Migrating From Visual Basic 6 and earlier

  • Article

I started coding with Visual Basic 3 in 1991. I ended up teaching it all over Asia,, Latin America, Canada, and the US. Language wise I’m more about C# and C++, but I still code VBScript once in a while.

It is one of the biggest success stories in computer science. What started as a prototyping tool became a serious development platform. An entire industry was  born. At the time it was about PowerBuilder, Delphi, MFC and so on.

Does this look familiar to any of you?

Note that we have some resources  below to help you.I’d love to hear from some of you what type of apps you have written or are converting.I’ll take your lessons and add them to this blog.Just shoot me an email at bterkaly@microsoft.com-Bruno TerkalyIt would be great to see the challenges you faced and how you developed code.

VB6 to .NET Migration Guidance:

MSDN Site on Migration - Upgrading from Visual Basic 6.0:  https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vbrun/ms788233.aspx

VB6 Interoperability and Migration: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vbasic/ms789185.aspx

Patterns and Practices: UpgradiVB6 to VS 2005: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa480541.aspx

Overview of Changes from VB6 to VB.NET: https://www.4guysfromrolla.com/webtech/053001-1.shtml

Business Planning Guide for Visual Basic 6.0 Applications https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=4113b928-4575-44a3-b494-020005203161

Preparing Your Visual Basic 6.0 Applications for the Upgrade to Visual Basic .NET: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa260644(VS.60).aspx

Webcast: Complete Methodology for Migrating Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 to Visual Basic .NET (Level 200) - https://msevents.microsoft.com/cui/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?culture=en-US&EventID=1032308930&CountryCode=US

Safari Online Book "Visual Basic® .NET Developer's Guide to ASP.NET, XML, and ADO.NET ": https://my.safaribooksonline.com/0672321319/ch02lev1sec8

Free Book - Upgrading Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 to Microsoft Visual Basic .NET - https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vbrun/ms788236.aspx

Migration Tools:

VB Upgrade Companion by ArtinSoft: https://migrationguide.artinsoft.com/

VB Migration Partner Software: https://www.vbmigration.com/

MSDN Download - Visual Basic 6.0 to Visual Basic .NET Upgrade Assessment Tool: https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=10C491A2-FC67-4509-BC10-60C5C039A272&displaylang=en

MSDN Download - Upgrading Visual Basic 6.0 Applications to Visual Basic .NET and Visual Basic 2005:  https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=7C3FE0A9-CBED-485F-BFD5-847FB68F785D&displaylang=en

VB 6 Code Advisor: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vbasic/ms789135.aspx

Unit Testing:

SimplyVBUnit - https://simplyvbunit.sourceforge.net/

TinyUnit - https://www.w-p.dds.nl/tinyunit.htm

VBUnit3 - https://www.vbunit.com/

Other Resources:

VB6 Resource Center: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vbrun/default.aspx

VB Team Blog:  https://blogs.msdn.com/vbteam/default.aspx

VB Team Blog - Migration/Interop:  https://blogs.msdn.com/vbteam/archive/tags/VB6_5F00_Migration_2F00_Interop/default.aspx

Support Statement for Visual Basic 6.0 on Windows®Vista™and Windows®Server 2008: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vbrun/ms788708.aspx