by Thomas Swift (28 Submissions)
Category: Coding Standards
Difficulty: Beginner
Date Added: Wed 3rd February 2021
Rating: 
(2 Votes)
A 3’rd party review of other language builders from a beginner’s view point.
VBcodersThis morning as I was sitting on my front porch having my morning cigarette daydreaming and I got a vision. I thought about my yearning to learn visual C++. I immediately flashed right to my feeling overwhelmed every time I have sat down to try. I then thought about the reason why visual basic 6 is so popular is because of the simplicity of the GUI and file system. Then in my mind I compared my experiences with both. Visual Basic 6 starts a user out with 4 basic file types and they are fairly self explanatory. It also doesn’t take much time for a newby to catch onto the basic starter procedures of using the programs GUI. Sure Visual Basic 6 has its bells and whistles however even most of them are not loaded when the new user first installs it. When I open up Microsoft’s Visual C++ interface I am immediately confronted with a whole bunch of GUI I don’t have any clue how to use or what its even their for. Then when I try to start a project I am confronted with a bunch of strange files I have no idea what they are. Then the crazy thing starts asking me to configure files I have no idea what they are or what they are used for. I don’t understand why Microsoft and other companies don’t create starter, more simplified versions of their builder programs. I don’t believe its to much to ask them to provide new students with a basic atmosphere and basic file set that is pre configured for those of us who are just starting to learn each new language and builder. I remember my first attempt to use Borland’s C++ builder. I even got a starter book on it. The first thing it started out with was building a simple database with a bunch of fish in it. One of the procedures was to select multiple components and tie them together using hot keys. I would like to express I didn’t learn dooky from that! Then once I managed to save my project, I couldn’t figure out how to load it again or it refused to load.
I find it completely ridiculous that I can learn advanced visual basic 6 programming, yet I cant even figure out the first steps of using Microsoft’s Visual C++ builder. I would like to remind the creators of these builders the reason for the huge popularity of Visual Basic 6 is its simplicity to learn and use. It has a uncanny ability to actually train a new user how to use and program in it. The same starter book I have for the Borland C++ Builder, in the back of it shows how similar both languages are. There is no excuse for the difference in atmosphere of the two programs. I feel there is way to much emphases being placed on providing for the already experienced programmers with expanded features and no attention being paid to the beginning atmosphere that is presented to the new user. These languages are not ever going to gather the following of users Visual Basic 6 has for these very basic reasons. I don’t see any logic in that!!! If these people had any brains at all they would not only create light versions but also provide students with them for free to spark interest and create more support for the other coding languages.
