AWS Porting Assistant Moves VB.NET Apps to .NET Core

AWS (Amazon Web Services)

VB.NET is a Windows-only technology. So, moving these applications to other platforms can be difficult. But Amazon has come to the rescue with its new AWS Porting Assistant.

Over the years a lot of businesses have developed all sorts of applications in VB.NET. And today, many of them are looking for ways to modernize these applications – sometimes moving them into containers or to other platforms like Linux.

AWS Porting Assistant comes to the rescue

The new AWS Porting Assistant for .NET supports assessment and porting of legacy VB.NET applications to .NET Core. Although widely used, VB.NET only runs on Windows. While the newer .NET Core is supported on both Windows and Linux.

The AWS Porting Assistant for .NET translates VB.NET class libraries, web APIs, and console applications to .NET Core 3.1, .NET 5, or .NET 6 applications.

Install the AWS Porting Assistant for VBNet
Install the AWS Porting Assistant for VB.Net

The Porting Assistant for .NET is an open source analysis tool that reduces the manual effort of porting VB.NET applications. There are two versions of the assistant.

  1. There is a standalone tool that runs from the command line.
  2. And the Porting Assistant for .NET Visual Studio IDE extension.

Like you might guess, the Porting Assistant for .NET Visual Studio IDE extension makes it possible to use the Porting Assistant for .NET functionality from within Visual Studio. The assistant scans .NET projects, analyzes the source code and package dependencies, and generates an assessment report that highlights incompatible APIs and packages.

It provides replacement suggestions for incompatible packages and APIs. It also notifies you if an application is using unsupported components that cannot be easily replaced by .NET Core on Linux components.

You can download the Porting Assistant for .NET at Install Porting Assistant for .NET. And you can start a compatibility assessment using the Application-level assessment option. The AWS Porting Assistant for .NET is available at no cost. There’s also a Porting Assistant for .NET Core that you might like to check out.