Has MS given up on us (again)?

[Alex Clark]

I've noticed that the number of VB samples has dropped off sharply in favour
of C#-only sample source code on the MSDN website. Helpfiles seem to be a
similar issue.

I know the documentation for .NET 3.5 technologies is shoddy and unfinished
at best, but are MS ever planning on putting effort back into their VB.NET
samples and articles or are we all expected to "upgrade" to C# whilst
learning 7 or 8 brand new technologies?

 

[Nathan Sokalski]

I will admit that I don't usually go to MSDN for examples, so I can't say
I've noticed it there, but I do agree with you that since the purpose of
..NET is to give developers a choice in which language they use and .NET is a
Microsoft technology, they should at least give examples in the two most
commonly used .NET languages, which as we all know are C# and VB.NET. My
personal preference is VB.NET, which is what it sounds like yours is as
well.

 

[Family Tree Mike]

I think you are mistaken. I went to System.IO.File.Exists and System.Random.
Both had VB examples.

 

[Scott M.]

I believe that all the MSDN help topics are written in each of the .NET
languages. These pages do have a language "filter" on them though, so it's
possible that yours is set the C# and you don't realize it when you are
looking at these pages.

 

[Michael C]

I've noticed that the number of VB samples has dropped off sharply in
favour of C#-only sample source code on the MSDN website. Helpfiles seem
to be a similar issue.

I know the documentation for .NET 3.5 technologies is shoddy and
unfinished at best, but are MS ever planning on putting effort back into
their VB.NET samples and articles or are we all expected to "upgrade" to
C# whilst learning 7 or 8 brand new technologies?

There's almost nothing to learn switching from VB to C#. You should have it
down pat in 1 day. Our whole company switched from vb to c#. We had meeting
and discussions and more meetings and when we finally did it it was such a
huge non-event we all had a big laugh about it.

 

[Scott M.]

There's almost nothing to learn switching from VB to C#. You should have

it down pat in 1 day. Our whole company switched from vb to c#. We had
meeting and discussions and more meetings and when we finally did it it
was such a huge non-event we all had a big laugh about it.

Clearly, you don't fully understand the C# language then. While it is not a
major undertaking to learn it, moving an entire company's developers to it
(without them having some kind of Java or C style background) in one day
just indicates that you haven't really learned all the facets to the
language.

 

[Michael C]

Clearly, you don't fully understand the C# language then. While it is not
a major undertaking to learn it, moving an entire company's developers to
it (without them having some kind of Java or C style background) in one
day just indicates that you haven't really learned all the facets to the
language.

What exactly don't we understand. If there is something we were missing then
we must have been missing it in VB and hence not important to us.

 

[Cor Ligthert[MVP]]

Michael,

What exactly don't we understand. If there is something we were missing
then we must have been missing it in VB and hence not important to us.

That should be it, because there is much more in VB (while the IDE is much
more advanced) then as in C#.

In fact the other way around should be much easier.

Cor

 

[Michael C]

That should be it, because there is much more in VB (while the IDE is much
more advanced) then as in C#.

In fact the other way around should be much easier.

It will be interesting to see what Scott M comes up with. I find the
learning curve relates to the framework more than the language so the shift
isn't difficult if you know the framework.

 

[Alex Clark]

Hi Scott,

I believe that all the MSDN help topics are written in each of the .NET
languages. These pages do have a language "filter" on them though, so it's
possible that yours is set the C# and you don't realize it when you are
looking at these pages.

No, I'm well aware of the language filter but I've still found plenty of
pages with nothing but C# code on them. Of course, that's when I can find
suitable documentation at MSDN at all...

And has anyone else noticed that the online MSDN search engine sucks now?
No matter what settings I choose, the first 100 results or more are always
from http://forums.microsoft.com. So I get the pleasure of wading through
dozens of posts from people having totally problems in the same areas that
I'm trying to find documentation, but problems that are often totally
unrelated to mine. Why does MS think I want to find forum posts over actual
official documentation...? Baffling.

