Is C# proper choice for education software applications?

[visharad]

In my spare time provide online tuition to the students from different parts of the world for free. I teach them Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics, Statistics.
I want to develop some software applications, which will help the students learn the subjects better.
I am wondering what programming language to choose. I first thought of C#.
But, will the students like to have .Net runtime on their system? After all, the amount of diskspace required to install .Net runtime may be quite significant for students.
Are there some other factors, which may make .Net as correct or not correct choice for education software applications? Or should I implement in VB6.0 ?

[monalin]

C# is perfect to use honestly. It's a very powerful language with lots of resources and documentation available. Unless they're running some operating system other than Windows they will most likely have the .NET runtime installed and if they don't you can build your applications to package the .NET installation and when they install your application it will also install the .NET framework.

Development time for C# is very fast which may also be another huge factor for you. For any windows application that performance is not a huge issue C# is an excellent choice.

[Arjay]

In general you'll probably not want to choose a language (or more importantly, a development environment) that is 11 years old.

The language way not have changed, but in 11 years, the development environment has changed drammatically.

It's just easier to develop in a modern environment.

[dglienna]

You should be using WPF to develop forms, and you can't really do that with VB6. You can design an object with Expressions Blend, then import it into VS2008

You can use C#, VB.Net, F# or whatever .Net language that you want. Or, you can mix and match.

Plus, if the kids have any modern games installed, they already have the runtime. Printers have installed it for about 5 years.

[visharad]

Thanks to the responses. Most of them have Windows OS. Yes, I can package the .Net framework. It is just that I was wondering if the disk space will be an issue for them.
I mentioned VB6 because about 2 years a professor from New York contacted me. He wanted me to develop a software on statistical tests of hypothesis. I suggested C# but he insisted on VB6 and that too without any ActiveX. I implemented as he wanted. That is why I was wondering if there VB6 would be better choice for education software.

I have developed lots of applications in C# but very very few using WPF. It is just that whereever I have been employed, I did not get the requirement to use WPF. For my own learning purpose, I developed a few but they are very small,

The software will need to display equations, some of which should be editable at runtime. It will also need to display diagrams and even animations. Will WPF be advantageous for this purpose. Since the students are young, they would like to see some beautiful UI. I need to keep that also in mind. Will WPF really be advantageous in that case.

Since I mentioned beautiful UI, will using Flash be better for UI (at least some of the forms)? Or will WPF be better? I do not know how to make communication between C# and Flash, but if it is possible and if it will be advantageous, then I will find the way out. The option of using Flash came to my mind because I once attended an interview. After I had cleared all the tests and interviews, there was a meeting arranged between me and some of software developers there so that they could briefly tell me about the product they were working on and thus I could be fully ready when I formally joined there. (For some reason I did not join.) In the meeting they mentioned that they were using C# for some very small part of UI and they were using it mostly as backend. They said that they were using Adobe Flash as front end. When I asked the reason, they said that with Flash they could create rich and sexy(yes they used that word) UI. When I mentioned WPF, they said that Flash was much better choice.
That is why I am asking if am asking if Flash really be more advantageous?

[monalin]

If you use Expressions Blend to create your objects it will look almost exactly like flash but still have all the functionality of C# because you can export the controls you make in Expressions Blend right into VS 2008. WPF is incredible, it can do whatever you want animations, diagrams, its got all of it.

[Arjay]

Thanks to the responses. Most of them have Windows OS. Yes, I can package the .Net framework. It is just that I was wondering if the disk space will be an issue for them.
I mentioned VB6 because about 2 years a professor from New York contacted me. He wanted me to develop a software on statistical tests of hypothesis. I suggested C# but he insisted on VB6 and that too without any ActiveX. I implemented as he wanted. That is why I was wondering if there VB6 would be better choice for education software.

What was his reasons for insisting on VB6?

Will WPF be advantageous for this purpose. Since the students are young, they would like to see some beautiful UI. I need to keep that also in mind. Will WPF really be advantageous in that case.

Oh yeah.

[thomus07]

You are doing your work remotely.
Why not consider a thin client (web browser based app)?
No problems of installation, operating systems, run time.

Some are there already worked out for free for different needs like google documents, even a blog (you can restrict it's views to specific users).