What to do if I don't have Visual Basic 6.0 and need to compile a VB6 project?

Question

A client wants me to do some maintenance work to a VB 6.0 application (migration to .NET is also in the pipeline), but he doesn't have the development tools because he received just the source code and running application from the original programmer, who is no longer available.

Microsoft doesn't sell Visual Studio 6.0, as far as I know. How can I modify and compile the source code for a VB6 application without VB6? or Where do I get Visual Studio 6.0 if Microsoft is not selling it?.

Even if I migrate everything to .NET without releasing a new VB6 version, I would like to be able to open the project and see it compile and run to better understand it.

I have VS 2005 and VB 2008. But I understand that if I try to open the project the code will be converted to VB.NET and that's not what I would want before getting to know the project better.

Answer 1

From what I recall the Visual Studio 6.0 is available for MSDN Subscribers.

Answer 2

Hunt Ebay or Craigslist. Or call your regular software vendor, I'm sure they can still get it for this sort of reason.

Answer 3

Visual Basic 5 Control Creation Edition might be suitable to tide you over until you can get hold of a full version of VB6. There are limitations and it is 5 not 6, but depending on the scope and complexity of the application it might work for you as an interim measure.

Answer 4

Many textbooks on Visual Basic 6 frequently included a fairly usable version if VB (I can't recall the exact name offhand, perhaps VB 6 student edition?) that allowed the compiling of .exe files. VB 5 textbooks usually bundled VB 5 CCE, VB 4 books bundled VB 4 WM, neither of these are suitable replacements for a production VB 6 app IMHO, especially their lack of ability to create .exe files.

I will say, Visual Studio 2005 (VB 8) converted VB 6 apps quite well if that's an acceptable interim solution (which it may not be given the requirement for the large .NET 2.0 runtimes).

Answer 5

To get a feel of the code, you could try to compile parts of the application in MS Office / VBA.

Of course, this will only offer limited functionality, but may suffice for some testing.

Answer 6

Both Amazon and eBay currently have copies for sale (although they seem a tad expensive but this would be a pass-through cost to your customer so it's up to them whether they pay this).

You may want to check out the licence for VB.net; it may allow you to run previous versions of the software, such as VB6 (though you'd still have to source the actual media to install it, of course).

The MSDN "Visual Studio 2008 Professional with MSDN Professional" has previous version of Visual Studio tools but it comes in at USD1200 so, if you just want VB6, eBay is the better option.

Keep in mind that MSDN pack has all the Visual Studio languages and VS6 through to VS2008 so it's probably got everything you need.