$ whois visual-basic-net

Visual Basic .NET

first released in 2001 · by Microsoft

$ guessprog --inspect visual-basic-net

year: 2001
paradigm: object oriented
family: basic
memory: automatic gc
binding: static
safety: weak

VISUAL-BASIC-NET(7)

AUTHORS: Microsoft
HISTORY: Microsoft released Visual Basic .NET in 2001, alongside C#, as part of the first .NET Framework. It replaced classic Visual Basic, whose 1991 drag-and-drop form designer had made Windows programming accessible to millions. The new language kept the familiar BASIC syntax but was rebuilt on the .NET runtime: fully object oriented, garbage collected, with inheritance, exceptions and threads. It was not compatible with Visual Basic 6, and many developers resented being asked to rewrite their applications.
USAGE: Still used to maintain many internal business applications on Windows. Microsoft stopped evolving the language in 2020 and now only keeps it supported on modern .NET, so new projects mostly pick C#. Its sibling VBA remains widely used to automate Microsoft Office.
SEE ALSO: Visual Basic .NET on Wikipedia ↗

$ cat Shapes.vb

Option Strict Off  ' the default: allows implicit conversions

Public MustInherit Class Shape
    Public MustOverride Function Area() As Double
End Class

Public Class Circle
    Inherits Shape
    Private ReadOnly radius As Double

    Public Sub New(r As Double)
        radius = r
    End Sub

    Public Overrides Function Area() As Double
        Return Math.PI * radius ^ 2
    End Function
End Class

Module Program
    Sub Main()
        Dim shape As Shape = New Circle("2")  ' the string becomes a Double
        Console.WriteLine($"Area: {shape.Area():F2}")
    End Sub
End Module