Santosh Benjamin

C-Omega and 'Future' languages

I just saw this post about the C-Omega language and the authors comment that we should favor C# over VB.NET for this reason. Inspite of being a C# developer currently I DO NOT AGREE.

So C# is ECMA standardised which is something nice for MS and I use that often to hit my Java friends over the head with especially when they complain that C# attributes are really meta-tags when viewed through Java lenses and that sort of rubbish. Hey, if its ECMA standardised then if MS calls them attributes thats exactly what they are. However I can't blame them. James Gosling, the founder of Java recently claimed that C# didnt have attributes. He's either totally blinkered or he's been living in some cocoon that has no real world view. How can anyone realistically make such a claim?

But coming back to the point. In the Busting Development Myths session at TechEd Amsterdam we discussed the VB and C# issue. One thing which came up is that since C# is largely ECMA standardised it really cannot move forward very quickly cos you have all the 'standards body' head honchos pontificating over every proposal. However VB.NET, being purely proprietary can actually race ahead in productivity and features [even more than the My namespace] since MS doesnt need to answer to anyone.

So this C Omega thing is not a reason to move to C#. It will probably be just as easily used in VB.NET. And dont forget that we can always wrap the functionality in a DLL and call it from any language.(Which is why its fine if we dont have the My namespace in C# - I'm sure we can just as easily wrap it and use it). Generics are part of the 2.0 framework so they arent exclusive to any language.

I dont see any reason to dismiss the VB.NET developers when .NET makes everyone equal. A well designed class library will last a long time no matter what language it is written in now.

This XML focussed language thing reminds me of another post (dont remember exactly where) where the MS person said that XAML was the outcome of the X#  excitement that went around a while ago. Wonder if C-Omega will end up being subsumed into some namespace dealing with XML !!!