# Visual Basic > Visual Basic .NET >  A self sustaining future for the VB.NET world

## Cristianlt23

Personally, I've always believed that the best thing that could happen to VB.NET would be to get rid of Microsoft's restrictions.

The last post on the VB blog (https://devblogs.microsoft.com/vbtea...d-for-net-5-0/) for thousands of developers was like being left with no ground and no future, I personally I thought it was the true beginning of the VB world.

For a long time the VB developer was very pragmatic and rightly so, MS has always left a very practical but also very limited ecosystem, but I will always be grateful to MS for bringing VB here.

Today after 2 years and 9 months and 11 days, Anthony D. Green presents us with a great opportunity, of course first of all I am saying a great opportunity for VB.NET enthusiasts and lovers.

Today, 12/20/2022, a self-funded VB.NET community is born, focusing on VB.NET and for VB.NET

I invite you to access:
1) https://anthonydgreen.net/2022/12/07...ility/#respond
2) https://gitter.im/VB-NET/community

and if you feel convinced, I invite you to visit

3) https://www.patreon.com/ThatVBGuy

Thanks for reading :Smilie:

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## vbdotnut

VB.Net will see me out of this world. Been teaching the kid C#, however. He's not taking to it very well though. Im not sure, but it could be because he is 3.

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## Shaggy Hiker

Sounds like somebody is advocating for a MonoVB project. After all, Mono already exists, but is all about C#. 

I'm not exactly convinced by the premise. It sounds mostly like a plea to not move the cheese. Technology is a race, has always been a race, and seems likely to continue to be a race. I've written for platforms that no longer exist using languages that no longer exist. Should that platform be required to continue? I can't see why, as it got replaced by something far superior. The language certainly shouldn't have continued, once the platform it was built for no longer existed.

In the blog post, Silverlight was used as an example. I don't find that a particularly compelling argument, either. It was picked up by a certain number of people, but not enough to keep it around, which is always going to be an issue. I work in Biology. It used to be pretty rare for people to come out of school with any coding experience, but that's no longer the case. It seems like the majority of new Biologists are entering the workforce with a certain amount of coding experience....in R. It also seems like most people coming out of GIS programs enter the workforce with a certain amount of coding experience....in Python. 

There are serious limitations to both R and Python, but they are fairly popular, and popularity is what largely drives the market. I don't see the point in complaining about that. A company like Microsoft exists to make money, not to appease programmers. They make choices based on what they think is best for their business. Of late, they also haven't objected to people doing competing, open-source projects. They've even supported (and bought) a few. They support Mono and they bought Xamarin.

We are in a field that has never been static, never been stable, and that doesn't look likely to change anytime soon. It's a situation that leads to laments like the blog post, but ultimately, that's probably futile. Change is going to happen in this field. What you know will become dated. If that ever stops happening, well....that would be a change.

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## PlausiblyDamp

> Sounds like somebody is advocating for a MonoVB project. After all, Mono already exists, but is all about C#. 
> 
> I'm not exactly convinced by the premise. It sounds mostly like a plea to not move the cheese. Technology is a race, has always been a race, and seems likely to continue to be a race. I've written for platforms that no longer exist using languages that no longer exist. Should that platform be required to continue? I can't see why, as it got replaced by something far superior. The language certainly shouldn't have continued, once the platform it was built for no longer existed.
> 
> In the blog post, Silverlight was used as an example. I don't find that a particularly compelling argument, either. It was picked up by a certain number of people, but not enough to keep it around, which is always going to be an issue. I work in Biology. It used to be pretty rare for people to come out of school with any coding experience, but that's no longer the case. It seems like the majority of new Biologists are entering the workforce with a certain amount of coding experience....in R. It also seems like most people coming out of GIS programs enter the workforce with a certain amount of coding experience....in Python. 
> 
> There are serious limitations to both R and Python, but they are fairly popular, and popularity is what largely drives the market. I don't see the point in complaining about that. A company like Microsoft exists to make money, not to appease programmers. They make choices based on what they think is best for their business. Of late, they also haven't objected to people doing competing, open-source projects. They've even supported (and bought) a few. They support Mono and they bought Xamarin.
> 
> We are in a field that has never been static, never been stable, and that doesn't look likely to change anytime soon. It's a situation that leads to laments like the blog post, but ultimately, that's probably futile. Change is going to happen in this field. What you know will become dated. If that ever stops happening, well....that would be a change.


It may sound harsh but historically VB.Net users haven't actually used a lot of the functionality that MS did provide for VB.Net, https://github.com/dotnet/vblang/iss...ment-354927626 is a pretty good example of this. People wanting a feature in VB.Net core for web apps that less that 1% of VB web apps used when running on .Net Framework. If VB users have been historically slow to adopt (if at all) language features then it puts an unnecessary burden on MS to implement them - especially knowing they will hardly be used anyway.

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## Cristianlt23

Discouraging comments have always been a constant in the VB world, even in a VB environment like this one.

What the Community has as its objective is simple, to create its own ecosystem in the long term, today we still depend a lot on Microsoft of course, but who knows in the future we will have our own tools?

Our proposal is really aimed at the VB.net lover and enthusiast, nothing more!

A good example to follow is the path Python has taken, lying dormant for nearly 20 years and re-emerging where it is today, the biggest tool the community used was the love and dedication to the language.

Making an analogy with the world of colors, there will always be a person who will choose blue over red and vice versa.

