15.4. Religious questions
15.4.1. Which is better OWL or MFC, BC++ or MS MSVC?
This is constantly getting asked on Usenet. The answer really depends on what you are doing. If you demand the latest C++ features such as templates, RTTI, etc.. BC++ usually has these first. But be careful, when Borland went from OWL 2 to 3 (or was it 1 to 2?) they made everybody completely rewrite their applications. Applications that were written with MFC 1.0 still work with the newer versions of MFC today! The best advice is to get the features from each vendor and see what's best for your situation.
[email protected] 6/8/95, comp.lang.c++
15.4.2. Should I use Visual C++ or Visual Basic?
(Here's a funny analogy I saw posted->) Well, the principle is the same (create interface, add code to respond to events, add code to do something useful). But programming in VB is like riding a kiddy bike, while programming in C++ is like driving a Formula 1 racing car - be prepared for accidents.
But seriously, VB is interpreted, MSVC is compiled, therefore MSVC programs should be much faster (if written well). It's generally believed that VB is the best way to 'prototype' a user-interface, but when it comes to code reuse and solving larger problems, VB breaks down. Visual C++ on the other hand is not as easy to use as VB, but once you learn it, you can write much more complex programs than with VB. The readers digest version of all this is: It depends on the application you are writing.
[email protected], 6/18/95
15.4.3. MFC philosophy (from a microsoftie!)
Just a note about the classes provided in MFC... keep in mind that these classes are designed as "general-purpose" classes, not "all-purpose" classes. No one implementation can have performance characteristics that are ideal for *all* possible applications. It is up to you, the programmer, to evaluate a provided implementation and decide whether it is appropriate for the task at hand. If it is not, you have several alternatives: modify or subclass the provided implementation; find a more appropriate class from another source; or write one from scratch.
[email protected], mfc-l, 7/15/95