This is the third article in the series. The first one focused on the differences between VBA and VSTO, the second Article showed how to migrate a VBA application and obtain functional equivalence on VSTO.
This third article shows you how to maximize the return of the migration by incorporating new .NET features:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/office/default.aspx?pull=/library/en-us/odc_vsto2005_ta/html/OfficeVSTOExcelVBARearchitecture.asp
Enjoy!
Another pointer to valuable resources that can show you how to expand the life of your VB6 code while learning about VB.NET 2005.
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Experience firsthand the latest advances in Visual Basic 2005. Brian A. Randell, a senior consultant with MCW Technologies and a Visual Basic MVP, will demonstrate how to create smart client applications that understand when they're connected to the network and when they're not; how to deploy these smart clients with just a click of your mouse; how you can make a smooth transition from Visual Basic 6.0; and much more. |
The Patterns and Practices group at Microsoft is working on a VB6 to VB.NET Migration Guide. This guide is “ the bible” of VB migrations and it contains a lot of best practices around how to move applications. I definetely recommend you visit this site to get early access to the guide. ArtinSoft is writing most of the content in the guide so, as always, feedback is highly appreciated!!!
http://www.gotdotnet.com/codegallery/directory.aspx
Here is another article that shows how to do migrations of VBA code for Office to .NET and VSTO (Visual Studio Tools for Office). I highly recommend reading the article:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/office/default.aspx?pull=/library/en-us/odc_vsto2005_ta/html/OfficeVSTOExcelVBAMigration.asp
This is another proof point around the viability of automated Visual Basic Migrations.
Read on...
During Tech Ed in Orlando next week there will be a session on migrating VB6 to VB.NET. If you are going to Tech Ed and reading this BLOG you will probably find it very interesting. Details can be found here: http://weblogs.asp.net/kpleas/archive/2005/06/01/410028.aspx Tuesday night from 6:30 to 7:30
Cheers!
Consider this hypothetical question posed to a career advisor:
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I've been working with Visual Basic on application development at a company that is considering a migration to .NET. The new IT environment involves Web-enabled applications. Do you have suggestions to help me take advantage of this transition? - Thrilled VB Developer
Dear Thrilled:
Managers need to understand the challenges of migrating applications when they're changing their businesses environments. Right now, your value lies in being a bridge to the new entity, helping in the task of migrating applications and moving the data from one entity to another.
Your knowledge of the original code, plus your understanding of the business logic and business processes of your current company, are the skills that will probably help you climb the job ladder and give you some breathing room to learn new technologies. Once you understand how the older technologies map to the new ones, you could be quite helpful, not just to your company but to other companies and government entities involved in similar projects.
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From the developer's perspective it makes a lot of sense to embrace Visual Basic .NET while still leveraging as much as possible the value embedded in the application written in Visual Basic 6.
Jay Roxe is the VB Product Manager at Microsoft. He also has at his heart the topic of Visual Basic Migrations. Check out his BLOG to see what I mean!
http://blogs.msdn.com/JRoxe/
A related topic around Visual Basic 6.0 migration is the migration of VBA code. This article: http://msdn.microsoft.com/office/default.aspx?pull=/library/en-us/odc_vsto2005_ta/html/OfficeVSTOLanguageMigrationFromVBA.asp refers to the low level approach of VBA migrations for Microsoft Office. This article is relevant to the topic of this blog because VBA code is essentially Visual Basic code with a special Object Model to access Office elements. Most of the strategies around VB migrations can be applied to the migration of VBA. Soon there will be 2 other articles that will go into more high level details around the VBA application migration.
Again, more support to destroy the Myths around VB Migrations!
Let's comment it!
I recommend the following article: http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dv_vstechart/html/appmigrationstrat.asp. It contains a holistic view around Visual Basic migrations and how to approach the migration task. Please read it and let's comment it here!