If you are prepared to put in the effort to learn C#, the language is maintained as an ANSI standard so will be stable and around for a long time to come. It's also quite a good thing to have on your CV.
Matlab is the language that most professional quants use. It has an expensive license ($2K?) but it is very easy to use and very powerful. One line of Matlab equals some 5 lines of C# or other related language.
For your situation use what you are already familiar with - VB .net would be easiest. ,Net really is not that difficult nor complex: anyone can pick it up using a basic inroductory book as a guide. Much of it is similar to the VB6 incarnation so it will at least be familiar as will the $soft system technologies. As others have said, C# is what $soft wants you to use and at some point they will most likely stop supporting any type of VB language.
I've been programming since '76. Not saying that I'm an expert, just that I've been doing it a while and I have experience with many languages. IMHO, like others have said, just use what you are most familiar with. This will give you a head start, and time is money. Would C++ or Python make a better autotrade system? "Better" is subjective, but I believe you could make a great system with those languages. It could be, depending on the programmer's skill, fast, tight, reliable, have very efficient memory usage, etc. That being said, I'm pretty sure it would take longer for you than using the VB languages. And the truth is, you can make a very reliable and profitable autotrader in VB. I've been using one everyday for years. And after you get it running well, nothing is stopping you from working on an upgraded version in whatever language is the latest and greatest at that time. Good luck.
Hi H2O: You're getting pretty bad advise here friom totally blind people. M$ revamped it's old VB and brought out its C# jave-clone some years ago with the .NET circus. These are two old hat go nowhere languages. Somebody mentioned Perl which is indeed an amazing language. If you look for super languages, go for Python - also Ruby. If you search ET, you'll find a lot of discussions about this. Of all the VB & C# lovers, not a single one pointed out that Microsoft RELEASED a PYTHON VERSION only about a week ago. Must have its reason: C# and VB are no match for it. M$ knows this very well and they are in fact buying some insurance for the future. They definitely prefer to see M$ sheep continue using their "lock-in" C# and VB though. http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdntv/transcripts/20051110PythonJHTranscript.aspx http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...26-E689-4F7F-859B-FEC6DACF3AE8&displaylang=en Hope this helps. Good luck. nononsense PS: you are not obliged to go M$ if you chose Python. (Much better can be found). You can go any place you want, for free. Can't do this with either C# or VB. You keep on paying dearly for life. Obsolescence built in.
I'd strongly recommend you go for C# and Python. They both can serve a wide range of requirements, are easy for a diligent beginner to get proficient in and nononsense has discovered, ironpython is now available to bring you the best of both worlds - python's great immediacy, simplicity and clarity plus the power of easy access to the dotnet framework. Together they offer two different approaches and are well designed modern languages with much to recommend them. I'd recommend Jesse Liberty's book to get you started on C#.
You simply must ignore the nonsense from nononsense. His diatribe is typical of those found on Slashdot that have more ferver for creating arguments than actual work. It's further obvious that you use the hopelessly trite M$ to represent their name. Grow up. If you want to develop any level of affluence in the developer world you'd be far better off working with .NET. To suggest Python, Ruby (???), or Perl shows lack of experience more than anything else. They are all fine languages in their own right, but to blindly suggest any one over the other is pure ignorance. As a professional developer with experience in projects from 100k to 100M I'd be laughed out of the enterprise with such childish remarks. Do yourself a favor: Learn .NET. If you find that it's something you actually enjoy you'll have an actual opportunity at finding projects. If you want *real* answers about what .NET is, or what it isn't, then please feel free to PM me. Listening to ignorants like nononsense will only serve to confuse you, and if following their advice you'll find yourself perpetuating language wars on forums rather than actually working. Regards.
I don't think you can go wrong with either VB or C#. I am about to jump in and learn C# here for some automation I've been wanting to do, so I will be eating my own dogfood, as they say. (I've done a few projects in VB.NET already though.) Would also recommend you ignore nononsense.
VB6 is *hardly* obsolete. There is no need to get the ferrari when the Lada will do just fine. I don't understand the fascination to have the latest and greatest releases as soon as M$FT drop kicks them out to the public. Give it time. Multi-threading? Focus on implementing the system simply...then once it's running and making $, you have the luxury of focusing on upgrades.
Or maybe it is so new that we didn't know about it yet? But the conspiracy version sounds better I guess. You can use C# for free and there is a Linux version.