The Dot Net Dilemma
By Ben Baird

Not very long ago - only eight years, at the time of this writing - I discovered the newly-released Visual Basic version 3.0. I wasn't a particularly experienced programmer at the time, having dabbled but little in an earlier version of Microsoft BASIC and Turbo C++ (back when my operating system was MS-DOS 2.x). But in the moment that I fired up Visual Basic 3.0 for Windows, I knew I'd found my programming language.

It was magic; there is simply no other way to describe the simple genius that was VB. One could pound out anything from prototypes to install programs to "real," usable Windows applications so much faster and more easily than was ever possible before. Hobbyists and professionals both were brought together through this language that they had in common.

I started the Visual Basic Thunder web site as a tribute to what I've long considered the best programming language that has ever been written. Slowly, as VB went through its growing pains in versions 4.0, 5.0, and 6.0, I came to grow quite attached to Visual Basic. It had its flaws and limitations, of course - most of which could be hacked around with varying amounts of difficulty. But VB was mine, warts and all - and countless other VB enthusiasts shared my sentiment. Visual Basic was, and still is, the most popular development language in the world. Is it any wonder? Even at the time of VB6, we were still discovering more and more what VB was capable of.

Paradigm Shift

What we did not know - but what we probably should have expected - is that not even Visual Basic could last forever. The buzz about "Visual Basic 7" rose from the masses just shortly after VB6 was released. For months on end, the chatter of speculation filled discussion boards, web sites, and newsgroups. By this time, I had become mired in many things other than VB. I quietly dropped from the face of the earth, and VB Thunder and my normal newsgroup posting dropped off with me. But I continued to lurk, unbeknownst to any. I read about Dot Net, and I did nothing. I lost my 3-years-running Microsoft MVP status for lack of newsgroup activity, and still I did nothing. What was there to be done? The writing was on the wall, so to speak.

That isn't to say that I was at any point neutral on the Dot Net issue. Sweeping language changes were taking place, after all; even with my relative absence from the VB scene, the news of VB.NET did not find me standing completely aloof.

Even so, I let others fight the battles without me. Heck, I even laughed at the ridiculousness of what a lot of VB old-timers began to call Visual Fred. I agreed with them, albeit silently. My non-VB distractions did not encourage me to join the flame wars that were erupting left and right. Don't get me wrong - I'm certainly not naive enough to think that one more voice could have restored the course of Visual Basic. It's just that there had been a time when I would have jumped at the chance to "go down with the ship," if ever it was necessary to do so.

You may think at this point that it's quite obvious what my feelings on VB.NET are. Perhaps you are right, but not if you think that I hate VB.NET.

You see, VB.NET is just a language. I am very strongly of the position that VB.NET is not Visual Basic, but I do not despise the Visual Fred language itself. What I despise is that we had to lose Visual Basic because of Visual Fred. It's true that I have never laid a finger the Dot Net line of programming languages, and accordingly I do not claim to be any sort of authority on them. I only know what I have read: The language changes, the gains and losses, the code snippets and screenshots that just didn't seem like VB.

The Trust is Gone

The changes have been covered so many times, and I'm so late to the party that it would be pointless for me to cover them again. But my feelings are the same as those of many others - that the destruction is complete; a trust has been broken that will most likely never be rebuilt, at least in my case. This turn of events is deeply disturbing, and signals a change of direction - a direction that I will not take. There can be no argument; those who invested their code resources in Visual Basic have suddenly found themselves stabbed in the back - with the large, protruding, serrated blade arrogantly engraved with a big Microsoft Dot Net logo.

I have a release build of Visual Studio.NET sitting on my desk. It's been there for months. I don't know if I will ever install it, but I can say with absolute certainty that I will never use Dot Net for serious development. You see, it would require rewriting from scratch nearly every piece of code that I've written for the past eight years. The problem is that by the time I have accumulated two or three years worth of Dot Net code, who is to say Dot Net will still be around? Perhaps I'll write some Visual Fred code just in time to be forced to translate it into Visual George.

In Closing

Make no mistake: Visual Basic Thunder is back, and isn't going anywhere. I still use VB6, as do many other people. I use it because I still like Visual Basic, and it still gets the job done - without my having to learn a new language. I just wish that I could still write VB code with the blessing of Microsoft behind me. Of course, I realize now that such a thing was simply too much to ask. I'm sure VB6 has a few good years, sans Microsoft support, left in it. Happily, that means that I should have plenty of time to learn Java.