Thank you Leland - great points!

Tom


>Hi Thomas,
>
>C# and the CLI (e.g. Common Language Infrastructure) have been turned over to ECMA as an international standard, see below link:
>
>http://msdn.microsoft.com/net/ecma/
>
>There are a number of dot net implementations. C# and the CLI are a lot like java in that java could be written and then run on all platforms within its Java Virtual Machine (e.g. JVM) Each OS needed its own implementation of the JVM to run the java app on the selected platform. Dot Net works just like java in that respect.
>
>Since C# and CLI are standardized, an app written in C# should be capable of running across operating systems.
>
>There are many current projects underway to build the .Net layer above the OS/s that is needed to run dot net ADO.NET, etc applications. One such project is mono that is being developed by the Linux Community. Borland is coming out with its version of Visual Studio NET. It is reasonable to assume at some point Borland may port their development tool to other platforms.
>
>I know that an app written in C# would be supported on all platforms that comply with C# and CLI standards, but I wonder if an app written in VB.NET for example would port to mono, or be support in the mono's window version of net, for example.
>
>Just to be safe and keep my options opened, I would go with C#.
>
>If you want to have the option of intraoperability, I would check with the mono project to see if its implementation of NET support the same 20 or so languages that Microsoft's version supports.
>
>
>LelandJ