VB6 won't die because the tool is geared to answer the problem "how do I get people to develop applications to solve problems themselves" and not "how do I make professional developers more productive and happy". VB6 solves a very broad problem whereas most other computer languages, IDEs and frameworks are geared for those who program for a living. And unfortunately, there really is no alternative. The fact that there are a lot of programmers today who grew into the profession who weren't programmers initially is not the point. VB6 is a tool that empowers a much wider audience to do their own thing than do "modern" programming languages.
VB.NET is more of a computer language that was wrapped around the.NET framework to try to "wean" VB programmers off of VB6. It won't work. You don't "get" what VB6 does for people if you think that. And it seems Microsoft simply doesn't get it either.
VB6 Staying power is also due to this fact: anybody can do programming with it. You don't need to get formal education in development to use VB6. It's a tool that was create to solve the problem "how do I get people to write their own applications and solve their problems themselves" and not "how do I make professional developers productive and happy". VB6's target audience is much wider than professional developers. And right now there is no alternative.
I would not be surprised that there are a lot of programmers today who aren't necessarily people who got a formal education in development but grew into the position. They are often specialists in other fields of work and needed to develop tools that assisted in their specialty. VB6 really is great for people who need to whip up an application rapidly without too much fuss and I don't see any real alternatives out there. VB.NET comes close, but what you're doing is wrapping a language around OO and.NET instead of going the other way around that is, what is it that would make life easier for field experts to develop apps for their field specialty without needing to hire professional developers. VB6 fills that gap and there really is no alternative.
VB6 also addresses another niche: hobby programmers. Any non-professional programmers can get some pretty slick apps done in VB6 you wouldn't be able to do otherwise on any other platform.
If a company today decides to target this market with proper financial backing, and maintain some kind of VB6 compatibility, while abstracting away most of the.NET backend so you don't need to do windows.form.open.this.stupid.long.object("some string")...
I've been living like that long before the "great recession" hit. Some call it voluntary simplicity. Frankly, I have tons of computer hand-me-downs, machines that are 1.0 Ghz+ that were running slow, but the people who gave them to me just went ahead and bought new PCs. Fine, I just upped the ram, put XP or Linux on them and the machines run fine.
I still have CRT TVs in my house, the only LCD display that I have is the one that I got used from a friend who sold me his old 17" LCD for peanuts, and a couple of recycled laptops. I don't think I've spent more than a couple of hundred bucks on new electronics for the past 5 years. There's just no point.
My car is a 1997 for Taurus Station Wagon with 200,000 km on it. Runs fine. I put maybe 500$/year of maintenance on it. Last repair (last week) was to change the muffler. The only big "new" thing that I bought in the past 10 years was a pop-up camper when the Canadian dollar was on par with the US dollar in 2008 which we pull with an old Jeep Cherokee.
The money I've saved over the years doing stuff myself has made it possible for me to pay off my mortgage real fast.
I bought my house in 2002. It's already payed off. No debt. Lots of savings. To me -- that's way more important than "Oooh, New! Shiny!".
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VB6 won't die because the tool is geared to answer the problem "how do I get people to develop applications to solve problems themselves" and not "how do I make professional developers more productive and happy". VB6 solves a very broad problem whereas most other computer languages, IDEs and frameworks are geared for those who program for a living. And unfortunately, there really is no alternative. The fact that there are a lot of programmers today who grew into the profession who weren't programmers initially is not the point. VB6 is a tool that empowers a much wider audience to do their own thing than do "modern" programming languages.
VB.NET is more of a computer language that was wrapped around the .NET framework to try to "wean" VB programmers off of VB6. It won't work. You don't "get" what VB6 does for people if you think that. And it seems Microsoft simply doesn't get it either.
VB6 Staying power is also due to this fact: anybody can do programming with it. You don't need to get formal education in development to use VB6. It's a tool that was create to solve the problem "how do I get people to write their own applications and solve their problems themselves" and not "how do I make professional developers productive and happy". VB6's target audience is much wider than professional developers. And right now there is no alternative.
I agree with the previous poster.
I would not be surprised that there are a lot of programmers today who aren't necessarily people who got a formal education in development but grew into the position. They are often specialists in other fields of work and needed to develop tools that assisted in their specialty. VB6 really is great for people who need to whip up an application rapidly without too much fuss and I don't see any real alternatives out there. VB.NET comes close, but what you're doing is wrapping a language around OO and .NET instead of going the other way around that is, what is it that would make life easier for field experts to develop apps for their field specialty without needing to hire professional developers. VB6 fills that gap and there really is no alternative.
VB6 also addresses another niche: hobby programmers. Any non-professional programmers can get some pretty slick apps done in VB6 you wouldn't be able to do otherwise on any other platform.
If a company today decides to target this market with proper financial backing, and maintain some kind of VB6 compatibility, while abstracting away most of the .NET backend so you don't need to do windows.form.open.this.stupid.long.object("some string") ...
Holy Cow! I just got a double-liner on my Bullshit Bingo card!
Good job!
I've been living like that long before the "great recession" hit. Some call it voluntary simplicity. Frankly, I have tons of computer hand-me-downs, machines that are 1.0 Ghz+ that were running slow, but the people who gave them to me just went ahead and bought new PCs. Fine, I just upped the ram, put XP or Linux on them and the machines run fine. I still have CRT TVs in my house, the only LCD display that I have is the one that I got used from a friend who sold me his old 17" LCD for peanuts, and a couple of recycled laptops. I don't think I've spent more than a couple of hundred bucks on new electronics for the past 5 years. There's just no point. My car is a 1997 for Taurus Station Wagon with 200,000 km on it. Runs fine. I put maybe 500$/year of maintenance on it. Last repair (last week) was to change the muffler. The only big "new" thing that I bought in the past 10 years was a pop-up camper when the Canadian dollar was on par with the US dollar in 2008 which we pull with an old Jeep Cherokee. The money I've saved over the years doing stuff myself has made it possible for me to pay off my mortgage real fast. I bought my house in 2002. It's already payed off. No debt. Lots of savings. To me -- that's way more important than "Oooh, New! Shiny!".