The end of Visual Basic

[OldMoses]

I suppose you can't teach an old moses new tricks, but I don't think I ever seriously considered trying to use Visual Basic, or any other language for that matter (save an abortive flirtation with Assembly). So I have no real idea how it was. When I get comfortable with a tool, it's the one I stick with. QB64 is that comfortable tool with a nice assortment of attachments.

[TerryRitchie]

I suppose you can't teach an old moses new tricks, but I don't think I ever seriously considered trying to use Visual Basic, or any other language for that matter (save an abortive flirtation with Assembly). So I have no real idea how it was. When I get comfortable with a tool, it's the one I stick with. QB64 is that comfortable tool with a nice assortment of attachments.

If you use InForm you'll get an idea of what VisualBasic was like: Create a form (screen) then drop controls (buttons, slider bars, drop down lists, etc..) onto the form and then attach snippets of code to each control. The controls in effect become event driven subroutines, just like InForm sets up for you.

[davidf]

I have to say when .net came out , I tried converting vb5 programs . The amount of code incompatibilities were huge ( not to mention the huge amount of data / programs / overhead/ slow performance / crap that came with .net framework) so I decided to stick with Vb5. I prefer Vb5 to vb6 because of the bookmark functionality within the IDE. I am so glad I never bothered with VB.net. I still use Vb5 on Windows10 (64bit) and I am using QB64 for about 20 or so programs  that I need to run under 64bit and had never needed to move to Vb5. QB64 is a great tool, only found a couple of incompatibilities so far LPRINT (which is known) and EOF function . I won’t miss Vb5.net but for all those that made the transition to .net it just another kick in the proverbial bollocks from Microsoft .

[CBTJD]

"Coding Basic Takes Jack Daniels."  Usually lots of Jack Daniel's.....

Ah, nice. Very true!

[krovit]

I welcome you too CBTJD, who I am one of the little ones, in here... nothing important.
But I was struck to find that we have the same ideas about the evolution of programming languages which, in my opinion, has been conditioned by the "known usual" and has slowed down its development and diffusion (voluntarily, of course).
QB64 is really a gem. the only flaw it has is not having a native windows-style window management. When you propose certain works, even valuable, the average user, intoxicated and plagiarized by propaganda, struggles to believe that it is a really good product.
But we know what the dynamics of each market are, especially the globalized market.
However, by its very nature, QB64 is true to its origins and that's fine.

Good luck with your work!

_____
Good luck, above all, for the COVID-19. Some governments downplay it, others want almost the entire population to be infected, others do what they can to put an end to the spread of the pandemic. Still others are pretending nothing. A lot of people, actually, pretend nothing.

In two years, I don't know how many will be left. God save us!
Excuse the OT argument but I think it is necessary to become aware of the issue as soon as possible. And pray.

[CBTJD]

native windows-style window management.

Thank you for your kind welcome and support.
Can you explain more about what you mean by a lack of window management?
Thanks.  :@)

[krovit]

I mean that InForm is a great project but it is not integrated into the language and still emulates windows.

FreeBasic is born 'native' windows, it seems. The same for Lazarus. They are both very powerful tools but the second has a very closed and - in my experience - very rude community of programmers. And then it has absurd limits that I can't understand.
VB - and I agree with your judgment - can produce excellent results (from an image point of view) and has conditioned people to the standard one. Java... better to let it go...

However I understand that QB64 can't become an improved VB.

[CBTJD]

I mean that InForm is a great project but it is not integrated into the language and still emulates windows.

I have yet to try my hand at InForm, but I'm looking forward to it. It appears to function as a code generator for visual GUI elements. Please correct me if I'm mistaken. If so, I've seen similar approaches with third-party GUI design applications like Liberty Workshop. Back in the day, Gfa BASIC came with a "Resource Editor" that performed a similar function.

However I understand that QB64 can't become an improved VB.

Not sure I would want it to. Frankly, if I can write GUI QB code and compile it for Mac and Raspberry Pi, I'm a happy camper.
:@)

[krovit]

The answer to the first question is yes. The second I do not know. But you will find out soon, it takes little to try.

Maybe you've already got an idea but I recommend you choose an editor for QB64. His, which a clone of the classic one, I can't use it with decent productivity. I use Dav'sIDE - the maximum of the minimum - but there are others (few, but there are).

[TempodiBasic]

Hi guys
Welcome CBTJD

here my point of view:
I have met at first Qbasic in old MsDos 5.0 and following versions, (great language but great wasting of time in coding  because it'snot be able to compile an .EXE, the Qbasic /Run batch was very terrible),  in second time  I met QB (Wow Qbasic with more power and a compiler), and in little time also (as third step) Visual Basic for windows 3.0 (Wow a Basic for Windows OS, but not so BASIC) and at my eyes it was a mix of a prebuilt library for different goals (GUI, database and something else) in which you have many advantages vs QB (libraries for mouse, window and its components , file manager, database etc) but it showed many problems... it was very difficult to have a direct access to the hardware (INP, OUT, PEEK, POKE, CALL INTERRUPT, CALL ABSOLUTE) so in some points of view MsVB3.0 was a tight evolution of QB45 and QBPDS ( this last I'd never used).
The next step from MSVB3.0 to MSVB4.0 was a revolution! The programs became quicker than previous ones in runtime! My experience stops here with MSVB.
After a long period I came back to search BASIC for windows... MSVB was at VB express 2008 edition plus MSVB.NET ( I gave a look that let me run away, there was no BASIC and so they were zombies!!!) so on the web (in the meanwhile more opened and more navigable) I found RapidQ (a semiRAD BASIC with good documentation and few followers, but it is died from many years) and XBASIC (a lonely project with few sites and few community). I found also an utility to run QB/QBasic into windows 32bits with an windows' IDE not just using an emulator of DOS in Windows, but after time Windows closed the back compatibility with 16bit programs... so Goodbye!
Just 2-3 years ago I met Terry Ritchie's  website Task and he showed me the pathway to reach this wonderful community!
After some years [abandoned, outdated and now likely malicious qb64 dot net website - don’t go there] dropped down and the QB64 team developers opened more websites. Some of these now are out, others lives. QB64.org put us together around QB64.

Qb64 has many powerful options...many pathway to travel to enrich itself with library or module like it has been done with Inform, vWatch and others less visible but powerful that different coders has posted , ...an active developers' team,  now there are also efforts to solve the internationalization of the IDE and of I/O routines,
if I should find something that is not yet developed is a file manager... but I don't know how is hard to develop this system in a crossplatform language. In the windows side we can call dll of OS, but the friends that are in Mac or in Linux what can do to manage files and folders? I don't know.
The possibility to share opinions and experiences at different levels is unique.
Thanks QB64 community

[bplus]

Okay, all set.
http://rosettacode.org/wiki/Word_search#QB64
:@)
CBTJD:
C-1 = B, B-1 = A, T-1 = S, J-1 = I, D-1 = C

Hey cool! Thanks :)

A-1 = @