Any pratical use for Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Pro

[Kyle Fenton]

In our included software package this year, we get FileMaker Pro 6 (Win. Only), and Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Pro.

FileMaker pro is an easy to use database application that significantly help with fundraising, hours, parts, scouting, etc.

Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Pro to my knowledge is a compiler for making .NET applications. Unless there is something weird about this competition, I see no practical use for this app, FIRST related anyway.

Don't get me wrong, anyone will take anything that is for free, but I am just curious why FIRST gave this application.

[rbayer]

There's been some discussion on this here:
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...threadid=15512

Other than that, I really can't think of anything.

[Mark Hamilton]

If Visual Studio .Net is like previous Visual Studio products (which it is if memory serves me) it includes a complete development enviroment, with compilers for many languages (C, C++, C# (the new .NET language), and Visual Basic) as well as debuggers and some neat stuff like Sourcesafe which allows large groups to work on the same codebase. Theres some other stuff in there as well. Overall it's a great tool for programming for the windows enviroment in general. They way it analyzes your code as you type it and makes it easy to refer to member functions is pretty neat. As for relevance to the robotics competition, I can't really see much. The only thing you would need it for would be if you wanted to make a dashboard program or something along those lines. I think Microsoft is pretty liberal about giving away copies of it, many of the programming competitions and such I've been to have given it away. Getting the programmers of tommorow used to developing on your platform can't go wrong.

[Gope]

There are lots of PC applications that oculd be built with it to help in robot trouble shooting and scouting. I dont remember exactly which team it was, but last year one team had an incredible piece of scouting software that used pocket PCs and laptops and was coded mostly in VB i think, really great stuff.

[rbayer]

There's all kinds of good stuff you can use it for. RoboEmu, RoboGUI, and RoboCon, for example, were all written with VC++ 6.0 pro. The question, however, is will there be something that requires it?

Visual Basic can be used to make a nice simple file database for scouting. In visual basic, you can write a simple conversion program for say standard to metric or convert inches to centimeters, or whatever.

Thats about it, unless other people toss other ideas

[evulish]

If Microsoft ever ports it's .NET software, I'll like it. Untill then, I'll stick with the classics.

A use for any language like that is beyond anything I can think up. If ANYTHING...an HTML editor would be used...but then again, no one should use an HTML editor Maybe the new controlelrs _don't_ use PBASIC (I will quit robotics if it were to ever switch to Visual Basic )

[Kyle Fenton]

Originally posted by D.J. Fluck
Visual Basic can be used to make a nice simple file database for scouting. In visual basic, you can write a simple conversion program for say standard to metric or convert inches to centimeters, or whatever.

That's about it, unless other people toss other ideas

Yes you can, but Filemaker Pro is a much better, and easier solution than VB. And best of all you get it free in this years software package.

Originally posted by evulish
If Microsoft ever ports it's .NET software, I'll like it. Until then, I'll stick with the classics.

A use for any language like that is beyond anything I can think up. If ANYTHING...an HTML editor would be used...but then again, no one should use an HTML editor Maybe the new controllers _don't_ use PBASIC (I will quit robotics if it were to ever switch to Visual Basic )

In a recent zdnet article said that Microsoft was porting its server components to linux, because they want to expand their services. I don't have the link, but it was a recent story.

They also might be porting .NET server to Mac OS X server to, but it is sketchy at best if they will pull through with the port.

Originally posted by Kyle Fenton
Yes you can, but Filemaker Pro is a much better, and easier solution than VB. And best of all you get it free in this years software package.

Yeah probably, but you were the one who was asking for possibilities for why.


Anyway, we all know this is some marketing promtion to get us hooked on microsoft. Anyone with half a brain won't get hooked.

[rbayer]

Originally posted by D.J. Fluck
Anyone with half a brain won't get hooked.

I disagree. Even though I payed for my copy of VC++, it still got me hooked. Aside from a few standards-compliance issues, I haven't found anything better than VC++ for Windows development. Given that I'm very pro-open-source and usually anti-MS, I think this says something about the quality of this particular product. If nothing else, it's the one piece of software that has NEVER crashed on me. Ever.

[Mark Hamilton]

Originally posted by evulish
Maybe the new controlelrs _don't_ use PBASIC (I will quit robotics if it were to ever switch to Visual Basic )

I think you will be the only one. PBASIC is one of the worst languages I've ever used. Of course the reason it's so bad is because of limitations in the hardware, but I would still take VB anyday. VB allows real object oriented programming, which would b the ideal approach to programming a robot imo.

As to the quality of VS, I was taught on Borland C++ and after a new teacher got me to try Visual Studio I've never looked back.

Also, the best thing about Filemaker Pro is it's the same thing FIRST uses. We used it exclusively for SOAP the first couple years. We've now moved onto ASP and SQL, but it gives you an idea of what filemaker is capable of. Our first year doing soap we were amazed to discover how much FIRST uses filemaker at competition.

[JonathanE]

Originally posted by Mark Hamilton
I think you will be the only one. PBASIC is one of the worst languages I've ever used. Of course the reason it's so bad is because of limitations in the hardware, but I would still take VB anyday. VB allows real object oriented programming, which would b the ideal approach to programming a robot imo.

This is true... Especially since we are forced to do AI programming this year... Ugh! Forget even trying to keep the code neat... And running out of vars might be an issue.

As to the quality of VS, I was taught on Borland C++ and after a new teacher got me to try Visual Studio I've never looked back.

This is true, I was also self-taught on Borland C++ Builder... BUT as I look at the software, I am ending up writing our debug and dash applications in Borland. Simple reason? The IDE. When I have one or two nights to write a program to calibrate sensors, I can whip out a GUI in five minutes with Borland. In Visual C++, even with all the enhancements that .NET gives, there IS NO FORM DESIGNER!!!!!! I would take Borland's odd VCL syntax any day over hand-coding a GUI or writing a console application...

So... Petition MS to give the C++ Developers of the world what Borland has done for years: A graphical form designer. Do they really need to keep such high-tech features locked within their proprietary Visual Basic and *shudder* C# languages?

What is the world coming to...