When will the VB6 application end?

Question

Microsoft no longer supports the development and support of Microsoft's VB6, which has already been stopped. But the VB6 application also works on Windows 8.1. This is an article that reports the Support Statement for Visual Basic 6.0 on Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 8.1 .

But I want to know when the VB6 application will no longer work? Is there an official expression from Microsoft, or any clue about the same?

EDIT: In this link , the visual studio team mentioned that "it will be supported at least until 2024." But it’s unclear whether they said it was supported on Windows 8 through 2024 or in a future version of Windows.

Answer 1

"2024" means as part of Windows 8. The link says that VB6 runtime is part of Windows and therefore will be supported in the same way as the rest of Windows. For example, Windows 8 will be supported until 2024 because this support life cycle is for Windows 8.

EDIT: Microsoft has now announced that the VB6 runtime is officially part of Windows 10.

EDIT: VB6 IDE (not runtime) is no longer officially supported on any version of Windows, but there are ways to make it work on Windows 7 and 8.

Answer 2

Uservoice : The VB6 runtime is still a component of the Windows operating system and is a component that ships with Windows 8.1. It will be supported at least in 2024.

It seems obvious that they mean that VB6 will be supported through 2024, not just VB6 in Windows 8 (whose main support ends 6 years earlier).

Answer 3

The VB6 programming language is installed and launched on Windows 7, 8.x and 10.

There is a utility for installing it here: VB6 IDE installation utility

Answer 4

It is in the interest of Microsoft for VB6 applications to run on Windows 10, and therefore they are likely to be. The same is probably true for most older application platforms: Microsoft is working to maintain compatibility. IDE works in Windows 7 (not sure about 8 or 10).

However, since Microsoft says that VB6 will work, this does not mean that your specific application will work, especially if you use third-party components. You should at least think about moving to another development environment.

Answer 5

From what I heard, VB6 applications are still working on a technical preview of Windows 10. I have not yet seen an official statement, but it looks like VB6 will be supported for at least several years.

Answer 6

Microsoft has just announced VB6 programming in Windows 10: -

"Windows is committed to compatibility. The Windows compatibility team looks at user telemetry and responds to feedback from Windows Insiders to ensure that existing applications work well with Windows 10. Windows 10 is designed to work with Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8.1. And yes, every your beloved VB6 Runtime will continue to work . In the near future, the concurrent team will go to Blogging Windows in more detail on this topic. "

All your favorite VB6 programs in Windows 10

So, VB6 programming will work on Windows 10, just like VBA programming.

They also claim that the universal Windows Platform Bridge "Project Centennial" will work with VB6 code.

VB6 IDE installation instructions are available here ...

Answer 7

In my personal experience, if you create a dll in VB6 and add it as a component in COM Plus in Server 2016, it just won’t be added. You will receive an error message similar to the following, even for the Hello World component.

A registry value was changed while installing the following component into a COM+ Application. If you are experiencing activation problems with this component then please check the registry value for the following key.

Component: C:\temp\Project1.dll

Registry Key: CLSID\{D5DE8D20-5BB8-11D1-A1E3-00A0C90F2731}\InProcServer32

Process Name: RunDll32.exe Comsvcs.dll file version: not loaded

Answer 8

There is a project to provide a new language, “RADBasic,” which should be compatible with the VB6 programming language.

New language compatible with VB6 programming