Vin, you took the words right out of my mouth! It is very true that legacy apps will continue for years to come, even for a "dead" language. Can we spell COBOL?

And as the world turns, the marginal "programmers" will be left out. Less competition. More quality and professionalism left in.



>>>> I love it! I f*cking love it! Do we live in interesting times, or what???
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>We do. It's a weird and disturbing world, as I like to say....
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>Funny, all the VB is Dead talk, to me, reinforces something that many of us have been saying for years... that these "Language X is Dead" rumors are not only inaccurate, but irrelevant in the current tech world (at least, admittedly, in the large-city, financial app world in which I live). Let's say VB is dead (insert "VFP" if you like) -- what would that mean exactly, and how much would it really affect the income and quality-of-life of a good VB programmer? The answer, I have long believed, is "not very much." Legacy apps will live on for a long time, paying pretty well (hell, I had 3 offers THIS WEEK to support legacy apps -- one FP DOS, FPWindows, and a VB 4.0 app; admittedly, this was not a typical week).
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>And, if you don't want to stick with legacy apps, there are plenty of companies willing to take you on and teach you The Next Big Thing if you have programming experience, and the right attitude.
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>Admittedly, there may be some pay discrepancies ("sorry, Bobby, we just can't go above 100k for someone who doesn't know C++."). And, you may not be working in Exactly the language, Exactly the framework, Exactly the environment, and Exactly the type of app that you want (do any of us, really?). But in the end, barring a SERIOUS economic downturn, good programmers will continue to make good money to program.
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>I understand, and often share, the anger at these sort of rumors about VFP, just as I understand the anger some VB'ers are feeling over the strong departure of VB.NET. In the end, though, it's all going to shake out just fine for good programmers on either side of the fence. In fact, as cruel as this sounds, I don't mind one bit that some of the weak links will fall away -- in many ways that helps me, economically, in fact.