Linux Format forums

[mgsAbFnc]

Hi!

I do some programming on Visual Basic and Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) and I consider myself proficient at it.

I like Visual Basic a lot, because it enables me to focus more on the problems I'm trying to solve and what I'm building than on the intricacies and the details of the language.

I'm thinking about starting some coding projects, but I don't want to do it with Visual Basic, because it's M$ Windows only

I've been checking Gambas and it's great, but I would like to use something that it's cross-platform.

So I just wanted to know what you guys think. If this has been answered, please be gentle and point me to the right thread

Is there a Visual, cross-platform, easy to use programming language that allows me to create (and distribute) programs for Linux, Mac and Windows? (If it's free and open source, even better )

I've been checking KBasic http://kbasic.com/ and Q7Basic http://www.q7basic.org/, but I don't know if that's the right path.

Do you think these are good projects, or should I go to a slightly lower level? If you do, which languages do you recommend?

I've been checking Qt, Java, Python and some others, but they're not so Visual.

I'm slightly confused. I'd like to find out the right language, before investing my time on learning it.

Thank you in advance for all the advices and pointers you may give me.

I'm using Fedora 15 and it's great.

Best regards.
_________________
Marco Silva

Love Linux and TWiT (twit.tv) netcast network.

[johnhudson]

The Visual bit was all about marketing; there was also Visual FoxPro and may have been others.

In Linux, the approach is different: separate the development environment from the language. There are various development environments of which Eclipse is possibly the most well-known. It allows you to develop in a variety of languages. So you don't have to learn a new development environment if you decide to use a different language.

[Ram]

Here's a mail I received yesterday.

The MonoDevelop team is proud to announce the release of MonoDevelop 2.6.

MonoDevelop is an IDE primarily designed for C# and other .NET languages. MonoDevelop enables developers to quickly write desktop and ASP.NET Web applications on Linux, Windows and Mac OSX. MonoDevelop makes it easy for developers to port .NET applications created with Visual Studio to Linux and Mac OS maintaining a single code base for all platforms.

The official announcement is available here:

http://monodevelop.com/Download/Release_Notes/Release_Notes_for_MonoDevelop_2.6

A detailed description of the features included in this release is available here:

http://monodevelop.com/Download/What%27s_new_in_MonoDevelop_2.6

Many thanks to everybody that made possible this release.
Enjoy!

The MonoDevelop Team.

It just might fit your bill.
_________________

Ubuntu LXDE 12.04 running on AMD Phenom II*4; ASUS Crosshair III Formula MB; 4 GB Ram.....

[Gordon]

Why not try Lazarus...

http://www.lazarus.freepascal.org/

Based on pascal and inspired by Borland's Delphi.

[roseway]

+1 for Lazarus. In the dark ages I used to use Delphi, and when I stopped using Windows, Lazarus was the obvious place to go. I've never regretted going that way.

Don't be put off by the fact that it's based on Pascal. It's a very advanced object-oriented form of Pascal, and totally functional.
_________________
Eric

[ScannerDarkly]

When you say "visual" do you mean the way in Visual Studio/Visual basic how you can use Windows Forms to quickly create GUIs, and then implement the code behind the GUI

Really, what you'll find, is it's best to learn, say, Python, and to actually learn the concepts behind real programming and then you'll work with widget toolkits/visual components like GTK+, QT, etc.

To answer your question, if I've interpreted it correctly, take a look at this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphical_user_interface_builder
_________________
Linux since Ubuntu 6.06.