🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <3637EAA9.78993487@loudoun.com>,
  jbarron1@loudoun.com wrote:
> Object Oriented is not simply a Marketing buzz word. It is a real and has a
very
> academic foundation. And one of the corner stones of that foundation is
Inheritance.
> Pull that stone out and the language simply can't be considered Object
Oriented.

Notice that I never actually called VB object-oriented, but object supporting.
Clearly, VB is not an object oriented language in the sense that C++ or Java
is. Of course, SmallTalk developers would argue that those aren't objected-
oriented languages either, but that's why we point at SmallTalk developers and
laugh (or, at least, would if we'd ever seen one in the wild.)

> Because Bill Gates says it is, and there is text on the box saying it is, and
their
> are things called objects in the language, does not make it so.

VB supports COM and DCOM objects which *are* objects, not just marketing hype.
True, Gates and Co. did decide not to allow C++-style class inheritence, which
I think is a mistake, but they had their justifications for doing so.[1]

FTR, it is possible to do functional class inheritence in VB through a
combination of interface inheritance (through the Implements keyword) and
encapsulated instantiation of the base class.  It's ugly as sin and hard to
maintain, but it's there.  This doesn't make it an object-oriented language,
but it is a language in which you can do object-centric programming.

> BTW, do you live in Washington DC? If not, you get a job in the White House
as a
> "Spin Doctor". You've taken the best vertue of PB, Object Oriented, taken
away one
> word "Oriented", add a negative term "Dependant" and refer to the the
opposing tool
> as Object Dependant. Great Spin!! My applause.

Thank you.  I miss my days in public relations at the oddest times.

Actually, my main objection to PowerBuilder is its more codepency with Data
Windows--similar to the issues I had with Access development and VB
development in the bad old days when bound controls were The Neatest Thing
Since Sliced Bread.

I've worked in both PowerBuilder and Delphi, though not extensively.  I found
that neither has much support in the PC development world (my career arena)
and that the reasons are more valid than just network externalities. 
PowerBuilder is wonderful at doing 80% of what you want easily, then making
the remaining 20% godawful difficult.  Delphi is wonderful, but has database
support to make you weep for what a great language it could have been
otherwise[2].

--Elocutus

[1] According to Nathan Myrvold and William M. Vaughn, Microsoft's research
showed that deep inheritance (three levels or more) was a cause of a hugely
disproportionate number of logic errors in programming and that they were,
invariably, the hardest errors to diagnose and fix.  The strategy with VB was
always to not give VB developers enough rope to shoot themselves in the
foot--a strategy I have always disagreed with.

[2]My last significant experience with Delphi was Delphi 2.  This may have
changed.

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