Microsoft KB Archive/317071

= INFO: Roadmap for Migrating Visual Basic 6.0 to Visual Basic .NET =

PSS ID Number: 317071

Article Last Modified on 8/12/2005

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The information in this article applies to:


 * Microsoft Visual Basic .NET (2002)
 * Microsoft Visual Basic .NET (2003)

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This article was previously published under Q317071



SUMMARY
This article provides a roadmap to learn and master the process of migrating a Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 application to Visual Basic .NET. To assist you with learning a Microsoft product or technology, roadmap articles provide links to useful information, including online documentation, Microsoft Knowledge Base (KB) articles, and white papers.

This article contains the following sections:
 * Overviews
 * Architecture (optional)
 * Key Concepts and QuickStarts (optional)
 * How To Articles
 * Walkthroughs (optional)
 * Guidelines (optional)
 * Troubleshooting

Overviews
Microsoft Visual Basic has had many evolutions since its original release, Visual Basic 1.0. The release of Visual Basic .NET is the biggest evolution yet. The language has been redesigned to take advantage of the .NET Framework. By leveraging the features that the .NET Framework provides, Visual Basic supports language features such as code inheritance, visual forms inheritance, and multi-threading. The object model is more extensive than earlier versions, and Visual Basic .NET totally integrates with the .NET Framework. Therefore, interaction between components written in other .NET languages is very efficient.

The following links provide overview information about how to migrate a Visual Basic 6.0 application to Visual Basic .NET. Review this information before you upgrade your application.

Ask yourself the following questions:
 * Should I upgrade or not?
 * Should I upgrade everything at one time, or should I upgrade piece by piece?

For information to help you make those decisions, visit the following MSDN Web sites:

Upgrading to Microsoft Visual Basic .NET

http://msdn.microsoft.com/vbasic/technical/upgrade/vbupgrade.asp

Visual Basic .NET Upgrade Overview

http://msdn.microsoft.com/vbasic/technical/upgrade/roadmap.asp

For an overview of the new features in Visual Basic .NET, visit the Microsoft Web Help file at the following Microsoft Web site:

What's New in the Visual Basic Language

ms-help://MS.VSCC/MS.MSDNVS/vbcn7/html/valrfWhatsNewInVisualBasicLanguage.htm

NOTE: This link is only available if you have the Visual Studio .NET documentation installed on your computer. After you decide to upgrade, make sure that your application is ready to upgrade. Just because you have a Visual Basic 6.0 application does not mean that it is ready to run through the Upgrade Wizard. Preparing your Visual Basic 6.0 code for the upgrade is an important step in the upgrade process. Follow the suggestions in the preparation guide to make sure your code is ready:

Preparing Your Visual Basic 6.0 Applications for the Upgrade to Visual Basic .NET

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnvb600/html/vb6tovbdotnet.asp

Note The Visual Basic .NET Upgrade Wizard is included in Visual Studio .NET Professional.

For additional language innovation overviews, visit the following Microsoft Web sites:

JumpStart to Visual Basic .NET

http://www.microsoft.com/Seminar/Includes/Seminar.asp?url=/Seminar/en/Developers/20011022VBNetJump_BM/portal.xml

Language Innovations in Visual Basic .NET

http://msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio/technical/articles/language.asp

Architecture
The following links provide architectural (internal) information about Visual Basic .NET.

For information about why some of the architectural changes were made to the language and what those changes are, visit the following MSDN Web site:

The Transition from Visual Basic 6.0 to Visual Basic .NET

http://msdn.microsoft.com/vbasic/technical/upgrade/transition/default.asp

The Upgrade Wizard is unable to upgrade your ActiveX Control projects to Visual Basic .NET. This is because the control architecture in Visual Basic .NET is different from the control architecture in Visual Basic 6.0.

For more information about these changes, visit the following MSDN Web site:

Differences Between Visual Basic 6.0 and .NET Controls

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dndotnet/html/actxvnetcontrols.asp?frame=true

Now that Visual Basic .NET is a object-oriented language, learn the object-oriented features that the language supports so that you can use them in your code.

For more information about the concepts of object-oriented programming and how they are used in Visual Basic .NET, visit the following MSDN Web site:

Object-Oriented Programming in Visual Basic .NET

http://msdn.microsoft.com/vbasic/technical/upgrade/programming.asp

For a quick guide to the programming element changes in Visual Basic .NET, visit the Microsoft Web Help file at the following Microsoft Web site:

Programming Element Changes

ms-help://MS.VSCC/MS.MSDNVS/vbcn7/html/vaconprogrammingelementschangesinvb7.htm

NOTE: This link is only available if you have the Visual Studio .NET documentation installed on your computer.

Key Concepts and QuickStarts
The following Web sites provide documentation about primary Visual Basic .NET concepts and QuickStart tutorials.

The QuickStart tutorials will help you get up to speed very quickly with Visual Basic .NET programming:

QuickStart Tutorials

http://samples.gotdotnet.com/quickstart/

With any project that you upgrade, use the Visual Basic .NET Upgrade Wizard. For a hands-on lab to help you become familiar with the wizard, visit the following MSDN Web site:

Using the Visual Basic Upgrade Wizard

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dv_vstechart/html/vstchexpvsnetlab5.asp

Two of the new project types that are available in Visual Basic .NET are Console and Windows Services applications. For more information about how to use these projects, visit the following MSDN Web site:

Why VB .NET?

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnvbdev01/html/vb01c8.asp

How To Articles
How To articles provide step-by-step instructions for accomplishing specific tasks. Run the following Microsoft Knowledge Base query to return How To articles about Visual Basic .NET:

Visual Basic .NET How To articles

Walkthroughs
Walkthroughs provide mini-tutorials that walk you through some typical application development scenarios in Visual Basic .NET. To access a variety of WebCast walkthroughs, visit the following Microsoft Web sites:

Increase Your Productivity with Visual Basic .NET

http://www.microsoft.com/Seminar/Includes/Seminar.asp?url=/Seminar/en/Developers/20011022VBNetProd_BM/portal.xml

Introducing the Visual Studio .NET Integrated Development Environment

http://www.microsoft.com/Seminar/Includes/VideoSeminar.asp?url=/Seminar/en/Developers/20011022VSNetIDE_NW/portal.xml

Introduction to Building Applications with Visual Basic .NET

http://www.microsoft.com/Seminar/Includes/VideoSeminar.asp?url=/Seminar/en/Developers/20011022VBNetApps_KS/portal.xml

Visual Basic .NET: Design Goals and Concepts

http://www.microsoft.com/Seminar/Includes/Seminar.asp?url=/Seminar/en/Developers/20011022VBNetDesign_AB/portal.xml

Guidelines
For information about key upgrading guidelines, browse to the following MSDN Web site:

A Framework for Upgrading Your Enterprise Application to .NET

http://msdn.microsoft.com/vbasic/technical/upgrade/entupgrade.asp

Troubleshooting
If you run into problems along the way and need some answers to your questions, the best place to get those questions answered is in the Microsoft Newsgroups, where you can share your experiences with your peers, or the Microsoft Knowledge Base (KB), where you can search for KB articles about specific issues.

For access to these resources, visit the following Microsoft Web sites:

Visual Basic .NET Upgrade Newsgroup

[news:microsoft.public.dotnet.languages.vb.upgrade ews:microsoft.public.dotnet.languages.vb.upgrade]

MSDN Newsgroups

http://msdn.microsoft.com/newsgroups

Microsoft Knowledge Base

http://support.microsoft.com/search

