A PROGRAMMER'S INTRODUCTION TO VISUAL BASIC.NET

By A. JANIK

CONTENTS INTRODUCTION WHY SHOULD YOU MOVE TO VISUAL BASIC NET? VISUAL BASIC NET: A NEW FRAMEWORK THE COMMON LANGUAGE RUNTIME MANAGED EXECUTION MICROSOFT INTERMEDIATE LANGUAGE (MSIL) THE JUST-IN-TIME COMPILER EXECUTING CODE ASSEMBLIES THE COMMON TYPE SYSTEM CLASSES INTERFACES VALUE TYPES DELEGATES THE NET FRAMEWORK CLASS LIBRARY SELF-DESCRIBING COMPONENTS CROSS-LANGUAGE INTEROPERABILITY THE CATCH SECURITY CODE ACCESS SECURITY (CAS) ROLE-BASED SECURITY SUMMARY YOUR FIRST VB NET APPLICATION THE START PAGE CREATING A NEW PROJECT EXAMINING THE IDE CREATING YOUR FIRST VB NET APPLICATION WINDOWS APPLICATION ENHANCEMENTS RESIZING CONTROLS AUTOMATICALLY ANCHORING CONTROLS TO THE FORM EDGES EASIER MENUS SETTING TAB ORDER LINE AND SHAPE CONTROLS: YOU’RE OUTTA HERE FORM OPACITY MAJOR VB NET CHANGES GENERAL CHANGES DEFAULT PROPERTIES SUBS AND FUNCTIONS REQUIRE PARENTHESES CHANGES TO BOOLEAN OPERATORS DECLARATION CHANGES SUPPORT FOR NEW ASSIGNMENT OPERATORS BYVAL IS NOW THE DEFAULT BLOCK-LEVEL SCOPE WHILEWEND BECOMES WHILEEND WHILE PROCEDURE CHANGES ARRAY CHANGES OPTION STRICT DATA TYPE CHANGES STRUCTURED ERROR HANDLING STRUCTURES REPLACE UDTS IDE CHANGES NEW ITEMS CONSTRUCTORS AND DESTRUCTORS NAMESPACES INHERITANCE OVERLOADING FREE THREADING GARBAGE COLLECTION BUILDING CLASSES AND ASSEMBLIES WITH VB NET CREATING YOUR FIRST CLASS LIBRARY ADDING A “SOUPED-UP” CLASS CREATING PROPERTIES BUILDING A TEST CLIENT READ-ONLY AND WRITE-ONLY PROPERTIES PARAMETERIZED PROPERTIES CONSTRUCTORS IN YOUR CLASSES CLASSES WITHOUT CONSTRUCTORS ADDING METHODS TO CLASSES ADDING EVENTS THE “FINAL” CODE COMPILING THE ASSEMBLY REUSING THE ASSEMBLY IN OTHER APPLICATIONS HOW NET LOCATES ASSEMBLIES INHERITANCE WITH VB NET WHAT IS INHERITANCE? INTERFACE INHERITANCE IN VB6 VB NET’S IMPLEMENTATION INHERITANCE A QUICK INHERITANCE EXAMPLE SHARED MEMBERS INHERITANCE KEYWORDS FORCING OR PREVENTING INHERITANCE OVERRIDING PROPERTIES AND METHODS POLYMORPHISM POLYMORPHISM WITH INHERITANCE POLYMORPHISM WITH INTERFACES WHEN TO USE AND WHEN NOT TO USE INHERITANCE DATABASE ACCESS WITH VB NET AND ADO NET ACCESSING A DATABASE FROM A WINDOWS APPLICATION USING THE DATAADAPTER CONFIGURATION WIZARD ADO NET ABOUT ADO NET DATASETS WORKING WITH THE ADO NET OBJECTS XML INTEGRATION THE XML DESIGNER BUILDING WEB APPLICATIONS WITH VB NET AND ASP NET YOUR FIRST ASP NET APPLICATION HOW ASP