Author Topic: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE  (Read 18430 times)

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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #15 on: June 29, 2010, 02:45:36 AM »
C++/ARX go away? I hope not! I just love C++.  :love:
I actually feel ARX has a longer future than .NET, I just don't  see VB.NET running on Linux or Mac, and we know this is in progress...

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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #16 on: June 29, 2010, 03:33:47 AM »
C++/ARX go away? I hope not! I just love C++.  :love:
I actually feel ARX has a longer future than .NET, I just don't  see VB.NET running on Linux or Mac, and we know this is in progress...

Ha, I hear ya.  ARX will always have internal support, but the public facing API's just might be .Net.

Ok, couple hypothetical questions
1) will or is Autocad being rewritten from the ground up? If so, it's being done in what language or mix or languages and for what gain? The last rewrite was the 12 to 13 transition (or was it 13, 14?) to go from the procedural nature of ADS to the OO of ObjectARX.  Is it good enough in its current form?

2) what parts of Autocad/ObjectARX are the weakest links , holding them back from taking advantage of current hardware or distributed computing methods?


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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #17 on: June 29, 2010, 03:53:26 AM »
IMO,  there will be no rewrite of "AutoCAD", there is no good reason to invest those types of resources at this stage of the game. Even if they did, it certainly would not be with .NET.

The weakest link is multi core support, At the Bricscad conference, Bricsys announced that they are working on multi-threaded support, so you know Adesk is working doing the same. None of the companies are going to be doing this via .NETs PFX.. that would be nuts!  As these companies move to support multiple platforms, multi-core, the clear choice is C++,. I actually see .NET getting less attention as these companies struggle to support APIs/SDKs that are cross platform.

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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #18 on: June 29, 2010, 05:05:47 AM »
IMO,  there will be no rewrite of "AutoCAD", there is no good reason to invest those types of resources at this stage of the game. Even if they did, it certainly would not be with .NET.

Tend to agree a rewrite won't be done, but lean towards .Net if it was to be done.

The weakest link is multi core support, At the Bricscad conference, Bricsys announced that they are working on multi-threaded support, so you know Adesk is working doing the same.

I'd put lack of multi core support in the top 3 category.  We know there is only so much that can be given multi-threaded support and it is hard to implement, did BC give any indication which areas they would focus on?  Since BC's API follows so closely with ARX does it also use or mimic AcDbStub / DRO / paging, or are the available API's there for cross compatibly only and the OS handles most of it natively? Full of speculation tonight, but I think those (AcDbStub, DRO, Paging) plus the memory manager are all from the Win 3.1 days of the original ObjectARX, and have been a big problem with drawings that are about 1.5 GB and crash Autocad. No proof, just a little finger pointing.

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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #19 on: June 29, 2010, 05:41:17 AM »
...Tend to agree a rewrite won't be done, but lean towards .Net if it was to be done.

Why, there is no .NET for Mac or Linux, You would be locking the future of your company into a proprietary framework. I say not a chance.


I'd put lack of multi core support in the top 3 category.  We know there is only so much that can be given multi-threaded support and it is hard to implement, did BC give any indication which areas they would focus on?  Since BC's API follows so closely with ARX does it also use or mimic AcDbStub / DRO / paging, or are the available API's there for cross compatibly only and the OS handles most of it natively? Full of speculation tonight, but I think those (AcDbStub, DRO, Paging) plus the memory manager are all from the Win 3.1 days of the original ObjectARX, and have been a big problem with drawings that are about 1.5 GB and crash Autocad. No proof, just a little finger pointing.


ODA has native DWG RW and supporting APIs/SDKs  for Atari to Zenith see http://www.opendesign.com/the_oda_platform/TD  (at the bottom)  How do you think Bricscad was able to build a Linux release so fast? Autodesk's issue is MFC, but even there it not impossible to change the underlying implementation to a cross platform technology.
Bricsys did not indicate what portions would be multi-threaded first. If I had to guess it would be graphics.
 

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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #20 on: June 29, 2010, 05:59:57 AM »
Don't get me wrong, I really like .NET, it's fun to code with. I just don't see it taking over the world like everyone else. Question.

How many .NET apps do you have on your machine right now?
How many of the top 100 software companies globally have apps written in .NET?

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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #21 on: June 29, 2010, 06:51:38 AM »
Don't get me wrong, I really like .NET, it's fun to code with. I just don't see it taking over the world like everyone else. Question.

How many .NET apps do you have on your machine right now?
How many of the top 100 software companies globally have apps written in .NET?


