Microsoft’s Professional Developers Conference is expected to be a coming out party of sorts for the next version of Visual Studio, code-named Orcas. Primary among the new features in and new direction for Orcas will be advances in how the toolset handles data, sources said. Data becomes “cool” in Orcas, said a source familiar with Microsoft’s strategy for Orcas.
I’ve been using Visual Studio off and on over the years, some more than others. People knock Microsoft a lot for various things, but very few developers can deny that they have a great set of development tools.
My main problem with the Visual Studio tools is price. Buying a commercial license is very expensive at the moment, since you have to buy a whole suite to even get optimizing compilers, you can’t just buy the language support you need!
I could only hope that a development environment like Visual Studio (and just as polished…intellisense, etc.) existed on other operating systems. Right now, KDevelop, Anjuta come closest, but are still far away in stability, polish, and features. And no, in my experience Eclipse, NetBeans, etc. don’t cut it either, at least not for anything but Java…
Does anyone else here know of an alternative?
If you are doing C# or VB programming, then I’ve heard SharpDevelop is pretty good, but I don’t know if that’s true or not.
I’ve never used SharpDevelop myself since I don’t use those languages.
The vast majority of systems in the world today are legacy systems not more than a few years old, and in the Windows world, are mostly based on COM, COM+ etc. We have to work with them, companies depend on them and the reality is things need to be done with them. No one has time these days to re-write everything and keep up with the latest development tools that Microsoft wants people to have wet dreams over. For crying out loud, people have only really just started looking at .Net starting with VS 2003 and they’re only just dipping their toes in with backwards-compatibility firmly in mind.
Either Microsoft learns that or they’re simply going to lose most of their developer community over the next few years to competing companies and development tools that actually share their concerns. Microsoft has made it quite clear that they don’t.
XML and web services are not simply wet dreams, they are far faster and easier to handle than DCOM, MTS etc.
At least using web services its cross platform, you can host em on any platform not as easy with DCOM.
COM certinally isnt going away anytime in the next 5 to 10 years but lots of NEW developments are moving on. Time to market is getting shorter and shorter.
Dude. Do you think technology should stand still for the sake of backwards compatibility? You can still call COM from .net anyway so I don’t know why you’re whining. .net is so much more productive than old style COM develeopment, it would be retarded to keep doing things the same way.
And if you’re at a company that just does legacy crap, maybe it’s time for a new job?
People just like to bitch about Microsoft of course. With VS.net, they actually offering a pretty damn sweet product with some innovation, so people have to find something about it to bitch about.
Dude. Do you think technology should stand still for the sake of backwards compatibility?
Yes. What we’re talking about here is huge amounts of infrastructure in businesses everywhere that cannot be rewritten overnight. Microsoft still seems to think IT and software development is some sort of massive growth industry with lifetimes of a few years, or even a few months.
I hate to break this to you, but software development is becoming like other industries out of necessity – much slower and more realistic.
You can still call COM from .net anyway so I don’t know why you’re whining.
You really don’t know what you’re talking about. There is some fairly primitive COM support, but none of it is intuitive, reliable or even well supported by Microsoft. To confuse things further, you’ve still got COM+ kicking around on the server-side and none-existant VB 6 migration support. The platform and it’s other components, like Indigo, change faster than I change my socks.
.net is so much more productive than old style COM develeopment
Blah, blah, blah, yada, yada. Get yourself a proper job as opposed to regurgitating that MCSE you’ve managed to get yourself on, OK? If you’ve ever seen comments from a Microsoft MVP or professional who actually has to maintain systems in the real world (as opposed to his head stuck up Microsoft’s marketing department’s backside) you’d know what I’m talking about. But, like most people who read OSNews, you don’t.
And if you’re at a company that just does legacy crap, maybe it’s time for a new job?
Legacy crap keeps business going, keeps the money coming in and keeps the world going round. If you don’t pay attention to legacy systems, if and when you do get a job in professional software development, you’ll be out of it pretty quickly.
Do try and think before making ludicrously stupid and irresponsible comments, will you? But, afterall, this is OSNews readers we’re talking about here.
Nicely modded down comment without any replies ;-).
Thanks. I’ll take that as a clear indication I’m right.
Thanks. I’ll take that as a clear indication I’m right.
Wait… is this OSNews, or did I just wander into the middle of recess in an elementary school?
Your first post was reasonable (so I modded it up) but the second is inflammatory (so I’ve left it alone). If you write a factually correct response that doesn’t entail delusions of granduer and decrying others as mentally deficient it might fair better.
Please excuse the malapropism. That should read “fare better.”
Now I understand why you have a tough time dealing with reality Seg. You just don’t live in it.
According to your post, things like VC++6 just go away when Microsoft comes out with something new. And Microsoft should just sit on their hands while they wait for people to ditch their legacy systems.
Microsoft has nothing to learn from you.
Now I understand why you have a tough time dealing with reality Seg. You just don’t live in it.
Well, since your reality is ‘not of this Earth’, I don’t find that particularly surprising.
According to your post, things like VC++6 just go away when Microsoft comes out with something new.
Older systems still need to be maintained and eventually migrated seamlessly, and as Microsoft has ended support (that one vendor thing again) for Visual Studio 6 companies are naturally looking at what is supported. The new supported tools provide absolutely woeful backwards compatibility and migration support.
And Microsoft should just sit on their hands while they wait for people to ditch their legacy systems.
Another mammoth clue that you don’t actually do software development for a living.
People do not, and will not, ditch legacy systems. Legacy systems are either migrated seamlessly in sensible stages or they’re generally not migrated at all. People in the real world, in real companies, do not rewrite everything from scratch. That’s a reality that everyone here, and in Microsoft’s marketing department, seem to be totally missing.
Why do you think that the core systems of many companies still run with twenty to thirty year old mainframes and COBOL? Because the businesses know they can depend on it, that’s why. .Net is the first initial wake up call to many organisations that they cannot depend on Microsoft.
Microsoft has nothing to learn from you.
I’m sincerely glad that you think that, and I hope Microsoft does too, because they’re not learning from themselves. Previous Microsoft software has always given good, as solid as possible, backwards compatible and migration support.
Older systems still need to be maintained and eventually migrated seamlessly, and as Microsoft has ended support (that one vendor thing again) for Visual Studio 6 companies are naturally looking at what is supported.
Nobody cares about support for VC6. People just use it.
The new supported tools provide absolutely woeful backwards compatibility and migration support.
