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I've noticed that the most popular answer is that VB isn't a real programming language. I wonder how many of those who claimed that have actually used it. Of those who have, I would ask "In what ways is it lacking?"
Nathan
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Actually I am willing to bet a lot of people got forced to use it at either school or university. Of people who don't like VB I have met, I can confidently say 0% of them have been "snobs".
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dog_spawn wrote:
Actually I am willing to bet a lot of people got forced to use it at either school or university. Of people who don't like VB I have met, I can confidently say 0% of them have been "snobs".
I am sorry if I implied people who feel VB is not a real programming language are snobs. Before I used I assumed that it was inadequate as a language just because it was called BASIC. Then my employer got a contract that required use of it and I found it was a quite capable language and that it had some really neat feature, especially events.
I was curious about how common my gut reaction to the name BASIC is and what people mean by a "real programming language."
Nathan
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Nathan Holt at CCEI wrote:
I would ask "In what ways is it lacking?"
To me, VB is bad because...
1. Object Orientation just got hacked in
2. The RAD development enviroment makes developing scalable, easy to maintain applications a nightmare. The entire environment is poor, editing code is a real bitch.
VB is like a toolbox, in the hands of a craftsman, you can end up with some amazing stuff, but without the skills to use it right you end up with Homer Simpson's attempt at building a barbeque or his attempt at a Spice rack
Sadly VB fell into the hands of people who had no business writing commerical grade software and that is how it earnt its reputation, because at the end of the day it's people like us who have to keep the things running.
Michael
But you know when the truth is told,
That you can get what you want or you can just get old,
Your're going to kick off before you even get halfway through.
When will you realise... Vienna waits for you? - "The Stranger," Billy Joel
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If you have to ask, then you wouldn't understand the answer...
And yes, I have used it. From when it was VB 3.0 with it's "p-code" to VB 6.0. Great for prototyping a UI, but for any real work, not even a distant second to a modern language(e.g. Java, C++)
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Nathan Holt at CCEI wrote:
I've noticed that the most popular answer is that VB isn't a real programming language
That depends on how you interpret the statistics. You could also say that about two thirds (actually slightly more at the time of writing) of people do think it is a real programming language.
--Colin Mackay--
EuroCPian Spring 2004 Get Together[^]
"You can have everything in life you want if you will just help enough other people get what they want." --Zig Ziglar
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Visual Basic has made programming accessible to the masses. Seemingly anyone who is computer literate can write a VB application. The language is simple and relatively 'safe'. While this is a good thing in terms of making the computer useful for more people, it has muddied the water when it comes to defining what makes a programmer, especially to people who are not programmers.
I don't think the ability to write VB applications in and of itself makes you a programmer. It just says that you can take a problem description and turn it into VB code that solves the problem. In my experience, 'VB programmers' have little or no knowledge of the fundamentals of computing: algorithms, data structures, logic, design, etc. They also tend to follow poor engineering practices; their code will be fragile and lack robustness.
In my view, a 'real' programmer (more properly, a software engineer) is someone who can take a problem description and write an application that solves the problem, in a language appropriate to the problem. A programmer adjusts his tools to fit the problem. A real programmer ensures that his code handles exceptional conditions and resource limitations gracefully. Note that a real programmer will use VB, if that's the appropriate tool. I've written VB apps, because they were so good at handling OLE automation.
Unfortunately in the corporate hierarchy, management usually fails to recognize this distinction.
Software Zen: delete this;
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I agree 100%, and you've said it very well.
The question is, how to stop this problem? On the one hand, we want software development to be easy. We don't want to jump through hoops to change the background color of a button, or the font in an edit box, or worry about double-byte strings, etc... but at the same time we don't want it to seem so simple that "programming" skills are entirely optional.
I guess it boils down to how much previous programming exposure management has had. 
Regards,
Alvaro
"I do" is both the shortest and the longest sentence in the English language.
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I think we want the 'nuts and bolts' things to be easy. Nuts and bolts includes the user interface, data bases, communications, device and file I/O, the kinds of things that the O/S manages. This lets us concentrate our expertise on the hard stuff: the problem space we are addressing.
I'm afraid my only means of addressing this issue is how I refer to myself. I refer to myself as a 'software engineer' or sometimes a 'computer engineer' (my degree is in computer engineering). The word 'engineer' still connotes a certain mindset and level of problem solving ability.
The term 'programmer' has become so generalized that it's almost meaningless. I've seen resumes where people described themselves as programmers. Their programming language: Microsoft Office macros. The most blatant offenders in this regard are the so-called 'web programmers', people who think that constructing HTML with little snippets of script consists of programming.
Software Zen: delete this;
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I normally stay out of these "mine is bigger than yours" discussions, but I have some time to kill before I get back to coding....
No language creates bad or good programmers, programmer egos create good or bad programmers. The term "Not Invented Here" has been around since way before VB or C++ or even C, but it has driven this industry. How many times have you copied code from another person, rather then re-inventing the whole thing cause you can do it better/faster/stronger/...
Your title should be "problem solver for your employer/client". The bigger the problem you can solve, the bigger the take-home will be. And it does not matter if the solution is done in C or VB or even if it takes building a rube goldberg solution, just solve the problem. Your toolkit should include as many languages as you can fit into your brain, as well as non-computer skills, such as being able to communicate in simple words, and discuss complex ideas in front of a group.
Solve the problem, even if it takes code or ideas from others, giving them fair credit for their work, and if you do this enough times, you will see than everything has its value, C for speed, VB1.0+ for allowing quick development of Windows apps, and .NET for providing an incredible library, and the first set of products from MS which allows me to truly take a module from anyone else and use it or expand on it as need be.
By the way, .NET CLR is nothing more that Java Engine, just as every other MS product was a copy of some other work. Even VB was created by a group other than MS, so they follow what I am saying... The only problem I got with them is the lack of recognition, but again Bill must be the emperor.
And forget what others do, and what they call themselves. Concentrate on you, and what you can do for your employer/client. I have yet have had an interview where I was asked what others did, nor I have asked anyone that question when I was doing the interview.
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No, because of the 'programmers' who created it. Having done at least occassional work using VB 3 - 5, my overwhelming impression of VB is that it was designed, not by programmers for users, but by marketers for IT execs. VB first becaume 'object oriented' simply by calling structures 'classes'. When that was no longer sufficient, they made the classes 'inheritable' simply by providing a function to copy the declaration code for a 'class' to a new file. This was no doubt a boon to programmers who hadn't yet mastered copy-paste, but for the rest of us, it was just more useless window dressing.
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I'm a c++ programmer, but the last company I worked for had a huge project in VB. I was pretty impressed that they got it all working and very stable at the end.
Up to VB5 Microsoft were continually improving it, but unfortunately with VB6 there was hardly any new features, and they didn't even bother fixing some of the exactly same crasher bugs that were in VB5.
I think this artical, written by the auther of Hardcore Visual Basic, says it all:
http://brucem.mystarband.net/mckinney1.htm
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Anonymous wrote:
VB wasn't too bad
As he posts anonymously... 
~Nitron.
ññòòïðïðB A
start
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Sorry... just too lazy to log in 
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