How steep is the learning curve?

[GBalcom]

I have a program that I've created in Access with approximately 5,000 lines of code. I'd like to learn VB.NET and recreate this application as a way to learn more. Provided I'll only be able to spend 5-10 hours per week on this, what is a realistic time frame for this? I'm very comfortable in VBA, if that helps any.


Also, what is the best way to learn such a program? I've looked into some books, if anyone has any recommendations, let me know. Most likely I'll use Visual Studio Express.

Thanks!

 

[DJkarl]

Depending on what your program does it could be easy or difficult to migrate to VB.NET. The syntax is similar to VBA in how you declare variable, and functions. However you lose what Access does for you automatically (it does surprisingly a lot of stuff). If you are still using Access as a database back-end then you can leverage the table structures you have and just build a new front end, if you want to do yourself a favor you could install SQL server express and begin learning that as well, it is a more robust platform for developing .NET applications.

 

[Galaxiom]

The main difference is VB.NET is a fully object oriented language. All variables are objects, even strings and numbers. Consequently the Set keyword is deprecated.

Instead of using functions for many operations a method of the object is used. For example adding to a date and converting to a string are both methods of their object variables. Even Null is an object. Once you realise this difference it gets pretty easy.


You can paste VBA code into Visual Studio. First thing it does is drop all the Set keywords. Then it shows the errors.

Visual Studio has Intellisense that us like VBA Intellisense on steroids. Syntax errors are highlighted and suggestions given for what might be intended.

Many extra tools are available for tasks like building connections but it supports virtually the same code structures as VBA for these tasks too.

It has a fabulously simple construct for working with program settings which are held in xml files.

One click publishing is nice too. It can even create an installation web page.