What’s funny about your cluelessness is that Microsoft retains better backward compatibility then Linux ever will. Is there support for that KDE 2.x app or that Gtk 1.x app? I didn’t think so.
People in the real world, in real companies, do not rewrite everything from scratch. That’s a reality that everyone here, and in Microsoft’s marketing department, seem to be totally missing.
And that’s why the legacy win32 subystem will still be there when Vista comes out.
‘m sincerely glad that you think that, and I hope Microsoft does too, because they’re not learning from themselves. Previous Microsoft software has always given good, as solid as possible, backwards compatible and migration support.
Haha, Microsoft has $40b in the bank and now they should take some advice from a KDE fanboy like you. Too funny. You’re as delusional as ever, thanks for the laugh.
Nobody cares about support for VC6. People just use it.
In transition to any new technology for future proofing backwards compatibility and migration support is always required. You haven’t got a clue what you’re talking about, as per usual.
Besides, it isn’t just old versions of Visual Studio to new ones. It is stuff like COM+ and surrounding technology as well.
What’s funny about your cluelessness is that Microsoft retains better backward compatibility then Linux ever will. Is there support for that KDE 2.x app or that Gtk 1.x app? I didn’t think so.
In case it had slipped that walnut sized brain of yours, this is not a discussion about Linux.
And that’s why the legacy win32 subystem will still be there when Vista comes out.
That’s not the issue here. This is about development tools and support.
Haha, Microsoft has $40b in the bank and now they should take some advice from a KDE fanboy like you.
No matter how much money Microsoft has, it’s irrelevant to the discussion. I’ve explained why Microsoft are getting it wrong, you explain why they’re right. Easy, eh?
One of these days you might be educated as to how this debate thing works.
You’re as delusional as ever, thanks for the laugh.
Likewise.
The modding down of comments without adequate replies tells me a lot about the calibre of professional we get around here – i.e. non-existant.
In transition to any new technology for future proofing backwards compatibility and migration support is always required. You haven’t got a clue what you’re talking about, as per usual.
Let me explain this to you in simple terms, since you have such a hard time comprehending simple concepts. VS6 has been out for 7 or 8 years now. Nobody cares about support for VS6. Companies are already aware of all issues surrounding it.
In case it had slipped that walnut sized brain of yours, this is not a discussion about Linux.
It’s always about linux with you open source/KDE fanboys. And I stated before Microsoft’s backward compatibility is light-years ahead of Linux even with the source code.
That’s not the issue here. This is about development tools and support.
And once again, there are no support issues with VS6. You might wish there was in order to promote your open source fanboy agenda, but nobody cares.
No matter how much money Microsoft has, it’s irrelevant to the discussion. I’ve explained why Microsoft are getting it wrong, you explain why they’re right. Easy, eh?
I advise you to go contact Microsoft with your advice. They’ll probably fire Ballmer and make you CEO. You fanboys are so funny.
The modding down of comments without adequate replies tells me a lot about the calibre of professional we get around here – i.e. non-existant.
You were probably modded down because everybody knows how clueless you are. Go back to your mom’s basement programming where you and the other fanboys can cry and moan about microsoft.
Let me explain this to you in simple terms, since you have such a hard time comprehending simple concepts. VS6 has been out for 7 or 8 years now. Nobody cares about support for VS6.
There are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of systems written with it that you can’t just rewrite. Did I mention that people in the real world can’t just rewrite systems? And all those MVPs and other Microsoft developers (you know, people actually doing development for a living) quite clearly do care.
You need to get out and get your ear to the ground a hell of a lot more, but of course, since you don’t because you don’t do any real world development you can’t.
It’s always about linux with you open source/KDE fanboys.
Funny. I never mentioned it once.
And once again, there are no support issues with VS6.
There are, and you’re obviously not fit to comment on them because you have no idea what’s actually going on.
You might wish there was in order to promote your open source fanboy agenda
You’ve got a bee in your bonnet about open source for some reason. I suggest you remove it before commenting further.
I advise you to go contact Microsoft with your advice.
Many MVPs and developers developing in the real world already have.
They’ll probably fire Ballmer and make you CEO. You fanboys are so funny.
Funny. Calling others fanboys does not make you any less of a one. Have you not learned that yet?
You were probably modded down because everybody knows how clueless you are.
Nope, it merely reflects the average experience of OSNews readers.
Go back to your mom’s basement programming
Funny, because that’s obviously the extent of your development experience.
There are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of systems written with it that you can’t just rewrite. Did I mention that people in the real world can’t just rewrite systems?
What reason do they have to rewrite their code exactly ?
just because there is a new version of visual studio does not mean that existing applications have stopped working.
It also does not mean that VS6 has stopped working.
And all those MVPs and other Microsoft developers (you know, people actually doing development for a living) quite clearly do care.
Ok this is really not that hard. First if you are talking VC++ then you can still write code like you used to do using VS.NET, its called ‘unmanaged code’.
If you need a mix or you need to support legacy functionality then you can use the COM interop or p/invoke to call your existing code that was authored in vs6.
You need to get out and get your ear to the ground a hell of a lot more, but of course, since you don’t because you don’t do any real world development you can’t.
I have no idea about that guy but I do real development and its not a nightmare by any stretch.
If you are expecting to just load your VS6 projects in VS.NET and click ‘build’ you will find you need to make changes and depending on how you wrote your application then yes you might have hell.
If you wrote your application correctly to begin with you will not have a major problem fitting VS.NET into your development cycle and you’ll find you can still use your existing investment in components.
Its the wannabes and posers that bitch about new compiler releases and cry about how the sh*tty apps they wrote broke.
Real developers just get the f*cking job done.
I find this exchange a bit childish, but I know of a real example where the Microsoft development advances have been very harmful to a software company.
This company had a very sucessful Unix based product. In 1996 they picked MS as a straegic direction for a complete re-write of the technology. They created the entire application in VS, but unfortunately chose VB as the language. They released their initial version in VB5 (using RDO for data access) in 2000. They quickly ran into performance issues and spent three years working through them. Part of the problem was RDO, so they moved up to VB 6, ADO and COM+. But ADO wasn’t ready for prime time until about 2.6 or 2.7. Needless to say it was a rough period.
Fast forward to 2005, they now have about 15 million invested in this product and many customers using it. It is truely a market leading application in regards to functionality. They have just about reached stability with the platform, and they are now fighting the reputation of being a “legacy” application in the minds of prospects and buyers, because there is no easy way to take the VB6 COM technology into the .Net world.
