Which programming languague

[Nuz]

I have been creating applications to my customers through VBA but found too many times problems caused due to different versions of Excel that my customers have. Secondly, I also find it really inconvenient to make user interface to look professional by using userforms in VBA since building menus, listviews etc. into the forms is really annoying. And third, my clients are typically missing some necessary reference library files and due to that receiving error messages when opening the application.

My question is, which is the best programming language that is independent of Excel version (i.e. not require a user to have Excel installed at all) but still in case the user has an Excel, it should be able to generate reports to .xls-format?
And at the same time I should be able to make the user interface professional by creating menus etc. into the application.
Is VB6 or VB.net suitable for that purpose? I have no experience from any C, C++ or similar languages but lot of experience from VBA coding and Excel programming.

 

[xenou]

The blogs and tutorials at Microsoft sites seem to be just as good as anything I've read, which isn't really much. If I think of one I'll post back (I think I read a book about 2 years ago just to cover the basics). MS does offer some training material by subscription for what seems a modest price. I'm sort of looking for a good book myself I wouldn't expect VS2010 to be radically different from 2008 - I could be wrong but you're probably okay with a VS2008 book if you get a copy (especially a used one at a good price).

 

[jkpieterse]

If you want your coding future proof, VB6 isn't the best path to take.

VB6 will work, but is unable to work with Office 64 bit. Office 64 bit requires you to use the .NET framework.
VB6 should work on a Win 64 machine with Office 32 bit (the default) though.

 

[Nuz]

And will all Vb.net applications work with all older (32-bit) systems?

 

[Macropod]

Provided:
1. the user has the .NET framework installed; and
2. you don't make application-specific calls that the installed version of the called application doesn't support,
yes. Since part of your problem seems to have been that you've been writing code that makes use of Excel API calls that aren't supported by all Excel versions, you will still have to address this issue. Using VB6 or VB.NET won't change that.

 

[jkpieterse]

The first Office version to support com add-ins is 2000 if I recall correctly.

 

[xenou]

VB.Net will certainly work with 32 bit systems. I think we're still only half-way into the 64 bit transformation, especially as far as workstations/desktops are concerned. Generally speaking if you target a 32 bit build, it will work in 64-bit systems. I've never even bothered thinking about it and all my .Net projects work fine so I think the defaults are okay.

 

[Norie]

I've used VB6, VBA and VB.NET.

There's hardly any difference in the basic syntax from one to the other.

The main change I see in VB.NET is the use of classes

That's a concept that's been around for years (C++, Java, many others) and isn't particularly hard to pick up/implement.

The problems you describe, eg different versions of Excel, users not having particular libraries etc, aren't really to do with the language the code is in.

You could even look at using ASP.NET which is kind of platform independent.

With that you could set up some nice UIs, pictures and everything.

PS You can get free express editions of VB.NET, C#.NET etc - basically VS2010 from Microsoft.

No idea how they work if the code you create is being distributed though.

 

[Nuz]

Now learning VB.net for some time it really isn't that hard to pick up as Norie stated here earlier, if the background is from VBA. Lot of improvements though in ease of coding, building menus etc.