his own advice,
s/he starts giving "lessons" to those further down the chain with "revision"
questions returning a confirmation of original assessment or doubt. I've
know a well site geologist who used to do this. It's a devious way of
getting assistance from contractors in other positions who are competing for
your position, and always brings a smile to my face because strictly
speaking, the contractors are all contracted to cooperate and not to
compete. In other words, the contractee cares less whether you know more
than God, than whether you fulfil your contract and in doing so contribute
to achieving the project objectives in a timely manner. Consultants come in
for exploring uncharted opportunities.

Now given that you or some of your people have been in the game for many
years, you collectively already know everything that is known about the
problem. A visiting expert is therefore useless. You can't hire someone to
give you an answer. It doesn't work that way, or you'd either find the
answer with a less expensive literature survey, or go bankrupt hiring
more consultants than contractors! I tend to think that the need to hire a
consultant emerges with the need to reorient the way you and your people
think about a problem.

So a consultant who may not know as much as you do about the problem is
there to alter your approach to the problem not give you the answer, and
this is far more valuable than a little dig through the literature. If you
ever work as a consultant, there are two broad ways to reorient client
thinking:

1. If people are open to change you can tell them how it is, keeping
personal opinion to a minimum and concentrating on the facts and methodology
that might be overlooked because it seems unrelated or otherwise
impractical.
2. However, if people are riding high on their egos, the only way to break
the
intellectual straightjacket is to play "Bobo the Clown", and *do* something
that reflects just a little badly on someone. That someone can't be your
client or you'll just alienate them, so you make what you do reflect just a
little badly on you. If memory serves, John Clease took this to a whole new
level with his customer service training videos for techies. You might even
offer an opinion with no basis in fact to force people off the beaten path
by forcing them to begin to question what they are accustomed to taking as
gospel. This can get people to start thinking for themselves instead of just
reminiscing the procedures they are accustomed to, and banishes the
unreasonable hope that God will manifest Herself as a consultant and come on
down to give the answer on a rhodium platter! :^)

You are entitled to your opinion of the consultant's style, but I think you
just might feel a little happier if you came to expect these kind of antics
from consultants (as opposed to contractors). The idea of incompetence
masquerading as expertise AND getting paid for it upsets me. It's just not
fair, is it? So I try to remember to look for what else might be going on
and
what other gain can be made to save myself the grief. Especially if it's out
of my hands anyway.

The world wide web is full of "expert" web designers who *don't* (not
"can't") even code standards compliant web pages and worry more about web
design artistry and less about web design accessibility, not to mention just
a little respect for visitor security requirements. Is it worth even having
an opinion about that? Maybe the opinion that this presents an opportunity
might even pay for itself, and maybe something like this makes the opinion
worth having? Perhaps the world of VB consultants is full of clowns
pretending to know more than they do...? I don't know for sure myself, but I
wonder how someone who does know the ropes could make that opinion pay for
itself?

Think about it. The "incompetent" statements we hear are great material for
a little humour, and sometimes a little humour sells the contract when all
other things seem all too equal. Humour is also a great way to process how
we feel about the unavoidable day to day injustices that are just part of
life.

All the best to you...

 

[Number 11950 - GPEMC! Replace number with 11950]

I agree with you, as I understood it well from you do you see this the same
as that the car industry have made the decission to stop making cars who use
petrol in future. However that is not my proffesion.

I think it more likely that cars will switch to an alternative energy source
than VB turning into C or any other language. That's like proper 4x4's being
phased out by SUV's (most of which don't even have a diesel engine much less
manual transmission). These languages may well converge but there will
remain key differences based on the kind of programming being done - hence
the total approach of Visual Studio where the full version provides you with
all of the languages at your convenience. Likewise SUVs are very comfortable
touring on unsealed roads, but it is begging for trouble to go off road
without manual transmission and a high-torque/low-acceleration engine such
as a low rev diesel engine. So even within VB there is divergence of
database, API, and communications programming that almost defines separate
programming languages within VB. Some of the programming dialects within VB
may closely resemble programming dialects within C#. While such conincidence
may not necessarily indicate a future technological merger, the implications
are food for thought nonetheless. However, this is only my opinion.

