The Visual Basic Niche

[e_dawg]

That reminds me of a couple projects I did way back in the day (3+ years ago, now), one had a graph that had to be generated and updated in real-time without losing data quality, but keeping a nice looking graph... it actually worked in VB, but it was very slow... It ended up that I had to re-write it in C++ to make it faster due to the rate of data collection...

We had a similar problem with a VB program at my next employer after that -- a program in VB was supposed to handle not only real-time display, but also input the data from the industrial scanner... Needless to say, the overhead of VB made it far too slow to handle problem, so I re-wrote it in C++ (nobody else had any programming skill except VB, so I was the only one that could do it).

That is semi-humorous; Historically, I have ended up being the only link between a project that would fail with just the skillset of the remainder of the team and success... Often due to my long list of languages and deeper-than-average understanding of the HTTP protocol (which is easy, and the fact that so many web developers don't know it angers me to no end).

[DeadKen]

Originally posted by e_dawg
That reminds me of a couple projects I did way back in the day (3+ years ago, now), one had a graph that had to be generated and updated in real-time without losing data quality, but keeping a nice looking graph... it actually worked in VB, but it was very slow... It ended up that I had to re-write it in C++ to make it faster due to the rate of data collection...

Actually, I was referring to a structural graph (you know, nodes & edges).

[hobbes2112]

I have only used VB6 and it certainly has is ups and downs.

You aren't going to find a quicker way to write front ends to database/spreadsheet manipulation in the windows environment....

Not really fast enough for much that I would want as computational codes, but useful none-the-less.

[Boldy]

It is possible to create complex applications in VB6 that perform very well. I was with one company that wrote structural engineering software with Visual Basic. These were very complicated applications that ran fast.

A lot of it comes down to the quality of the code. One of the main reasons most visual basic programs are slow is because they aren't designed well. It is very easy to rely on Visual Basic to do everything for you instead of concentrating on good design and architecture.

It will rarely be as fast as well designed C++ code, but it's speed often shouldn't be too much slower. It's usefulness certainly isn't limited to trivial applications.

Now that I supported it, I would like to say that it does have many shortcomings. Number one on this list has to be lack of class inheritance. It also lacks the flexibility that C++ has, specifically when trying to interact directly with Windows.

[e_dawg]

Originally posted by DeadKen
Actually, I was referring to a structural graph (you know, nodes & edges).

That would be impossibly slow in VB...

They were just insane at that place -- the specs I had to code to for their QA were insane!

[e_dawg]

Originally posted by Boldy
A lot of it comes down to the quality of the code. One of the main reasons most visual basic programs are slow is because they aren't designed well. It is very easy to rely on Visual Basic to do everything for you instead of concentrating on good design and architecture.

It will rarely be as fast as well designed C++ code, but it's speed often shouldn't be too much slower. It's usefulness certainly isn't limited to trivial applications.

As of late, I must agree with this -- VB was optimized heavily between then and now. VB6 is actually far faster and cleaner than VB4 was (which is the version of VB that I wrote most of the VB code I have written in)... It almost rivals poorly-designed GUI programs written in C++, anymore.

The downside is that it makes it too easy for bad programmers -- poor-quality programmers never design their code, and they have no clue how to write an optimized hack, which degrades the poorer than average performance even more.

[coop_2000]

I've programmed in various languages, and find that VB is great for creating fast projects that need to interact with databases--ADO is the best!

C++ is faster computation-wise--great for games, graphics, etc. VB is easier, which decreases production time for general office applications.

Especially when you get into developing in COM/COM+, VB programmers will see that the gap between C++ and VB is closing. Arguing about which is better is pointless. You can open a paint can with the end of a hammer, and pound a nail into a stud with a screwdriver--as long as you meet the time constraints, the boss ain't going to care!