Yes, it can be wrapped with .Net, and referenced, but the buyers know that it is a non-trivial port.
All of their development was done in consultation with Microsoft the whole way. They did not make any of their technology decisions without direct advice from MS.
I think the VB shops have been burnt the worst in the past few years. How would you feel if your 15 million dollar investment had just “come of age” only to be “end-of-lifed” by your supplier?
Makes it hard to get too excited about future directions.
So basically, even though there’s been a clear migration path since about 1-2 years before .NET 1.0 shipped, they chose not to use it. Even still, COM (or any other unmanaged code) is only “legacy” if dependence on unmanaged code doesn’t fit your deployment model or the security context in which you want to run.
The majority of applications for Windows are still unmanaged/COM-based. The whole point of .NET’s support or unmanaged interop is to maintain you existing investment while taking advantage of new capabilities provided by managed code.
Microsoft Office is a COM platform, but that didn’t stop MS from exposing existing functionality to .NET via interop assemblies, and start developing some of their new applications in managed code. The whole point is not to rewrite existing code, else they could’ve just left out unmanaged interop.
So basically, even though there’s been a clear migration path since about 1-2 years before .NET 1.0 shipped, they chose not to use it.
Rewriting millions of lines of code, or at least picking through millions of lines, is simply not an option, no matter how much time you have. Businesses in the real world simply do not have the time or money to lavish on such luxuries.
Simply saying ‘oh, Microsoft has told you about this years ago’ is simply not good enough. Microsoft simply has no right to throw existing code on the scrap heap.
The whole point of .NET’s support or unmanaged interop is to maintain you existing investment while taking advantage of new capabilities provided by managed code.
The COM interop adds a maintenance step which shouldn’t be there, and it isn’t just about COM interop but the maintenance of existing code as well. COM interop tends not to work particularly well in a lot of large system either, as it is effectively a wrapper which should not be there.
Microsoft Office is a COM platform, but that didn’t stop MS from exposing existing functionality to .NET via interop assemblies
Well bully for them. I hate to point out the obvious but Microsoft controls the technology, so they can do what they like.
Rewriting millions of lines of code, or at least picking through millions of lines, is simply not an option, no matter how much time you have. Businesses in the real world simply do not have the time or money to lavish on such luxuries.
Re-read my post. The point of unmanaged interop is that you don’t have to rewrite your code. I used MS Office as an example. It is still unmanaged COM exposed to .NET via interop assemblies.
Simply saying ‘oh, Microsoft has told you about this years ago’ is simply not good enough. Microsoft simply has no right to throw existing code on the scrap heap.
Existing code goes nowhere. Why is that so hard to understand? It will still run and is still supported on present and future versions of Windows. The build environment continues to work. The runtime continues to work. What’s the problem?
The COM interop adds a maintenance step which shouldn’t be there, and it isn’t just about COM interop but the maintenance of existing code as well. COM interop tends not to work particularly well in a lot of large system either, as it is effectively a wrapper which should not be there.
The existing code does not need to change. Define large systems. Do Windows, Office, and Visual Studio not qualify as large systems? Interop has worked well for these and other large unmanaged and/or COM-based products.
Well bully for them. I hate to point out the obvious but Microsoft controls the technology, so they can do what they like.
Microsoft has used the same public, documented methods available to everyone else included w/ VS and online via MSDN and even 3rd-party sources to achieve their results. Control of the technology has nothing to do with it. They even offer guidence and case studies on how they and other companies have achieved their results.
OK. One more post and then I’m done. I think there has been some confusion regarding my story about the company that invested in VB.
First, I am not complaining about it, and yes, there are technical solutions to the issue, which they are implementing.
This whole thing started off as a discussion about Visual Studio versus other development tools and environments. So, while I admit that VS is a good development platform in regards to IDE functionality, my story was about the other things that should be considered.
The VB story is about investment and return on that investment. Not whether Microsoft’s technology is good or bad. And when you look at it from that perspective, the track record of other platforms is more favorable to a return on investment than VS and the Microsoft way, at least in this one example. And I admit that this represents a worst case senario.
The company made an investment that was based on a calculated return that they were projecting for this time frame. Unfortunately, they find themselves with a larger than expected future investment requirement and therefore a lower return than they expected. No big deal, and it happens everyday in business for various reasons.
But when you start to think about where you are going to make the next big investment, the stability of other platforms like Linux and Mac OS X, as well as the development environments they support like Eclipse, start to off-set the fact that VS is a really good tool.
That’s what I was trying to add to the discussion..
Existing code goes nowhere. Why is that so hard to understand?
Maybe you’re not aware of the support issues that go on in the vast majority of major companies. The code is rendered useless simply because your existing code is not supported in new versions of development tools. Trust me, existing code is going to be around for years and years to come and it will need to be supported, long after many people like yourself have believed that everything has moved to .Net.
The existing code does not need to change.
Ever heard of maintenance and support? Quite clearly, you’ve never done it because you’re always on to the next greatest thing.
Microsoft has used the same public, documented methods available to everyone else included w/ VS and online via MSDN and even 3rd-party sources to achieve their results. Control of the technology has nothing to do with it.
That’s simply because Microsoft have products that depend on that so they need it. Anyone who falls outside of that bracket (VB/VBA) systems are on their own.
Maybe you’re not aware of the support issues that go on in the vast majority of major companies. The code is rendered useless simply because your existing code is not supported in new versions of development tools. Trust me, existing code is going to be around for years and years to come and it will need to be supported, long after many people like yourself have believed that everything has moved to .Net.
The old tools still work. Existing code can still be maintained with them. As far as interop, the COM binaries from the old code will also work in the new IDE.
Ever heard of maintenance and support? Quite clearly, you’ve never done it because you’re always on to the next greatest thing.
You original point was about the code needing to change in the form of a rewrite for managed migration, not for maintenance. The code changing for maintenance reasons is not a .NET-specific issue and would occur anyway. My point in response to your original point was that it isn’t true that the code has to be rewritten. That same code will run on Windows for years to come.
That’s simply because Microsoft have products that depend on that so they need it. Anyone who falls outside of that bracket (VB/VBA) systems are on their own.
MS’ code is dependent on the same infrastructure as their ISVs. VB customers can use VS or go to MSDN and use the exact same info/tools MS uses for interop/migration. MS has many internal apps written in VB.
