He is saying to someone else to learn an older API
because he thinks the changes in .NET 2.0 are meaningless.
I said no such thing. You *interpreted* my exact words, which were exactly
what I wanted to say. Let me quote *exactly* what I *did* say, to remind
you.
"For someone starting out, these changes are relatively meaningless."
Now, as you seem to have trouble understanding plain English, let me parse
the sentence for you:
"For someone starting out..." This phrase is a qualifier for the rest of the
statement. It indicates that the following statement is true for "someone
starting out," *not* universally true. To further explain the meaning of
this, let me explain why this is true. Someone who is "just setting out to
learn VB.Net to use with ASP.Net Framework," has quite a lot on their plate
to learn. The OP did not specify whether or not he had any prior experience
in programming, but if he did, he only had experience with VB6. The
difference between VB6 and VB.Net is incredible, and just learning the
language, object-orientation, strong data typing, and the Framework itself
(not to mention the CLR, which one can only so much of anyway) is going to
take awhile. And these are the basics. They have not changed since version
1.1. In addition, he wants to learn ASP.Net. While it is true that ASP.Net
has had some enhancements, he will have a time understanding the ASP.Net
environment, HTTP, web servers, virtual directories, HTML, Cookies,
JavaScript, etc., and that will take some time as well. These are the
basics. Learning about Generics, Anymous Functions, Master Pages, new
classes, etc., can wait.
"...these changes are relatively meaningless." The word "relatively" is an
adjective or qualifier for the statement as well. While you seem to think
that I made a sweeping generalization, I used 2 distinct qualfiers for the
remark, and without these 2 qualifiers, the remark takes on a different
meaning (the meaning you "read into" it). In this case "relatively" means
"compared to the more general and universal understanding that is a
pre-requisite for 'someone starting out' to master." It means that in the
scope of the entire body of knowledge that must be assimilated, the changes
referenced are so small as to be ("for those starting out") meaningless. It
does *not* mean that they are absolutely meaningless, unimportant, or nice
to have. I have been using Generics, for example, for quite some time now.
But I got along fine without them. I got along fine without anonymous
methods, and Master Pages.
As an analogy, I recently bought a new car. It has quite a few features that
my old car did not have. It gets better gas mileage, has a CD player,
performs better, automatically locks its doors, and automatically turns its
headlights on and off, depending on the amount of ambient light. But I was
quite able to drive my old car to and from anywhere I can go in my new car.
And for someone learning to drive, who already has a car, well, having a new
car might be nice, but he's not likely to use many of the new features until
he figures out how to drive.
The argumentation is stupid because it's wrong from the start and based
merely on his own personal preferences.
And there you go again with your favorite characterization. Well, if you're
*not* stupid, how about making an argument, and backing it up with some
logic? You might start by learning a little reading comprehension.
Kids these days!
--
Kevin Spencer
Microsoft MVP
..Net Developer
A watched clock never boils.
