Website? Missing the point. The problems in business are typically "web applications" not websites - either internal custom applications that they have lost the source for, the developers left, or they use technologies nobody has heard of, or enterprise apps that were purchased long ago and upgrade paths are too expensive or disruptive.

Hundreds of staff where I work were forced to stick with IE7 until earlier this year because a single app used by a handful of users in HR wouldn't work on IE8. On thin clients. Why on earth they couldn't provide a separate IE7 TS instance for those users is beyond me. But this is the insanity of corporate IT departments.

How exactly does one install that on a terminal server session where everything is locked down? And yes, I'm a developer not a member of the admin staff.

I'm forced to use IE8 at the office (thin client crap for internet access) and already there are some sites I cannot use, and others that degrade to basic versions. The sooner this happens the better IMO - the more sites that do not work in IE8 the faster my IT department will be forced to realise that they have to upgrade from Win2003 server and/or install a different browser. Oh, and that really, Internet Explorer isn't "secure" just because it offers an illusion of security lockdown...

This kind of setup is increasingly common here in the UK, except the pedestrian crossings are implemented with lights too. This comes as a shock when first implemented, followed by a feeling of anger at the stupidity and the risk it will put pedestrians under, followed by annoyance - but I've not heard of an accident involving a pedestrian on these junctions here, only involving cars rear-ending other cars because they weren't concentrating well enough or were driving too fast. That said bridges and subways are more inconvenience to pedestrians, not to mention more expensive.

These improvements often also go hand in hand with alterations to introduce spiral lanes on the roundabouts to assist the flow of traffic. Except that a lot of people completely ignore them (through ignorance, stupidity, bloody mindedness or "cos that's what I've done for the last 60 years") often making things more confusing and for people to concentrate a few yards ahead rather than brakingDistance++ ahead too.

In the UK a pedestrian has right of way (highway code rule 108 I think) so I'm not sure your comment about responsibility is correct. Perhaps pedestrians in the UK are more used to idiotic driving (we are king of chav culture, boy racers, and breaking the speed limits after all) are more conscientious? That said, few pedestrians realise one has to place a foot on a zebra crossing before the traffic has an obligation to stop, so maybe not!

Incidentally, my short commute to work (7 miles) involves 9 roundabouts and 5 sets of traffic lights. Fortunately none of them have crossings on the exits.

Mod parent up. It really sucks to take any technical notes on an iPad. Hell, it sucks for taking notes period - whether thats using an onscreen keyboard, a drawing app and a stylus, or whatever. A laptop is better, but is far from adequate.

The best lecturers I've had (admittedly this was last century, before tablets were commonplace but still totally impractical for notes) gave the class partial notes for the class. Nobody had to worry about writing the boiler plate stuff - instead they could concentrate on the topic and start to understand it. The lecturer would then ask someone in the lecture what the blanks should be - and we all filled in the important bits (so we got to write it down to help reinforce it, but also got a decent amount of time to THINK rather than writing as fast as we could, missing the important bits, and spending hours trying to catch up. I learnt a LOT in that style of lecture.

However, I do wish that we had permission to record the audio in lectures, and that tech such as livescribe pen existed back then! (on top of the boilerplate notes)

VS.NET has "Express" editions that are free to download and use (including for commercial use) and are quite powerful, so I'm not sure the "pay pay pay" argument holds up unless you mean development costs. I've used VS Express to develop COM components to bridge ESRI ArcGIS applications with other applications (eg in Java), and they are relatively powerful (certainly as much as VB6 was).

Can you detail the things that don't work? I'm curious, and it might provide a catalyst for my friend to rewrite his app.

I also run XP in a VM occasionally, but I (and my friend) would rather be working on Windows 7 (caveat: I use Macs and Linux on my machines and have Windows 7 in a VM) - mainly because the app connects to remote database servers over the Internet. While I could also host the database on the VM and avoid that, I can't have any real data in there for testing due to regulatory constraints. I suppose we'll have to host the VM at the client site and RDP into it. Meh.

In this case, the result was the organisation stayed on Windows 2000 for nearly a year after its end of life, with an eventual minor upgrade to Windows XP fairly recently. Windows 7 is nowhere near ready to being rolled out.

Your comment about webapps is irrelevant. Yes, many companies have done this. The GP and my friend have not, so I was asking for the strategy for maintaining that code when (supposedly) the IDE doesn't run properly on Windows 7, but from the other posts this might not be the case. In any case, web applications were also frequently written in VB classic and many still have not been migrated to .NET or other things yet.

I agree with your assessment of Microsoft development technology - I attempt to stay well clear of it. While I'll probably learn Metro (purely so its on my CV for contract work), I won't be building any of my own projects with it...

Right. Which is what my friend does now. However, XP becomes unsupported in the not too distant future, so I'm wondering what the strategy is then.

That's what TFA is discussing, and not what I asked.

I thought there were major compatibility problems with the VS98/VB6 IDE on Windows 7 and Windows 8 (caveat: I heard this from a large desktop consultancy that were brought in to provide new systems for a large organisation - I haven't validated it myself). If so, won't this stop you developing once XP is unsupported, unless you want to be developing using an un-patched OS? I'm genuinely interested in your strategy going forward, as a friend maintains a VB6 application that is going to be a nightmare to port to VB.NET, so it might as well be rewritten in something else.

My attitude was that I had 4 years to learn enough to be in a position where I could start to learn how to work on a reasonable system. 12 years on and I still feel like a rookie.

Maybe I should just give up and pick grapes instead?

For $99 a year you can publish to the app store for a year, so you can give it to any number of people. After which the apps disappear of course. Boo.

I have owned both (and used a number of ICS devices) and feel far more comfortable in iOS. Maybe that is familiarity, but most of it is fluidity. I have to use crappy Windows and Linux environments all day. Something that feels more fluid, consistent, and integrated is most welcome when I finish work and am reunited with my mobile devices.

I actually find it works quite well (caveat: I have a 1920x1080 and 1280x1200 monitor side by side at work).. You can have two source files open side by side just fine along with other auxiliary views. Sure, 1920x1200 would be nice, but its ok.

That said, I've got a 2048x1152 monitor at home, and the extra height comes in useful from time to time, Not sure I could justify spending another 300 quid for an extra 48 pixels though.