This story you recite leaves a few things untold.
First of all, why did they decide that it should be redone, for a different system at that?
Who made the decision to make the thing in VB? The company or MS?
And lastly… Why have they decided to stay with VB6, after they learned that VB6 support would come to an end?
I don’t particularly like that MS cuts the support for VB6 in favor of VB .NET and I think that they should actively help customers make the transition to VB .NET where the customer needs the help.
– Microsoft’s business model, from day 1, has been software obsolence.
It’s to bad the Microsoft FanBoy’s at this company had to learn it the Hard Way. That’s why Mainframe Cobol systems managers laugh all the way to the bank.
An update to my story.
First of all, why did they decide that it should be redone, for a different system at that?
It was 1996. They wanted to catch the Microsoft wave. A transition from character based to graphical UI.
Who made the decision to make the thing in VB? The company or MS?
It was at Microsoft’s recommendation, based on the number and complexity of the user interface forms.
And lastly… Why have they decided to stay with VB6, after they learned that VB6 support would come to an end?
We are talking timing here. Someone else commented about the migration path to .NET that was being discussed even before it’s release. The problems this company encountered included:
1. They had embarked on a huge task and it was taking longer than expected. Their customer’s expectations (and renvenue projections) had been based on a delivery in 1999. To delay that release so a re-write of the re-write could be accomplished was not really an option.
2. After release of the product and the release of .NET 1.0, the company began looking at moving the product to .NET. But it takes a while to stabalize a large enterprise level system, so their resources were consumed by customer requirements and could not be freed up for a .NET transition.
Now they are ready to start the effort and are doing so. You can fault them for not being perfect, but they really have executed fairly well. If VB6 had an upgrade path to VB.NET they would be sitting pretty right now, and the 15 million would have been an excellent investment.
But to go through all of this effort and end up facing another steep incline is discouraging. And to hear a prospect say, “we can’t consider your product because it is not based on current technology” is hard to take.
They released their initial version in VB5 (using RDO for data access) in 2000. They quickly ran into performance issues and spent three years working through them. Part of the problem was RDO,
I can see this happening back in that timeframe if they were dealing with massive amounts of data so I’ll agree.
They have just about reached stability with the platform, and they are now fighting the reputation of being a “legacy” application in the minds of prospects and buyers, because there is no easy way to take the VB6 COM technology into the .Net world.
This is where I get lost because if this company developed this application in the late 90s with the help of MS then its designed to MS’s DNA model and the bussiness logic, database code and UI are seperated.
Some examples of what exactly is a porting issue for them would be nice.
I think the VB shops have been burnt the worst in the past few years. How would you feel if your 15 million dollar investment had just “come of age” only to be “end-of-lifed” by your supplier?
End of life ? VB6 will not be end of lifed until March of 2008.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/vbasic/support/vb6.aspx
Read that and do the math. If this company launched in 2000 then they will have had 8 years of time getting support for the development tool they used to write the software.
If they cannot figure out how to move the application to a more modern development platform in 8 YEARS I do not know what to say.
Then of course we get back to the whole “why” of porting. I wrote a 16-bit terminal emulator back in 1994 that is still used to this day on Windows XP by more than a few companies. The program was mostly written in VB3 of all things and it still works fine. VB3 was End of Lifed back in 99′.
Quit crying about change and get busy embracing it is what I tell the guys I work with. The only thing to fear in new development platforms is that you might have to learn new skills (which you should be doing anyway)
What reason do they have to rewrite their code exactly ?
just because there is a new version of visual studio does not mean that existing applications have stopped working.
That point has been addressed many times. It is about more that just support for Visual Studio but the technology around it.
Ok this is really not that hard. First if you are talking VC++ then you can still write code like you used to do using VS.NET, its called ‘unmanaged code’.
No, because you end up doing far more work than you should have to. You also have an absolute mish-mash of technology of .Net assemblies, COM+ assemblies for COM+ which are actually COM and the prospect of Indigo looming around in the background. It is simply not that simple. Layering .Net on top of COM is also not terribly reliable in a whole lot of cases.
If you are expecting to just load your VS6 projects in VS.NET and click ‘build’ you will find you need to make changes and depending on how you wrote your application then yes you might have hell.
Not good enough, is it?
If you wrote your application correctly to begin with you will not have a major problem fitting VS.NET into your development cycle and you’ll find you can still use your existing investment in components.
Writing the application properly has absolutely nothing to do with it. The fact is, .Net and COM and the new versions of Visual Studio are totally different technology and have basically cut off millions of lines of code and COM components written today. That has happened regardless of how well that code is written, and Microsoft wants to simply ignore it.
Its the wannabes and posers that bitch about new compiler releases and cry about how the sh*tty apps they wrote broke.
No actually. It’s the people who actually got sensible work done with the right technology and software tools available to them at the time at various companies and projects they worked with.
I applaud your maturity on that one, and it is a clear indication that you’re simply not a developer out there in the world maintaining and developing the sorts of applications required in many companies.
I know you’re one of these people who want to praise .Net to the hills, but it simply isn’t like that, .Net is not as great as everyone says and the current situation is Microsoft’s fault. There’s no getting away from that.
What are you going to say when new versions of .Net come out that break your applications? Bear in mind that what we’ve got now with iterative releases of the .Net framework, independent of Windows versions, is not too dissimilar to that of different Java runtimes and is only likely to be worse.
Real developers just get the f*cking job done.
Thank you for that really useful nugget of information. Real, and professional, developers look carefully at the time they have available and the code they should be reusing to get the job done, on time, reliably and making sure they don’t throw away existing knowledge in existing code.
That point has been addressed many times. It is about more that just support for Visual Studio but the technology around it.
I have yet to hear a good reason so I’ll keep asking the question. Technology around it ? COM ? Its going to be around for years. MS’s own applications are largely COM based. Vista will have COM and likely the version after Vista will still support this technology. Its been built into the OS ever since the first OLE libraries were available.
Writing the application properly has absolutely nothing to do with it.
It has everything to do with it. If you fail to grasp that then I put you squarely in the group of people who tend to do more crying about new technologies then actually working with them. Oh thats right, look what I am replying to you about. Oops that was an obvious answer.
That has happened regardless of how well that code is written, and Microsoft wants to simply ignore it
So you expect to be able to load code from any previous version of a program on a newer version and have to do nothing in terms of porting ? I’m not sure I follow you here.