 

[Alex Clark]

Hi Michael,

There's almost nothing to learn switching from VB to C#. You should have
it down pat in 1 day.

I can convert from C# to VB.NET relatively easily, but in order to do that I
tend to want to copy/paste and go through it line by line (unless it's some
ridiculously small example).

With MS putting examples for using their shiny new technologies in C#
exclusively, many of which don't have the most intuitive of syntax to begin
with, I'm then forced to do extra mental conversions which aren't always
easy if it's not immediately obvious as to what the code is doing (which is
often the case and is the whole reason I'm searching for examples to begin
with).

It would have been nice if MS had done the work of putting up VB code
alongside C# for all code samples in the documentation. Would have been
nice if they'd documented a lot of areas a bit more thoroughly as well
though, and actually provided sample code of *any* kind in many cases.

Our whole company switched from vb to c#. We had meeting and discussions
and more meetings and when we finally did it it was such a huge non-event
we all had a big laugh about it.

Just out of interest, what made your company want to make the change over to
C#?

 

[RobinS]

It will be interesting to see what Scott M comes up with. I find the
learning curve relates to the framework more than the language so the
shift isn't difficult if you know the framework.

As someone who was forced to switch to C#, there's nothing I could do in VB
that I can't do in C#, except it's not as obvious when you read it. Not to
start a war, but here are some observations off the top of my head:

Examples: When defining a class, you use the Implements and Inherits
keywords in VB. In C#, all you get is a colon. For God's sake, don't start
any of your base classes with an I or you'll never know which it's doing.

When you do implement an interface like IEditableObject, in VB the method
says "Implements IEditableObject.BeginEdit" and your method doesn't have to
be called BeginEdit. In C#, it is just called BeginEdit, and no sign
anywhere that it implements IEditableObject.BeginEdit. Better remember it,
or comment it for the next guy who comes along.

+= versus AddHandler. I mean, really.

Office Automation. Enough said.

And actually, with the new DLR stuff in VB, there is now stuff you can do in
VB that you can't do in C#.

Just my opinion. I have no problem with either language; I've now become
ambilanguagedextrous.
RobinS.

 

[Herfried K. Wagner [MVP]]

I believe that all the MSDN help topics are written in each of the .NET
languages. These pages do have a language "filter" on them though, so it's
possible that yours is set the C# and you don't realize it when you are
looking at these pages.

This is true for the .NET Framework documentation, but unfortunately not for
many .NET-related SDKs.

 

[Herfried K. Wagner [MVP]]

What exactly don't we understand. If there is something we were missing
then we must have been missing it in VB and hence not important to us.

There are lots of subtle small differences between the two languages
(arrays, 'out' keyword, event handling, ...). I agree with you that
learning C# can be done in very short time for somebody who knows VB, but I
believe it will take some time until one writes "good" C# code.

 

[Phill W.]

When defining a class, you use the Implements and Inherits keywords
in VB. In C#, all you get is a colon. For God's sake, don't start any
of your base classes with an I or you'll never know which it's doing.
Agreed!

When you do implement an interface like IEditableObject, in VB the
method says "Implements IEditableObject.BeginEdit" and your method
doesn't have to be called BeginEdit. In C#, it is just called BeginEdit,
and no sign anywhere that it implements IEditableObject.BeginEdit.

Actually, IEditableObject.BeginEdit and BeginEdit are treated as
completely different methods, each being invoked depending on how the
object is being /used/ (i.e. via the object's class or via the
Interface). I find it damnably annoying that C# lacks VB's ability to
have a class method called "Bob" implement an /Interface/ method called
"Wendy".

Better remember it, or comment it for the next guy who comes along.

Again, agreed!

+= versus AddHandler. I mean, really.

I can't remember if Operator Overloading has arrived already or if it's
"coming soon" to Visual Basic. Actually, I quite like +=; AddHandler
just seems so cumbersome.

Office Automation. Enough said.

Haven't tried it with .Net and don't look forward to doing so ...

