Visual Age C++ to MS VC++ conversion issues?

Hi all,

I have a set of desktop applications which are running in OS/2 environment to migrate to WinXP environment.

A lot of the code is in IBM Visual Age C++. IBM has discontinued the support for it on Windows.

One option is: convert all this code to MS VC++.

Other option is: let the code be compiled on NT with an old compiler and take the objects to XP and hope that everything runs (may be with a few alterations).

My take is that converting to MS VC++ right away is the most sensible thing. But the guy who is going to pay the money feels that it might be easier to just stick with VAC++.

Anyway, so the question is:

What could be the potential issues involved in both the options?

Any inputs would be appreciated.

TIA.

If the compiler/language is going out of date, I recommend upgrading to something like Visual C++ .NET. You dont want to have to worry about having support problems on newer systems.

IF your code is ANSI-compliant C++, you should be OK porting to VC++ .

Problem is not with non ANSI coding.

Since these are desktop application, a lot of code is screen based visual code. Which uses built-in libraries provided by IBM Visual Age.

Now that support for VAC++ on windows has been discontinued, such libraries/DLLs are better not used since they too are not supported anymore.

Converting to MS VC++ means using MFC classes (for instance) instead of VAC++ classes. For which there is no direct mapping (of course). The effort could be large. Or it could be simple, provided there is a conversion strategy about which I don't know.

If you can put in any inputs, it would be great.

TIA.