We are not type C and we don't want to be, simple!  :Smilie:

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## vbdotnut

> We are not type C and we don't want to be, simple!


Im not sure about your sales pitch here... Your unwillingness to learn  and/or utilize industry leading language(s) is a shortcoming that I don't believe justifies your purpose, which I will admit, I am not understanding.

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## Shaggy Hiker

There are plenty of such approaches. Just take a look at the RADBasic and TwinBasic projects going on currently, which would extend the otherwise moribund VB6. Those are there because there are enthusiasts willing to take them forwards. They might well succeed. The Mono project is an effort to take C# forwards (and somewhat away from Microsoft, though Microsoft is a supporter). MonoGame takes the XNA technology forwards after it was abandoned by Microsoft.

Seeing a similar effort for VB.NET wouldn't surprise me any. People have been predicting the demise of VB since around 2005, if not earlier. Eventually, they will be right. All things change, and in this industry, change is a bit faster and unpredictable. An open source project taking VB.NET forwards is understandable. Doing so before the actual demise is a bit unusual, but also not all that surprising.

Personally, I'm a bit indifferent to these efforts. They always start with much enthusiasm, but if you follow the saga of OpenOffice/LibreOffice, you can see the tribulations of even a successful project. For one thing, they can succeed right up until they don't, but in that way, they are no different from any other computer project. I just can't muster any enthusiasm for them. That's for more enthusiastic folks.

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## Cristianlt23

> Im not sure about your sales pitch here... Your unwillingness to learn  and/or utilize industry leading language(s) is a shortcoming that I don't believe justifies your purpose, which I will admit, I am not understanding.


Maybe I expressed myself badly!

But yes! I use the main languages ​​daily like: JavaScript, Python and Java and their ecosystems, although the other languages ​​are extremely smaller in users and application, I still look for them.

I also use C#, mainly as a front-end with Blazor keeping the back-end in VB, but I'm already looking at more modern languages ​​like Golang and when I want to suffer less with C++ I already use Rust.

Since you don't know me, it's natural for you to believe that I'm VBlang,

You don't get into such a project just knowing VB, at least until version 17.0, what we want is that version 18.0 has been developed by 17.0  :Big Grin: 

I am also working on Bubble.io to be a frontend and PWA for VB, VB developer loves drag and drop.

Another job is to offer native mobile development for VB with the AppGyver front-end, in addition to being an alternative to B4a. At the same time, I'm doing the same AppGyver project for Python, as native mobile development isn't currently this language's strong suit.

But the objective of this project is much greater than simply attending fads and marketing in the software industry, in addition to, of course, enabling the reduction of the eternal loop of redoing what is already ready due to technological changes every summer, and also enabling the programmer for VB.NET, Enterprise and Government strikes a balance between stable and modern.

We believe that this project can succeed because our focus is the Customer, and we want to present a stable, compatible product, with low investment in updating and training and a longer life cycle.

We are a group that can see a lot of beauty in VB.NET, in addition to its extreme simplicity of use.

VB.NET is another option for many developers and it is natural that many identify with the tool's way of thinking.

What I want is to help VB.NET have its own ecosystem and be able to solve many of the current problems, just like other languages ​​do.

For me it will be a lot of fun to participate in the evolution of a complete ecosystem, such as: framework, compiler, libraries, etc.

Today my biggest interest is more about software engineering, learning and creating and I chose to help VB.NET, am I a loser for that? Of course not, VB.NET is beautiful!

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## Cristianlt23

> There are plenty of such approaches. Just take a look at the RADBasic and TwinBasic projects going on currently, which would extend the otherwise moribund VB6. Those are there because there are enthusiasts willing to take them forwards. They might well succeed. The Mono project is an effort to take C# forwards (and somewhat away from Microsoft, though Microsoft is a supporter). MonoGame takes the XNA technology forwards after it was abandoned by Microsoft.
> 
> Seeing a similar effort for VB.NET wouldn't surprise me any. People have been predicting the demise of VB since around 2005, if not earlier. Eventually, they will be right. All things change, and in this industry, change is a bit faster and unpredictable. An open source project taking VB.NET forwards is understandable. Doing so before the actual demise is a bit unusual, but also not all that surprising.
> 
> Personally, I'm a bit indifferent to these efforts. They always start with much enthusiasm, but if you follow the saga of OpenOffice/LibreOffice, you can see the tribulations of even a successful project. For one thing, they can succeed right up until they don't, but in that way, they are no different from any other computer project. I just can't muster any enthusiasm for them. That's for more enthusiastic folks.


Thanks for your comment. Overall I thought it was very positive for us  :Smilie:

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## M.Hamdy

@Cristianlt23 
Thanks for your true belief in VB.NET. But I think this conversation should be resumed after Anthony posts his update of ModVB (in a few days), where people can see what we are talking about, not to jamb into conclusions based on just impressions.
Thanks.

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## Cristianlt23

> @Cristianlt23 
> Thanks for your true belief in VB.NET. But I think this conversation should be resumed after Anthony posts his update of ModVB (in a few days), where people can see what we are talking about, not to jamb into conclusions based on just impressions.
> Thanks.


@M.Hamdy

Thank you for your guidance and you are absolutely right.

ModVB will already do the necessary work and will be the best answer for a non-believing view.

Thanks :Smilie:

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## Cristianlt23

Checking in (Wave 2) :wave: 

https://anthonydgreen.net/2022/12/28...ave-2/#respond

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