Visual Basic.Net is a programming language designed to create applications that work with Microsoft's new .NET Framework. The .NET platform in turn aims at addressing many of the limitations of Classic COM, Microsoft's Component Object Model, which provided one approach toward application and component interoperability. These limitations included type incompatibilities when calling COM components, versioning difficulties ("DLL hell") when developing new versions of COM components, and the need for developers to write a certain amount of code (mostly in C++) to handle the COM Plumbing. In contrast to VB, with its reliance on COM, VB .NET offers a number of new features and advantages. Followings are some of these.

• Object Orientation
• A Common Type System
• Access to System Services
• A Common Runtime Environment

With its language enhancements and its tight integration into the .NET Framework, Visual Basic is a thoroughly modernized language that will likely become the premier development tool for creating a wide range of .NET applications. In the past, Visual Basic was often seen as a "lightweight" language that could be used for particular kinds of tasks, but was wholly unsuitable for others. (It was often argued, sometimes incorrectly, that you couldn't create such things as Windows dynamic link libraries or shell extensions using Visual Basic.) In the .NET Framework, VB .NET emerges as an equal player; Microsoft's claim of language independence?that programming language should be a lifestyle choice, rather than a choice forced on the developer by the character of a project?is realized in the .NET platform. This means that VB .NET can be used to create a wide range of applications and components, including the following:

• Windows console mode applications
• Standard Windows applications
• Windows services
• Windows controls and Windows control libraries
• Web (Asp.Net) applications
• Web services
• Web controls and web control libraries
• Microsoft .NET classes and namespaces
• Accessing application object models (such as those of the inpidual applications in the Microsoft Office suite) using COM automation

Most importantly, for the first time with the release of VB.NET, Visual Basic becomes an all-purpose development environment for building Internet applications, an area in which it has traditionally been weak. This means that the release of this newest version should revitalize Visual Basic, allowing it to remain the tool of choice for developing state-of-the-art software for the next generation of software development.

SOURCE: INTERNET