No actually. It’s the people who actually got sensible work done with the right technology and software tools available to them at the time at various companies and projects they worked with.
If these people are good then they will adapt. Good developers adapt and get the job done. Its the suckers and losers who just complain and complain and complain.
I applaud your maturity on that one, and it is a clear indication that you’re simply not a developer out there in the world maintaining and developing the sorts of applications required in many companies.
Honestly I could care less what you think about it, but yes I do development for a living. Have been making a living at it since 1993.
Is it mature to complain over and over about newer technologies like .net when you are a paid professional who is supposed to be providing solutions ?
Honestly if you worked with me I’d have you blown out of the business in no time flat. Your attitude is a joke at best.
What are you going to say when new versions of .Net come out that break your applications?
Well the first thing to try in a situation like that is to make sure the application is being run on the same version of the .net framework it was written with.
1.0, 1.1 and 2.0 can all be run side by side. This is only an issue if you writing an application that supports multiple .net framework versions in the same executable MSIL. If you are doing that you really need to make sure you know why and are aware of the pitfalls.
Bear in mind that what we’ve got now with iterative releases of the .Net framework, independent of Windows versions, is not too dissimilar to that of different Java runtimes and is only likely to be worse.
Already dealing with it. Got a .net 1.1 application that needs to realistically move to 2.0 due to the new serial port namespaces. I can’t take the risk that .net 2 may be delayed and ship a finished application on a beta framework.
If I were you I’m sure I’d just complain about it and then cry a bit about how my application is broken by the evil tools group at MS.
Of course that is a complete waste of time so instead I came up with another solution.
1 = I used the COM interop in a class and built a software interface over an existing serial port DLL interface that I had in a previous application.
2 = After completing this I ported the application up to beta 2 of vs.net and rewrote my interop code in the class library to use the System.IO.Ports.SerialPort namespace internally instead of the COM interop.
In the end what do I have ? I have a version that runs on .net 1.1 right now and can ship. I also have the groundwork complete for a future release on .net 2.0.
Was it more work ? Yes it was.
Was it the ideal way to do it ? Not at all, however not every situation in development is ideal.
The bottom line is that a solution was found and a plan is in place. It will work.
Its been fun and entertaining but I think I’m done. I do not care if you or this company can’t figure out how to get their heads out of a sand bank. The only advice I can give is to quit complaining and start thinking because there is an answer.
Technology around it ? COM ? Its going to be around for years. MS’s own applications are largely COM based. Vista will have COM and likely the version after Vista will still support this technology.
The issue is support with new development tools for maintenance of existing code and support for any issues that happen with third party components or similar with new development. Nice way to skirt around the issue – what you’ve decribed is not the issue here.
It has everything to do with it. If you fail to grasp that then I put you squarely in the group of people who tend to do more crying about new technologies then actually working with them.
As I’ve said – if the technology used is completely different it simply doesn’t matter how you write your application. That is the fundamental point.
The point is you cannot migrate existing VB code no matter how well written it is, and has been pointed out by many people as a serious shortcoming.
Is it mature to complain over and over about newer technologies like .net when you are a paid professional who is supposed to be providing solutions ?
My job is to get things done and get from A to B. Newer technologies like .Net should, quite simply, not be getting in my way. It is the height of immaturity, and is something prevalent in the software industry (so it’s not totally unusual), that I should somehow rewrite everything in the latest brave new technology. There is not the time or the money.
Why do you think businesses distrust software development intensely?
Honestly if you worked with me I’d have you blown out of the business in no time flat. Your attitude is a joke at best.
If you’re looking for a job in a real company that has several hundred existing VB apps and components and is looking at future development and maintenance for those applications then it is fair to say you aren’t going to last very long with your recemmendations.
Already dealing with it. Got a .net 1.1 application that needs to realistically move to 2.0 due to the new serial port namespaces. I can’t take the risk that .net 2 may be delayed and ship a finished application on a beta framework.
Right, so it runs great on your developer machine. Now deploy that over several thousand workstations with existing applications and functionality, make sure everything is reliable and nothing breaks. But of course, that’s someone else’s problem, isn’t it?
You will find the issues somewhat less straightforward.
I do not care if you or this company can’t figure out how to get their heads out of a sand bank.
I take it you’re not maintaining existing code then, you’re continually writing new code in new, fashionable technologies and you simply don’t care? Sorry, but companies in the real world do not have that luxury.
The issue is support with new development tools for maintenance of existing code and support for any issues that happen with third party components or similar with new development. Nice way to skirt around the issue – what you’ve decribed is not the issue here.
I do not use new tools to support legacy code, I use the existing tools that were used when the code was developed. That means this: If I am maintaining an application that was developed in VC++ in Visual Studio 6 I am not going to load the project up in VS.NET 2003 to do some minor bug fixes.
3rd party components? Considering you probably don’t have the source it really does not matter. You might want to contact them and if its an ongoing issue, look for another alternative.
As I’ve said – if the technology used is completely different it simply doesn’t matter how you write your application. That is the fundamental point.
Yes it does matter. Completely different would be a tool that failed to load your existing code. VS.NET has converters and depending on how you wrote your code will make a difference in how it ports over.
The point is you cannot migrate existing VB code no matter how well written it is, and has been pointed out by many people as a serious shortcoming.
Bullsh*t I’ve migrated 2 of them myself. Was it completely seamless? No it was not but I’ve never seen a seamless transition to new development tools. Something always changes that causes you to address something. It goes back to my original question, why port in the first place ?
My job is to get things done and get from A to B. Newer technologies like .Net should, quite simply, not be getting in my way. It is the height of immaturity, and is something prevalent in the software industry (so it’s not totally unusual), that I should somehow rewrite everything in the latest brave new technology. There is not the time or the money.
You do not have to rewrite everything. Why do people think that because vs.net shipped that they HAVE to port over their vb6 stuff? I’ve done minimal porting but have moved a lot of legacy stuff over to working with .net via COM interops and p/invoke. I do not understand this ‘we gotta port’ attitude.
Why do you think businesses distrust software development intensely?
No idea where you work but where i do business management trusts us, in fact they rely on our decisions to keep pretty much everything running smoothly.
If you’re looking for a job in a real company that has several hundred existing VB apps and components and is looking at future development and maintenance for those applications then it is fair to say you aren’t going to last very long with your recemmendations.
My job with a major airline company that supports over 100,000 users worldwide must not be real. God the dream seemed so real too!