NET WORKS WEB PAGES AND CODE SERVER CONTROLS VALIDATION CONTROLS DATA BINDING HANDLING RE-ENTRANT PAGES BUILDING WEB SERVICES WITH VB NET CREATING YOUR FIRST WEB SERVICE TESTING THE WEB SERVICE CREATING A WEB SERVICE CLIENT HOW WEB SERVICES WORK AND YOU THOUGHT DISCO WAS DEAD ACCESSING WEB SERVICES BUILDING WINDOWS SERVICES WITH VB NET CREATING YOUR FIRST WINDOWS SERVICES PROJECT ADDING INSTALLERS TO YOUR SERVICE CONFIGURING YOUR SERVICE UNDERSTANDING WINDOWS SERVICES SERVICE LIFETIME AND EVENTS DEBUGGING YOUR SERVICE UPGRADING VB6 PROJECTS TO VB NET UPGRADING YOUR FIRST VB6 APPLICATION THE VISUAL BASIC UPGRADE WIZARD EXAMINING THE UPGRADED FORMS AND CODE MODIFICATIONS DIFFERENCES IN FORM CODE THE VISUAL BASIC COMPATIBILITY LIBRARY THE UPGRADE PROCESS LEARN VB NET PICK A SMALL PROJECT AND MAKE SURE THAT IT WORKS UPGRADE THE PROJECT AND EXAMINE THE UPGRADE REPORT FIX ANY OUTSTANDING ITEMS IN VB NET HELPING YOUR VB6 APPLICATIONS UPGRADE DO NOT USE LATE BINDING SPECIFY DEFAULT PROPERTIES USE ZERO-BOUND ARRAYS EXAMINE API CALLS FORM AND CONTROL CHANGES A THE COMMON LANGUAGE SPECIFICATION WHAT IS THE COMMON LANGUAGE SPECIFICATION? VB NET DATA TYPES AND THE CLS WHY SHOULD YOU MOVE TO VISUAL BASIC NET? ONE OF THE MOST COMMON QUESTIONS TODAY IS, “WHY SHOULD I MOVE TO NET?” NET IS NEW, AND THERE ARE MANY QUESTIONS ABOUT WHAT IT CAN DO FOR YOU FROM A VISUAL BASIC STANDPOINT, IT’S IMPORTANT TO UNDERSTAND SOME OF THE DRAMATIC BENEFITS THAT CAN BE ACHIEVED BY MOVING TO VB NET VISUAL BASIC NET: A NEW FRAMEWORK MANY PEOPLE HAVE LOOKED AT VB NET AND GRUMBLED ABOUT THE CHANGES THERE ARE SIGNIFICANT CHANGES TO THE LANGUAGE: A NEW OPTIONAL ERROR HANDLING STRUCTURE, NAMESPACES, TRUE INHERI- TANCE, FREE THREADING, AND MANY OTHERS SOME SEE THESE CHANGES AS MERELY A WAY THAT MICROSOFT CAN PLACE A CHECK MARK NEXT TO A CERTAIN FEATURE AND BE ABLE TO SAY, “YEAH, WE DO THAT ” HOWEVER, THERE ARE GOOD REASONS FOR THE CHANGES IN VB NET THE WORLD OF APPLICATIONS IS CHANGING THIS IS MERELY A CON- TINUATION OF WHAT HAS OCCURRED OVER THE PAST SEVERAL YEARS IF YOU TOOK A VISUAL BASIC 1 0 DEVELOPER AND SHOWED HIM AN N- TIER APPLICATION WITH AN ASP FRONT END, A VB COM COMPO- NENT MIDDLE TIER, AND A SQL SERVER BACK END FULL OF STORED PROCEDURES, IT WOULD LOOK QUITE ALIEN TO HIM YET, OVER THE PAST FEW YEARS, THE VAST MAJORITY OF DEVELOPERS HAVE BEEN USING VISUAL BASIC TO CREATE COM COMPONENTS, AND THEY HAVE C H A P T E R