Python 2 to 3 conversion - embrace the pain

[Mario Figueiredo]

On Thu, 19 Mar 2015 22:03:02 -0400, Dennis Lee Bieber
<wlfraed at ix.netcom.com> wrote:

>On Thu, 19 Mar 2015 16:23:04 -0700, Paul Rubin <no.email at nospam.invalid>
>declaimed the following:
>
>>Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python at pearwood.info> writes:
>>
>>> Anyone remember the big backwards incompatible changes made to Visual
>>> Basic?  How long did that take to settle down afterwards?
>>
>>No idea from me, I never used VB.
>
>	VB6 was Win32API, native code... It was replaced by VB.NET -- .NET API,
>"managed" code.
>
>	Imagine if "CPython" 2.x were replaced with "Jython" 3.x, and most of
>the Python standard library was replaced with Java packages.

I think Steven was referring to the VB 3, 4, 5, and 6 releases (to
name the ones that went into mass distribution back then). Microsoft
was infamous for making each release non backwards compatible except
for the most trivial projects, sometimes making meaningless changes
that would break incompatibility for no reason at all; like changing
the vbp tag for the project title, for god knows why.

VB.NET, on the other hand, isn't comparable. It is not an upgrade to
VB. Both languages are completely distinct, sharing only a similar
syntax. For obvious reasons back in 2000, Microsoft wanted Visual
Basic developers to adopt the .Net framework experiment and even made
the first VB.NET version number one up from Visual Basic. But they are
completely different languages.