Rating: 
Summary: This should be a trial package
Review: I wrote a small program consisting of several forms. You'd think it would be easy to deploy using the wizard, right? No. You can't just click a few buttons and create a program file that will run on any Windows Machine. I went to the exe file that was in my programs folder and moved it to my desktop. Guess what? You can't even move the exe file and have a program run like a normal exe file. Creating your own programs for fun that you can share with others is not doable with this product, which is what I wanted. My advice is, stick to VB 6 if you don't need this for work or school and haven't upgraded to Windows XP,
Rating: 
Summary: Good For Students
Review: I'm a student in an advanced VB class and I've only had one problem with this software so far. I haven't worked with web pages yet, so for a student this is pretty fair. If you want to include a database in your projects, make sure you have Microsoft Office or the full version of Access 2000 or greater. I have Microsoft Works (which doesn't include Access or .mdb files) which is not supported by VB.NET. Now I have to buy yet another Microsoft product!!! I have the XP Home Edition, which has supported VB.NET very well, opposed to some of the reviews that stated they had problems with the compatibility of the two.
Rating: 
Summary: Incredibly powerful & easy
Review: I'm not sure why everyone is complaining about Visual Basic .NET (VB.NET), when this software is so powerful. First, let me say that it's true VB.NET Standard Edition is somewhat crippled in that it doesn't let you create DLL's or mobile apps for WinCE devices. Nor does it include Crystal Reports, or some other features you'd find in VB.NET Professional/Enterprise. However, it's perfect for making small utilities/applications. Most of my programming experience has been with Perl, PHP, Java, C, C++. I had a little exposure to Visual Basic in college, but I had forgotten everything I had learned about it. With VB.NET standard and _Visual Basic .NET Step by Step_ (ISBN: 0-7356-1374-5) I was able to write a fully functional and moderately complex application (and distribute it with the included Windows installer) in about 2 weeks time. I was astounded by the low learning curve. There are two different types of programs you can create with VB.NET, those based on Windows forms and those based on Web forms. Windows forms would be your traditional type of Windows application, while Web forms are designed to work through the Internet. I have no VB.NET experience creating Web forms, but the features look promising. VB.NET is different than earlier versions of VB because it is built around the .NET framework. The .NET framework works more like Java. Your programs are converted to bytecode which runs on the .NET framework (which your users must install to run your apps). That would probably explain why it is slower than older VB compilers. In the past, applications created with Visual C++ would run faster than those made with VB. This is no longer the case. All Visual Studio Languages (C#, C++ and VB) all compile to .NET bytecode. Because the resulting bytecode is the same, you choose the language whose syntax you are most familiar with. I feel the benefits of switching to .NET are worth the performance loss. Because .NET is Microsoft's answer to Java, everything is now heavily dependant on Objects. OO programming with VB.NET is incredibly simple. Chances are any structure or function/method you'd like to use is already written - you just need to find the proper namespace in the .NET framework, import it into your code and then create an instance of the object you want. It's OO at its best. I would definitely not recommend VB.NET to people who have no programming experience. You need to get your feet wet with something else before delving into this. Just to clarify compatibility issues; VB.NET requires WinNT, Win2k, or WinXP Professional. It's my understanding that it will work on WinXP Home for applications, but you need XP Pro for creating/testing Web forms.
Rating: 
Summary: Visual Basic -- finally, just a toy.
Review: I've been a professional developer with VB6 Pro for years and found it to be a widely useful product. People accused it of being a "toy language" but with a little ingenuity and a few Windows API calls you can do nearly anything a C/C++ programmer can do, in a fifth the time. But this edition of Visual Basic is a downgrade. Don't get me wrong, I like the changes Microsoft has made to the language, but the VB.NET Standard package is a hamstrung dog. You can't use it to create DLLs or custom controls, so modularized code goes out the window. They only give you part of the web package, so all the claims about web development are just a lure. The most irritating thing is that if you buy the next edition up you're paying for C# as well, even though the two languages are using the same libraries and the same runtime and are completely functionally equivalent. I like the design choice, but the no one needs both languages, so why isn't there a Visual Basic.NET Professional edition? Par for course, Microsoft is stacking redundant features in one box to raise the price. It's just that in this case, the programming language itself has become a mere feature.
Rating:
Summary: Download Sun One Studio 4 for FREE!
Review: Sun ONE Studio 4 Community Edition is FREE. If you want to self-eduate yourself in how to develop web applications, it is a good choice.
Rating:
Summary: What you see is not what's in the box
Review: The Standard edition does not have an upgrade wizard, the error lookup, nor any built in report tools. I am running an IBM T20 with 128 RAM and being in the IDE for more than an hour slows my machine to a fustrating crawl. It takes on average 37 seconds to switch from code view to object view. I then have to restart the application to get an improvement. All the features advertised seem to relate to Visual Studio .NET Professional and above, so this product has been a complete decoy. Do waste your money.
Rating:
Summary: .net lacking
Review: This product does not include the upgrade wizard for visual basic 6.0 scripts. In order to get the upgrade wizard you must buy the whole visual studio package which costs [much] more. Just another way to make a little more money!!
Rating: 
Summary: A worthwhile purchase for those on a budget
Review: VB.NEt standard IS fairly crippled, however theres more than enough functionality in there to keep you occupied through the rather large learning curve. Winforms and WebForms(asp .net) are both possibly using this edition, which really does allow for a large scope of applications. You'll be limited to Access DB's using the wizards, but you can still code everything for SQl Server by hand if you get that good. So, if you want to get stuck into VB.NET and cant quite afford the full version of dev studio, I would thoroughly recommend this version...you have more than enough functionality to keep you going for a few months...unless your app just HAS to have web services or the like then you are probably ok. just bare in mind, you probably will want to buy the full version at some stage, when you wallet allows it.
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Summary: At last ... VB with OOP that aproaches the power of VC++
Review: Visual Basic has been around for more than a decade and has been used by millions (well 3 million) people to do things ranging from making Excel more friendly to large, standalone software packages.
However, until now Visual Basic has been easier to use than C++ but at the expense of power and object orientation. This has changed with Visual Basic.NET. Basic is now more powerful and more solidly one of the main planks of Microsoft's strategy.
At about US$100, the package is great value for money. However, if you have not touched a programming language for a whicle, you will need a good introduction (such as Wrox Press, Beginning Visual Basic.Net).
I found the transition from VBA to VB.NET to be interesting and challenging and I look forward (as a hobbyist, rather than a professional programmer) to getting even more out of the product.
Rating:
Summary: Best Buy For the Price
Review: Visual Basic.NET Standard is the best buy for the money. For all the people that think this version is crippled. It's not, you just have to do a little more work with it. This is not a trial version, the people that made that complaint are either too lazy to learn to code and are dependant on wizards ( scary ) or just lazy. You can do alot with this package and for the money like I said before this is
an excellent buy. As Far as not being able to compile dll's yes you can if you write your own project wizard, like I did :) Things VB.NET Standard CAN DO
Windows Apps
Web Apps
Console Apps
Web Services AND Yes Class Libraries if you know what you are doing.
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