[mono-vb] Future of Mono's VB.NET

[Miguel de Icaza]

Hello,

> 1. VB.NET is not "standardized". This is to our advantage for we can
> scope and define what mono's VB.NET will or will not support.
> 
>  We can leave out certain constructs like supporting error numbers or
> mapping error numbers to exceptions. Going down to the last detail as
> in retaining error numbers across vbc and mbas2 would be seriously
> detrimental to progress and should be avoided at all costs. 

The error codes are not standardized in C# either, they were just a
useful thing to have.   Sure, its some extra work, but it helps finding
potential probelms.

> Even if we decide to go down this path, we would miss nothing if we
> restrict the patches to those that were committed before Anirban took
> over.

That sounds fine.

> Neither am I a C# or VB.NET programmer (in the remotest sense) nor am
> I am compiler guru. I am making these observations as a practitioner
> and as someone who spared some sincere love over mbas/bmcs.

I do have another concern though;   Today folks are reporting that VB
does not work (and in a sense that is correct, we do not even have full
runtime support).

I think I might want to move mbas, mbas2, bmcs and the VisualStudio
runtime *out* of mcs and not distribute it as part of mono/mcs until
they are ready.   The runtime in particular is missing enough pieces
(from 2.0, but the issue comes up frequently) that I much rather just
state that we do not support VB.NEt for the time being.

Miguel.