I don't expect MS to ever open source it at this stage.
For many years the biggest source of angst for those of us marooned in VB6 was the fear that our applications would no longer run in the 'next' version of windows and rewrites would be necessary. I don't think that fear is there any longer as each successive release has continued to support them.
Now it's just slightly depressing to be working with a tool that was already due an update before the end of the last century.
Re:Happy 15th Birthday .NET
by alex_hitchins on Wednesday February 15, 2017 @08:17AM
(#13651750)
I think Windows 10 still ships the VB runtime, but I'll go and check. Support I've come across it mainly down to third party components, be it some weird DLL or an ActiveX control that will not behave. A plain vanilla VB6 app that you might get as an ePos system or some internal CRUD tool should work 'just fine'.
Thinking about it, I am going to dig out my old VB6 VM image and have a play. Be interesting to see how many people out there would want support for VB6 apps today.
But for people who have to support VB6 regardless of whether or not Microsoft open sources it, I'm sure it'd be pretty helpful.
We still have stuff out there that runs on COBOL, I have a feeling there will still be some life-dependent VB6 code out there somewhere in 2050.