So what you are saying is that because I do not advocate porting everything we have already written over to .net just for the sake of porting I am not going to last long? OK Gotcha dude.
Right, so it runs great on your developer machine.
No actually it runs great on the 150 workstations that we are testing.
Now deploy that over several thousand workstations with existing applications and functionality, make sure everything is reliable and nothing breaks. But of course, that’s someone else’s problem, isn’t it?
We’ll deploy everywhere after the initial testing is done and the focus group working with the software gives us their final feedback.
We will likely roll the software into the next blockpoint release of windows that is issued on the workstations.
Its very much my problem if it goes wrong.
You will find the issues somewhat less straightforward.
Newsflash brainiac. I do this every day and I’m well aware of the issues.
I take it you’re not maintaining existing code then, you’re continually writing new code in new, fashionable technologies and you simply don’t care?
I’m doing more than just maintaining existing code, I’m actively porting over existing code AS NEEDED.
I would have run vb6 forever man, no problem. I love the language but .net is getting popular at work and I can see the advantages myself.
We maintain, port and write new software as needed and in accordance with budgeting constraints, er I mean guidelines.
Sorry, but companies in the real world do not have that luxury.
No they do not. They also do not have the luxry of just porting everything over to a new development platform for the hell of it so I really do not know WTF you are complaining about in half of these posts.
There are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of systems written with it that you can’t just rewrite. Did I mention that people in the real world can’t just rewrite systems? And all those MVPs and other Microsoft developers (you know, people actually doing development for a living) quite clearly do care.
No shit sherlock. You are like captain obvious when you can’t make a point. Nobody has to migrate until they’re ready. Microsoft isn’t forcing anybody. They’ve got the tools already. They don’t need Microsoft to hold their hands. I guess RedHat and Novell would hope that every single person using linux is so incompetent that they need hand-holding so they can make some money off of their “services” model.
You need to get out and get your ear to the ground a hell of a lot more, but of course, since you don’t because you don’t do any real world development you can’t.
I was doing professional linux development probably before you popped in your first Mandrake CD and thought you were cool because you were now on Unix.
There are, and you’re obviously not fit to comment on them because you have no idea what’s actually going on.
Maybe you would like to explain these “support” issues that you’ve magically conjured up. Maybe you need some company to hold your hands with an 8 year old product, but most competent developers don’t.
Many MVPs and developers developing in the real world already have.
VBers, for the most part, and they can either stick with the existing systems and tools that they have or move on. It’s simple.
You’ve got a bee in your bonnet about open source for some reason. I suggest you remove it before commenting further.
Well, we all know you’re an open source/KDE fanboy so it’s obvious that you’ll conjure up any kind of fantasy grievance against Microsoft.
Funny. Calling others fanboys does not make you any less of a one. Have you not learned that yet?
Bzzz. Wrong. I don’t program for windows only, but I don’t have some irrational, slashdork hatred for Microsoft. They make some good tools. Open Sores should learn from them.
Nope, it merely reflects the average experience of OSNews readers.
I’m not going to argue with the general level of technical incompetence among your average OSNews poster, but things were a lot better 4 years ago before it got overrrun by Open Sores fandorks.
Funny, because that’s obviously the extent of your development experience.
I question if you have *any* development experience, much less real-world, because obviously you live in fantasy-land.
Nobody has to migrate until they’re ready.
Thanks for the obviousness there. But people don’t just migrate large systems. It is always a stepped and steady migration using the systems they already have in place. New systems written with new technology have to integrate and morph seamlessly with the old. You don’t do that by rewriting, and no one who wants to keep their job or contract does.
Direction on that, while not critical to a programmer in their bedroom, is critical to any organisation.
The fact that I might be personally fine with new .Net development is absolutely irrelevant to the wider issues. It doesn’t matter if the old ways are broken as some people call it. There are many industries that have had broken methods, and they have simply had to deal with the issues because those methods have been used in the past and there is a legacy. That’s where software is heading as an industry – where other industries are now. It will hurt Microsoft, but that’s the way it is.
They don’t need Microsoft to hold their hands.
Wow really, because it’s Microsoft’s technology?!
I was doing professional linux development probably before you popped in your first Mandrake CD and thought you were cool because you were now on Unix.
Whether you did or not is pretty irrelevant because you have no clue whatsoever how people actually migrate systems and use new technology out there in the world.
Maybe you would like to explain these “support” issues that you’ve magically conjured up.
1. Seamless migration and maintenance of existing code without rewriting – something no professional developer does. As the petition states:
http://classicvb.org/petition/faq.asp
It is a dangerous precedent for Microsoft to essentially dictate that systems and data are disposable. That is something that customers and companies will decide for themselves, not Microsoft.
2. VBA support and future proofing is extremely sketchy.
3. Simple confusion and a total mess over what .Net is, what is written with it and its future direction in the not-too-distant future. COM+ is still used with .Net currently, but the proposed ditching of it for Indigo (whatever it actually is) isn’t helping anyone.
4. Simply using COM etc. as it stands is uncertain. Something somewhere will break a third-party component at some point or something new will break something old, and Microsoft won’t care. With stuff like COBOL it is still supported by many vendors after many decades.
In short, as wonderful as many people think it is to have something completely new and fresh and wander off on to the lush new green grass, it simply isn’t practical. These people, and software as an industry, are simply gowing to have to grow up and mature as other industries have done regarding this.
That is why COBOL and mainframe technologies crap over anything Microsoft or PC based in terms of age, and why Java (multiple vendors and multiple implementations) and any open sourced development tool (Qt etc.) will increasingly become the more attractive option. Even if one vendor wants to end of life it, if the vast majority of customers don’t want that then due to demand there will always be a company, piece of software or product that can help them.
That’s the lesson to draw out of all of this, and one you seem to be mightily irritated by.
VBers, for the most part, and they can either stick with the existing systems and tools that they have or move on. It’s simple.
Right……and how do these people move from one to the other? In any real environment you can’t just jump from one pit to another completely different one. And as they’re using an exclusively Microsoft technology, what happens when something new breaks something old? That’s been my whole point.
Well, we all know you’re an open source/KDE fanboy so it’s obvious that you’ll conjure up any kind of fantasy grievance against Microsoft.
It’s funny that I’ve done no such thing here and you’re trying to do it going the other way. Do you not realise what you’re actualy doing?! Look up the word ironic in the dictionary.
