The main documentation lives at .\doc\index.html

vb2Py Installation

Important If you installed v0.1, or the CVS version, prior to v0.2 please remove the old directories completely before installing v0.2. Changes in the package (in particular the renaming of vb2py.py) will causes problems. Sorry for the confusion!

• Main Installation_
• GUI Installation_
• Simpleparse Installation_
• mxTools Installation_
• PythonCard Installation_

vb2Py uses Python and has been tested on Python 2.2. Python 2.3 should work but earlier versions will not.

Main Installation
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

vb2Py is written in Python and runs on any platform which has a Python interpreter. The simplest way to install is through pip.

> pip install vb2py

Or, if you have downloaded the vb2py package, you will have a zip file. Before you can do anything you must have Python installed. After Python is installed you can install the vb2py modules by going to the directory you unzipped the files to and typing::

> python setup.py install

Now you should have a 'vb2py' folder in your Python site packages directory.

Note: You do not need VB to run the converter!

Command Line Usage

The easiest way to use vb2Py from the command line is by working in the vb2py directory in your Python site-packages location.

To check the basic usage from the command line::

> python converter.py -h

Two example projects should be installed in the folder, vb2py/vb/test1 and test2. To convert the test2 project (which is slightly more meaningful than test1!) to a PythonCard project, use the command::

> python converter.py -c vb/test/test2.vbp vb/test/test2

-c = convert the code also  
vb/test/test2.vbp = the VB project file for the project 
vb/test/test2 = the location of the generated Python files

The directory where the Python files will be put must exist before you run the conversion.

If you have PythonCard_ installed you can see what the forms look like by typing::

> python vb/test/test2/frmMain.py

You should see a form open with a lot of controls on it. Clicking on the controls should perform the same actions as for the VB version.

.. image:: images/sm_test2_frmmain_py.gif

See the full form_

For cases where you don't have a VB project file (*.vbp), you can still use the converter to convert individual files on at a time. The following command will convert the single code module in the test2 project::

> python converter.py -c -f vb/test/Utils.bas vb/test/test2

The code will be placed in the destination directory. Note that when doing file-by-file conversions certain parts of the conversion will not be possible. In particular, global variables will not be correctly handled since in order to determine the correct qualified name for a global, vb2Py needs to know all the files within the project.

For example, when converting an entire project the following code segment (where BASEDIR is defined in a module called FileGlobals)::

Function addBaseDirectory(Path as String)
    addBaseDirectory = BASEDIR & Path ' BASEDIR is a global
End Function

Would be converted to::

def addBaseDirectory(Path):
    _ret = FileGlobals.BASEDIR + Path
    return _ret

However, if the file is translated on its own (using the -f command line switch) then it would be converted to::