By the way, I think it doesn't have to be your profession for you to have
and express your perspective about it. I happen to appreciate your opinion
as well. Only I don't think the car industry really has a choice. If car
manufacturers want to stay in business, they must provide the market what it
demands. If that is solar powered vehicles, then I suspect they will
experience something similar to growing pains some of us experienced moving
across to VB.NET. A few decades ago, we wanted PCs but Honeywell decided not
to roll them out because PCs would cannibalise the more lucrative
minicomputer market. Although honeywell's decision makes good business
sense, IBM rolled them out instead. Ironically, Honeywell though right in
their assessment of the new technology, utterly failed to benefit from this
asessment when the lucrative minicomputer market was canniblised out of
existence by IBM's supply of PCs. The lesson history bequeaths us is that
when the market swings, there is no viable economic choice but to comply.
Presently, the most viable development path to the latest market demands
appears to be .NET. We don't have to like all the changes, but that's where
the money is...

There is an electrician living in Adelaide who has removed the petrol engine
from his car and replaced it with batteries and an electric motor. His
battery-electric car is registered, roadworthy, can hold it's own in freeway
traffic, and costs a lot less to run because electric grid energy (not being
so highly taxed) is a lot cheaper than petrol energy. If he can do it, it
won't be long before other people join him. Whether they get help from the
car companies or from their friendly local electrician, there is a huge
demand for anything that helps people reduce the amount of tax they have to
pay. This is what made diesel and then gas conversions so popular in
Australia. Converting your car so that you plug it into the wall at night to
charge, and it runs all the next day is one way to dodge fuel taxes.

I'd like to think that the petroleum boom will go on forever, and that I can
get filthy rich talking about rocks instead of "breaking my head" writing
software! :^) However, I think I'd be unrealistic to expect no major and
economically catastrophic changes in my industry, so I look at history and
may well gripe about petroleum executives not being able to provide a more
stable industry, but I assume they are doing the best they can with this
because at the end of the day, they too are in it for the money. After all,
petroleum companies are known for their uncanny ability to deliver a huge
project 40 years in development on time and on budget. Can you imagine the
implications? It's just mind-blowing from a software perspective, but then
looking at a larger picture: where will VB be 40 years from now? I can
imagine a slogan,

"NB: Neural Basic, I think therefore I progr-am." :^)

There would be many changes along the way; big changes that both delight and
infuriate people using the new bleeding edge technology. Such changes would
have the potential to alienate entire industry sectors if not implemented
considerately. That's how it goes. I ask this group how to secure VB2005
object code and I don't like the answer, but it's the truth and what can any
of us do about it? The fact remains that VB2005 object code can be just as
secure as VB6 object code. It's just that the sudden change, requiring
sudden infrastructure development that is unpalatable to ISVs - ISVing being
something I do in addition to taking contracts as a well site geologist.

And yes, whether I like it or not, fossil fuel technology is getting a
little stale too. Whether people make up an excuse to find another way to
get to work or just admit that variety is the spice of life that makes new
technology so much more attractive; these kind of changes are coming. In
Australia, you can already drop off the power grid for less than five
percent of the value of your home (and that's without the generous
government subsidy). Of course this is bad for the coal and gas business
because it means one more punter is switching to battery/solar powered
electricity, but who wants grid power if it's going to be so unreliable? As
a well site geologist, I can't do anything about the outfits that are
poisoning the coal and gas market with negligent maintenance policies, and
neither can my petroleum clients. What we can do is participate in making
the most of the opportunities presented by the market demand for something
new (and hopefully more economical :^)

I guess a similar idea could be to use the current to help you go where you
want to go, instead of fighting the current for a specific route.

While I'm at it, if people can be sold on the idea of fitting electric cars
with x86/x64 RISC systems (like the PC), this could make for some
interesting software development opportunities for those here with
electrical and/or electronic engineering backgrounds...

All the best to you...