…before it got overrrun by Open Sores fandorks.
Right…..
I question if you have *any* development experience, much less real-world, because obviously you live in fantasy-land.
Real world development simply doesn’t happen the way you think it does, and if you recommend some of the things you’ve done you’ll be out of any job fairly quickly.
The modding down of comments without adequate replies tells me a lot about the calibre of professional we get around here – i.e. non-existant.
Then perhaps maybe you should post your comments in a forum with a higher standard of debate. I would suggest the Platform Advocacy forum on Ars Technica ( http://episteme.arstechnica.com/eve/ubb.x?a=frm&s=50009562&f=484095… ). Quite a few professional developers post there, including a couple of Microsoft employees.
I’ll be keeping an eye out for your post, assuming you’re interested in anything other than acting superior to the uninformed kiddies who around post here.
I like how you engage in “acting superior to the uninformed kiddies who around post here,” while chastising him for it. Delicious.
Used to like visual studio and the IDE thing until I got a handle on VI. Sometimes simplicity is power.
Am I the only one that finds all the ‘new’ microsoft tech overwhelmingly boring.
haha… VI? You must be quite the programmer.
Maybe you’re paid by the hour so it’s good to be slow?
Vi sucks as a development tool. The only thing good about it are the keybindings. I use Vim for ruby programming because there are no decent development environments out there.
But is quite funny that certain people think they’re hardcore because they use Vim or Emacs.
What? VI is an awesome development tool. It is also a great editor, especially for doing long, menial tasks.
NOTE: This is about the MSVC++ 6.0 UI. I have no experience with the .NET UI.
I like vi’s keyboard commands better for the most part, but there are a few things that I would like in vi, such as the search tool that MSVC has. I do have my gripes with MS’s search tool though: it outputs the complete filename before the code that matched, and if you’ve got you’re stuff organized into folders, it can get quite hard to read without scrolling the search window. And I hate reaching for my mouse when I’m working, it interrupts me too much. I use grep to do my searching, and it works even better. Note that I don’t exactly think that search functionality should be re-invented in an editor, that’s the wrong place for it. It’s just something I miss. Maybe an interface to grep in part of the vi window would be cool.
Another thing I like about vi is the highlighting (I use the desert colorscheme), which is easier on my eyes than the MSVC highlighting.
The main reason I don’t like VC is the amount I have to use the mouse. Now, I know that VC has lots of keyboard shortcuts, but heck, I only have to use VC for the summer (intern job) so I’m not going to bother learning another keyboard interface.
The only thing I don’t like in vi is that I can’t just “jump around between functions” like you can in the Eclipse IDE. If I’m dealing with a lot of new code where I have to fix bugs, I’ll often use Eclipse, just because I can find the function I want with extreme ease. Once I’ve got enough knowledge about the program, I go back to vi though.
And to the other people commenting about this, I don’t think that I’m “hardcore” because I use vi. That’s a stupid reason to use an editor. I use it because it’s easier for me to use.
Emacs pnz0rz j00.
At Uni I was taught C++ using VS 6.0. The computers at Uni have both VS6.0 and VS.net, as soon as I tried to compile and execute on VS.Net I said to myself “how the hell do you do this?!” No menu item has the word compile anywhere?
I wish the interface was backwards compatible.
as soon as I tried to compile and execute on VS.Net I said to myself “how the hell do you do this?!” No menu item has the word compile anywhere?
If you don’t know your way around menus then I seriously doubt you have any stand in critisizing VS. Btw, it’s under Build.
From the article, it is totally unclear what they are set to accomplish. Is this some ten-years-behind EOF/CoreData ripoff, or something actually new? “Data becomes cool”. That’s very informative. Database access in Visual Basic. Wasn’t there an .ocx for that in ’94?
What I’d like from MS would be to actually try and polish their existing products: it’s just ridiculous that VS uses Unix line endings exclusively, and everything else in Windows (including Notepad) completely barfs them up. Or that a standard .NET application in XP has some strange not-quite-like-W2000-theme look.
[i]VS uses Unix line endings exclusively, and everything else in Windows (including Notepad) completely barfs them up.</>
Use Wordpad
Recently at work we started evaluating various IDE’s to see if we could replace our current VS 6.0 setups with something that doesn’t add extra costs.
Our target platform is not Windows, so there’s no reason why we have to use Visual Studio really.
After looking at KDevelop, Anjuta and Eclipse (as well as commercial IDE’s like CodeForge and Borland’s stuff) we concluded that any upgrade would be to a newer VS version. KDevelop was closest to being usable of the free tools, but it was simply not good enough now.
Personally I’m waiting for VS2k5 to be released and hopefully I can get it cheap or free through school. If not, I think I’d rather wait for Orcas. At least if Orcas is slated for release around the same time as Vista. Too short time between releases for it to be worth doing a full price upgrade to 2k5, and then later to Orcas, even if an upgrade to that is likely to be cheaper.
After looking at KDevelop, Anjuta and Eclipse (as well as commercial IDE’s like CodeForge and Borland’s stuff) we concluded that any upgrade would be to a newer VS version. KDevelop was closest to being usable of the free tools, but it was simply not good enough now.
How is it that people can compare KDevelop to VS? Even if one is significantly better than the other, since they run on different platforms, doesn’t the choice of platforms kind of dictate which one you’re going to use? For example, if your primarly/only platform of development is Windows, how the hell can you use KDevelop on that? And vice versa?
And for all you vi fanatics, trolling aside, is coding in this thing really faster than a full-blown IDE? I’m sure it’s possible to code a GUI using only a text editor, but I sure as hell wouldn’t want to
For example, if your primarly/only platform of development is Windows, how the hell can you use KDevelop on that? And vice versa?
According to his post, it seems that they’re probably just writing a lot of crossplatform C/C++ so it doesn’t really matter what they develop in.
And for all you vi fanatics, trolling aside, is coding in this thing really faster than a full-blown IDE? I’m sure it’s possible to code a GUI using only a text editor, but I sure as hell wouldn’t want to
There’s nothing faster than vi(m) for pure “coding”, but Vi(m) is just a text editor and not a development environment. Eclipse has vi keybindings, and I believe IDEA does too. The problem with Vim and Emacs is that at their heart, they’re just console programs. Unfortunately, nobody has ripped out the guts of vim into a proper library….well, I think the successor to kvim might be doing something like that but not sure. But that’s not surprising considering that you have stuff like #ifdef VMS and other obscure platforms still being supported where parts of the c standard library have to be rewritten to support quirky compilers on said obscure platforms.
