Considering migrating to Python from Visual Basic 6 for engineering applications

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On Thursday, 18 February 2016 18:01:17 UTC+2, Dan Strohl  wrote:
> Disadvantages of python... (compared to VB)
> 
> That's a hard one, but here are my thoughts:  (keep in mind that these kinds of discussions are subjective and much is based on the background and experience of the coder, these are also assuming that 100% of your audience is on windows, as soon as you start talking about cross platform support, VB gets much harder to use (yes, you could use it on Linus, via a web based app, or an emulator if you HAD to).
> 
> - I find that VB is much easier at making quick GUI apps (for windows).

Yes, and I have used it for about 20 years. VB2 was wonderful for my work. VB3 was fine. VB6 is also OK, but VB.net is too bloated. But can I count on using VB6 for the next five years? Or more?

> 
> - VB is easier to integrate with office apps and other windows specific things (there are some python modules that will access office files etc, but if you want to have an engineering app that directly integrates / interacts with excel, VB is probably better.
> 

Python will read *.csv, and that will be enough. I guess writing *.csv will also be easy.

> - I find VB is easier to package and distribute.  (there are some good utilities that will take Python and package it into an exe, along with all of the needed pieces, interpreter, etc, but those all require some level of work to setup and make work... not a lot sometimes, but certainly more than "click compile" and copy the .exe file.
> 

Is Python packaging a lot more complicated than VB.net?

> - VB is often, for simple apps, often simpler to learn for non-programmers.  (I know I will get slammed for that one).  For complex apps, I find VB harder to do things than Python, but for example, if I wanted to make a quick windows calculator, I would probably go to VB first.)
> 
> My approach is generally:
> 
> I use Python for:
> - server apps, web based apps, plugins, modules, library development, or apps that I want to be able to expand later with plugins, console apps and utilities (things that I am only going to run from the CLI anyway),  performance focused apps (unless I need to go all the way to C for performance), anything that might ever need to be cross platform, apps that interact with other (non-Microsoft) apps.
> 

For me, none of these things are very interesting.

> I use VB for:
> Quick user focused, non-web apps, apps that are used in or directly with Microsoft Office apps, apps that I am developing for someone else that is a VB programmer (or non-programmer but might poke at them).. apps that I need to distribute to lots of less controlled workstations that don't have python on them already.
> 
> These days, I find that I am using VB much less than Python, most of the reasons that I would pick VB can be overcome by developing a cloud app instead of a local app, but there are still times that VB is the right tool (for me at least).
> 

But how long can I continue to use VB6?

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