Hi-ho, all! My first post here; I hope I don't screw up.
So, I'm told everywhere that my best bet is to get Visual C++.
Now, I'm a mostly-newbie programmer (one college course in C a few years ago, learned a little more on my own, and have been teaching myself Visual Basic -- just what comes with MS Office 2000). I'm not looking to do this professionally in the forseeable future, I just like code, and playing around with making games, a-life simulations and miscellaneous cool apps, on a machine that's several years old.
Som Question: Since I'm unlikely to need anything cutting-edge, is there really any need, IYO, for me to get 6.0, when I could save a few bucks getting a secondhand 5.0? or even a 4.0? On the one hand, I don't want to waste money getting more than I'll need, on the other I don't want to waste it buying something I'll just have to replace soon. In what circumstanes would compatability issues arise?
Thanks
- Sean