Native .Net apps maybe 2, one I can think of off the top .NetPaint.

I don't know, I just don't see AD taking a big risk outside the MS family.  They have years invested getting it to the current .Net state. Autodesk is about market share, and MS has 90.5% of it (see source link). Linux has a paultry 1.13% market share, most of whom wouldn't buy any software no how.  The Mac market place is a completely different than the Linux group. Mac people will buy software, but Autocad is priced at the business level which is out of the price range of most. However, Autodesk is testing the Mac and iPhone markets with some current products, so at some level there is interest.

Staying in the family is safe, building and deploying for .Net is safe. Even if MS looses market share to another OS, there is always that change that they could open source .Net.  If the OS market tanked for MS, they still win by providing services, office software, developer tools, everything they already provide, minus the OS.

market share source: http://www.netmarketshare.com/os-market-share.aspx?qprid=11

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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #22 on: June 29, 2010, 08:02:21 AM »
Funny, just reading some similar discussions VB4/ vs C++

Code: [Select]
In VB takes one quarter of the time it takes in C++ to make an application.   :laugh:

.. of course if evrything goes on the cloud, it won't really matter

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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #23 on: June 29, 2010, 08:34:16 AM »
Funny, just reading some similar discussions VB4/ vs C++

Code: [Select]
In VB takes one quarter of the time it takes in C++ to make an application.   :laugh:

.. of course if evrything goes on the cloud, it won't really matter

... that depends upon your level of expertise
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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #24 on: June 29, 2010, 08:41:02 AM »
do you mean sea level?   :laugh:

edit: ok that was dumb

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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #25 on: June 29, 2010, 08:41:55 AM »
maybe .. it might be underwater soon, so .. below sea level
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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #26 on: June 29, 2010, 12:19:37 PM »
So here is the real question ... with the removal of vba from the mix . . .
I would have thought that to be absolutely true a few months ago. Now I'm not so sure. I looked at the new Office 2010 and expected VSTA or ? but there was good old VBA. MS is still putting articles on MSDN about "Getting Started With VBA". I did not THINK VBA would stick around in AutoCAD but now I'm not so sure. The VBA for Mac is an interesting example.

... and if so, will VB.NET eventually see its demise as a close cousin of VBA?
VB.NET is as close a cousin to VBA as I am. They are related in name only. Like a dog that has it's masters last name (I won't say which is the dog) or maybe it's a red-headed step-cousin.
They were so different that I took up C# when I made the switch to .NET.

. . . but it would be nice to know the lifespan of these other development platforms so we don't waste time dealing with code that will be obsolete in the very near future.
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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #27 on: June 29, 2010, 12:44:22 PM »
I've actually been somewhat surprised by the lack of outcry concerning the impending demise of VBA.  I wonder how much of it is because people are assuming exactly what you say, and that when push comes to shove, VBA will stick around.

If so, then it will have to be a complete port to 64-bit.  You can currently use VBA in 64-bit Autocad, but it slows down the entire program quite a bit.  I actually can't see many people being happy with that.

As far as VB, I suspect it will be around as long as .NET is around.  I don't care for it myself, but in general, there seem to be quite a few more VB.NET programmers than C#.NET.  As time goes on, things like Boo or IronPython might start to grab some market share, but a lot of programmers (especially the "weekend warrior" type of programmer) seem to like VB.  And since all .NET languages get turned into CIL anyway, the particular language is not as relevant for .NET as it is in other circumstances.

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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #28 on: June 29, 2010, 04:12:46 PM »
As far as VB, I suspect it will be around as long as .NET is around.  I don't care for it myself, but in general, there seem to be quite a few more VB.NET
programmers than C#.NET.
Based on what?  Last time I checked on Monster or CareerBuilder, demand for C# programmers outnumbered VB by 10 to 1.  As you said, the weekend warrior programmers favor VB, but they aren't getting paid either.
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Re: VBA'S (lack of a) FUTURE
« Reply #29 on: June 29, 2010, 07:43:56 PM »
Every poll of "Which .NET language are you using?" that I've seen has VB users in the lead by a wide margin.  C# is always easily in second place, but VB is always easily in first place.

And considering how little the choice of language really impacts .NET development, my guess is things will probably stay that way for some time to come.  Once people settle on a .NET language, most of them tend to stick with that choice.  Maybe at some point in the future, a newer language might start to take over.  But at the moment, both VB and C# seem solidly entrenched.  Microsoft even seems to be focusing MORE effort on VB than on C# (for example, witness how VB got optional parameters before C# did).