The initial release of the .NET platform (circa 2001) caused quite a stir within the Visual Basic programming community. One the one hand, many die-hard VB 6.0 developers were up in arms at the major differences between VB 6.0 and Visual Basic .NET. Individuals in this group were a bit stunned to see that VB .NET was not in fact “VB 7.0” (i.e., the same syntax and programming constructs as VB 6.0 with some new features thrown in for good measure), but something altogether different. The truth of the matter is that VB .NET has little to do with VB 6.0, and might best be regarded as a new language in the BASIC family. This cold hard fact caused some individuals to recoil to such a degree that they coined terms such as “VB .NOT” or “Visual Fred” to express their displeasures. In fact, there are even web sites (http://vb.mvps.org/vfred/Trust.asp) and petitions dedicated to criticizing Microsoft’s decision to abandon VB 6.0 in favor of this new creature termed VB .NET.weiterlesen