And actually, with the new DLR stuff in VB, there is now stuff you can
do in VB that you can't do in C#.

Until the next release, when each tool catches up with what the other
one had in the release before (but it /is/ nice to be "ahead", just for
once).

Regards,
Phill W.

 

[Herfried K. Wagner [MVP]]

I can't remember if Operator Overloading has arrived already or if it's
"coming soon" to Visual Basic. Actually, I quite like +=; AddHandler just
seems so cumbersome.

VB supports operator overloading since VB 2005. BTW, I disagree with you.
To me, using /addition/ and /subtraction/ operators for /adding/ and
/removing/ handlers just seems semantically wrong.

 

[cj]

I've found that managers and even a fair number of non-programmer
computer people think C automatically results in super powerful programs
and those programmers are highly paid geniuses and VB, Visual BASIC, is
basic code for beginners and students and isn't really what a true
professional would use. I find often C programmers hold these same
feelings too. I think many managers allow VB code in their company only
because they think VB programmers cost less. It all comes from the
origins of the language's name. C was terse and powerful among
languages back in the day and Basic was introduced to be easy. Frankly
with the changes that happened when VB became VB.net maybe it should
have died, as a name as least. C# meanwhile is supposed to be putting
the easy in the old terse, powerful C, C++. I have to wonder if VB and
C# will merge in the future and I would expect the name will lean toward
the C side because of these general impressions. Of course Java might
surprise us all.


P.S. Long live dBase and it's derivatives, Foxpro, and Clipper! The
truly best languages.

 

[Tom Shelton]

As someone who was forced to switch to C#, there's nothing I could do in VB
that I can't do in C#, except it's not as obvious when you read it. Not to
start a war, but here are some observations off the top of my head:

Examples: When defining a class, you use the Implements and Inherits
keywords in VB. In C#, all you get is a colon. For God's sake, don't start
any of your base classes with an I or you'll never know which it's doing.

If you follow the .NET class designer guidlines, then this isn't an
issue. Never has been for me.

When you do implement an interface like IEditableObject, in VB the method
says "Implements IEditableObject.BeginEdit" and your method doesn't have to
be called BeginEdit. In C#, it is just called BeginEdit, and no sign
anywhere that it implements IEditableObject.BeginEdit. Better remember it,
or comment it for the next guy who comes along.

Well, usually I just put Interface immplementations in a region - and,
actually the IDE will do that for you anyway when you let it auto
implement.

I'm not sure how I feel about renaming interface methods...

+= versus AddHandler. I mean, really.

If you understand the concept of multi-cast delegates, then the += operator
actually makes sense.

Office Automation. Enough said.

Definately easier in VB.NET. Last time I had to do some from a C#
program, I did the automation peice in a vb.net dll and called it from
my C# program

And actually, with the new DLR stuff in VB, there is now stuff you can do in
VB that you can't do in C#.

Actually, not until the next version (VB10).

 

[kimiraikkonen]

As someone who was forced to switch to C#, there's nothing I could do in VB
that I can't do in C#, except it's not as obvious when you read it. Not to
start a war, but here are some observations off the top of my head:

What about vice versa? I wonder with no enough experience, is there
anything that a developer can do in C# but can't do the same in VB?

 

[JDS]

Hi Scott,


No, I'm well aware of the language filter but I've still found plenty of
pages with nothing but C# code on them.  Of course, that's when I can find
suitable documentation at MSDN at all...

And has anyone else noticed that the online MSDN search engine sucks now?
No matter what settings I choose, the first 100 results or more are always
fromhttp://forums.microsoft.com.  So I get the pleasure of wading through
dozens of posts from people having totally problems in the same areas that
I'm trying to find documentation, but problems that are often totally
unrelated to mine.  Why does MS think I want to find forum posts over actual
official documentation...?  Baffling.

"And has anyone else noticed that the online MSDN search engine sucks
now?"

Yes. Try Google and follow your search term with
site:msdn2.microsoft.com
Works a treat.