From: Scott Rubin <srubin@...>
Date: 2004-07-21T03:32:04+09:00
Subject: Re: VB(ish) replacement

Dave Boland wrote:
> The other day I was asked if there is an open source replacement for VB6 
> that is cross-platform.  I spent a little bit of time at Barnes-Noble 
> and looking at news groups, but don't have a good answer.  Hope you can 
> help without geting into a language war.  These will be for commercial 
> applications with a GUI.
> 
> What they seem to be looking for is:
> 1. High level language, but not necessarly VB compatible.
> 2. OOP
> 3. Reasonalble learning curve
> 4. Cross-platform
> 5. IDE and ability to graphically design windows.
> 6. Distribute programs as .exe's, so some sort of compiler needed.
> 7. Serial communications library (RS-232, 485, USB)
> 8. SNMP library
> 9. Good performance (not expected to be as fast as C/C++)
> 10. Windows are native to each O.S.
> 11. Database support of Access and MySQL
> 
> It looks like any of the three languages have most or all of what they 
> need, but I don't use scripting languages enough to give a good answer.
> 
> Dave,
> 

I'm fairly certain you can use python and glade together to make cross 
platform GTK+ guis in a graphical way.  I'm also fairly certain that it 
meets all your requirements. There might be a way to use glade with 
other gtk supporting languages. Also, KDevelop I think can do the same 
with Qt stuff, but I don't know for sure since I haven't used it in a 
long time. Don't you have any programmers who can make guis the "real" 
way instead of drawing them with a VB type interface? it's not that hard 
if you draw them on paper with a pencil and plan them out first.

-Scott