There’s nothing faster than vi(m) for pure “coding”, but Vi(m) is just a text editor and not a development environment.
Yes, this is one of the big things that really bother me about IDEs: no good editor. If VS.NET had a vim style editor indside of it, it would be one of the best IDE’s out there. Unfortunately, it doesn’t and I wind up wasting a lot of time typing “j” and “k” all over the place.
Another thing that bother’s me about IDE’s is limited language support. VS.NET has support for it’s particular languages, but has no support for other languages.
One thing you have to keep in mind though (and I’m speaking mostly to the grandparent) is that a lot of people do not write the same type of code you write. Embedded systems is a really big market, and most of that code is not gui code, so using something like VS.NET is kind of pointless in those markets. VS.NET is great for certian markets (i.e. Windows Applications), but is not that great for other markets (i.e. embedded and real time systems).
One thing you have to keep in mind though (and I’m speaking mostly to the grandparent) is that a lot of people do not write the same type of code you write. Embedded systems is a really big market, and most of that code is not gui code, so using something like VS.NET is kind of pointless in those markets.
If you’re writing fairly portable C code then it doesn’t matter what you develop in. It’s not pointless if they have decided that they are productive in VS. And there’s probably 3rd party plugins for various embedded environments.
“Another thing that bother’s me about IDE’s is limited language support. VS.NET has support for it’s particular languages, but has no support for other languages. ”
Visual Studio don’t have direct built-in support for other languages, true. It is however possible to create IDE plug-in’s AFAIK.
I can’t point you to any resources about how to make such plug-in’s, but as an example look up ActiveState’s python and perl plug-in’s for VS.
A little quick searching around and I found this site that should have information about how to extend VS to support other languages than the builtin ones. As far as I can tell, it should be even be possible to make a VI-like editor for visual studio.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/extend/
Except that you must pay for it….At least, for the VS.NET part…may be 2005 will be free (it is right now, but beta, you know….)
“Except that you must pay for it….At least, for the VS.NET part…may be 2005 will be free (it is right now, but beta, you know….)”
Maybe I’m just blind, but I didn’t see anything about having to pay to get the stuff needed to make VS extensions.
If you mean that you have to pay for Visual Studio itself, well duh ;p
I was merely pointing out that it is possible to extend Visual Studio as someone complained that it only has support for certain languages built in.
Also there’s SML.NET’s VS integration:
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/Research/TSG/SMLNET/vs.html
“How is it that people can compare KDevelop to VS? Even if one is significantly better than the other, since they run on different platforms, doesn’t the choice of platforms kind of dictate which one you’re going to use? For example, if your primarly/only platform of development is Windows, how the hell can you use KDevelop on that? And vice versa?”
We are using Windows only because we are using Visual Studio.
It would be no problem at all switching to *BSD or GNU/Linux, if that would be necessary for a switch to another IDE.
And I believe you can run KDevelop through cygwin (urgh) if necessary.
“I’ve been using Visual Studio off and on over the years, some more than others. People knock Microsoft a lot for various things, but very few developers can deny that they have a great set of development tools.”
the problem i have with microsoft tools, is that they made it by stealing people from other companies. years ago, microsoft C was trounced time and again by borland tools, so microsoft stole the main developers from borland, taking advantage of the great deal of money they had. they finally settle out of court, bu borland almost never recovered. so the problem with microsoft is the anthietic practices they allways do.
the problem i have with microsoft tools, is that they made it by stealing people from other companies.
Lay off the pipe. Microsoft didn’t “steal people”. They offered them a job.
the problem i have with microsoft tools, is that they made it by stealing people from other companies. years ago, microsoft C was trounced time and again by borland tools, so microsoft stole the main developers from borland, taking advantage of the great deal of money they had. they finally settle out of court, bu borland almost never recovered. so the problem with microsoft is the anthietic practices they allways do.
LOL. Give it a break.
Offering some one a better paying job is “stealing” someone ?
When you grow up and move out of your parents house you’ll truly understand how this stuff works.
So then why is MS suing Google? They just offered him a job, in China.
Borland should have used the same line of thought MS is using with google.
Those 2 events are _completely_ unrelated – in any form I can think off. Just FYI Microsoft sued Google, because the china guy had a contract with them to work there for xx years or something… I can’t remember correctly right now. Anyway, he signed it.
So then why is MS suing Google? They just offered him a job, in China.
Cause they had the guy sign an agreement or a “covenant not to compete” as they like to call them (not worth signin EVER)
Borland should have used the same line of thought MS is using with google.
Just another example of the mistakes Borland was making back then.
I loved Borland and was using Borland tools long before MS tools. For a spell there they really lost focus on their core audience.
Visual Studio only runs on a proprietory OS and doesn’t provide enough for what you pay. If you are looking for a great IDE that’s free and flexible try out kdevelop or anjuta. Both IDEs have become very impressive.
But not nearly as impressive and powerful as VS.net.
If you think otherwise, you’ve obviously never used VS.net for any actual projects.
Kdevelop and Anjuta aren’t even in the same league as VS, but unless Kdevelop has been ported to windows then you’re locked into Unix as much as the VS guy is locked into windows.
Of course, you can probably crosscompile for both platforms though.
Nobody can really put an integrated package like Microsoft can because nobody else has the resources and the ability to hook into the operating system as much.
VS 2003 has only usable editor and debuger. For ASP.NET development is unusable – you can not use build in designer. Debuger sometimes is hell slow. Visual Source Safe sucks.
“Visual Studio, code-named Orcas. Primary among the new features in and new direction for Orcas will be advances in how the toolset handles data, sources said. Data becomes “cool” in Orcas, said a source familiar with Microsoft’s strategy for Orcas.”
Isn’t Visual Studio part of their Software Factory goal?
It seems like seged is now just talking about development in general. These issues he talks about are issues, but minor ones, and NOT vs.net specific at all.
What a joke. He keeps spread his argument until he starts saying something true and hopes no one notices his argument has substantially shifted.
These issues he talks about are issues, but minor ones, and NOT vs.net specific at all.
It’s peripheral – but very related, and they are certainly not minor by any stretch of the imagination.
What a joke. He keeps spread his argument until he starts saying something true and hopes no one notices his argument has substantially shifted.
The argument certainly hasn’t shifted, but you wish it had.