Beginning Visual Basic 2010 E-Book

Thearon Willis

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Wissenschaft und neue Technologien
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2011

Beschreibung

Visual Basic 2010 offers a great deal of functionality in both tools and language. No one book could ever cover Visual Basic 2010 in its entirety—you would need a library of books. What this book aims to do is to get you started as quickly and easily as possible. It shows you the roadmap, so to speak, of what there is and where to go. Once we've taught you the basics of creating working applications (creating the windows and controls, how your code should handle unexpected events, what object-oriented programming is, how to use it in your applications, and so on) we’ll show you some of the areas you might want to try your hand at next.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

About the Authors

About the Technical Editor

Credits

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Whom This Book Is For

What This Book Covers

What You Need to Use This Book

Conventions

Source Code

Errata

p2p.wrox.com

Chapter 1: Welcome to Visual Basic 2010

Event-Driven Programming

Installing Visual Basic 2010

The Visual Studio 2010 IDE

Creating a Simple Application

Using the Help System

Summary

Chapter 2: The Microsoft .NET Framework

Microsoft's Reliance on Windows

Writing Software for Windows

Common Language Runtime

The Common Type System and Common Language Specification

Summary

Chapter 3: Writing Software

Information and Data

Working with Variables

Comments and Whitespace

Data Types

Storing Variables

Methods

Summary

Chapter 4: Controlling the Flow

Making Decisions

The If Statement

Select Case

Loops

Summary

Chapter 5: Working with Data Structures

Understanding Arrays

Understanding Enumerations

Understanding Constants

Structures

Working with ArrayLists

Working with Collections

Building Lookup Tables with Hashtable

Advanced Array Manipulation

Summary

Chapter 6: Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML)

What Is XAML?

XAML Syntax

Windows Presentation Foundation

Summary

Chapter 7: Building Windows Applications

Responding to Events

Building a Simple Application

Counting Characters

Counting Words

Creating More Complex Applications

Creating the Toolbar

Creating the Status Bar

Creating an Edit Box

Clearing the Edit Box

Responding to Toolbar Buttons

Using Multiple Forms

Summary

Chapter 8: Displaying Dialog Boxes

The MessageBox

The OpenFileDialog Control

The SaveDialog Control

The FontDialog Control

The ColorDialog Control

The PrintDialog Control

The FolderBrowserDialog Control

Summary

Chapter 9: Creating Menus

Understanding Menu Features

Creating Menus

Context Menus

Summary

Chapter 10: Debugging and Error Handling

Major Error Types

Debugging

Error Handling

Summary

Chapter 11: Building Objects

Understanding Objects

Building Classes

Reusability

Designing an Object

Constructors

Inheritance

Objects and Structures

The Framework Classes

Summary

Chapter 12: Advanced Object-Oriented Techniques

Building a Favorites Viewer

An Alternative Favorite Viewer

Using Shared Properties and Methods

Understanding Object-Oriented Programming and Memory Management

Summary

Chapter 13: Building Class Libraries

Understanding Class Libraries

Using Strong Names

Registering Assemblies

Designing Class Libraries

Using Third-Party Class Libraries

Viewing Classes with the Object Browser

Summary

Chapter 14: Creating Windows Forms User Controls

Windows Forms Controls

Creating and Testing a User Control

Exposing Properties from User Controls

Design Time or Runtime

Creating a Command Link Control

Summary

Chapter 15: Accessing Databases

What Is a Database?

The SQL SELECT Statement

Queries in Access

Data Access Components and Controls

Data Binding

Summary

Chapter 16: Database Programming with SQL Server and ADO.NET

ADO.NET

The ADO.NET Classes in Action

Data Binding

Summary

Chapter 17: Dynamic Data Web Site

Creating a Dynamic Data Linq to SQL Web Site

Summary

Chapter 18: ASP.NET

Thin-Client Architecture

Web Forms versus Windows Forms

Web Applications: The Basic Pieces

Active Server Pages

Building Web Sites

Summary

Chapter 19: Visual Basic 2010 and XML

Understanding XML

The Address Book Project

Integrating with the Address Book Application

Summary

Chapter 20: Deploying Your Application

What Is Deployment?

Creating a Visual Studio 2010 Setup Application

User Interface Editor

Deploying Different Solutions

Summary

Appendix A: Exercise Solutions

Chapter 1

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Appendix B: Where to Now?

Online Resources

Offline Resources (Books)

Index

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Beginning Microsoft® Visual Basic 2010

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Copyright © 2010 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana

Published simultaneously in Canada

ISBN: 978-0-470-50222-8

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For my daughter, Stephanie, my most precious gift from God.

For Wendy, my wife and friend in Christ

—Thearon

For my wife Jennifer and daughter Katelyn.

—Bryan

About the Authors

THEARON WILLIS currently works as a senior developer and develops Windows applications and add-ins for Microsoft Office products using Microsoft Visual Basic .NET. Over the years, Thearon has worked on a variety of systems from mainframe to client-server development.

BRYAN NEWSOME leads a team of lead developers specializing in Microsoft solutions. Since starting his career building Visual Basic 5 solutions, he has embraced each new version Visual Basic and now creates all new solutions leveraging the .NET platform and VB.NET. He provides clients with solutions and mentoring on leading edge Microsoft technologies. For VB.NET, Bryan is a Microsoft Certified Application Developer.

About the Technical Editor

DAMIEN FOGGON is a developer, writer, and technical reviewer in cutting-edge technologies and has contributed to more than 50 books on .NET, C#, Visual Basic, and ASP.NET. He is a multiple MCPD in .NET 2.0 and .NET 3.5 and can be found online at http://blog.littlepond.co.uk.

Credits

Acquisitions Editor

Paul Reese

Project Editor

Maureen Spears

Technical Editor

Damien Foggon

Production Editor

Eric Charbonneau

Copy Editor

Luann Rouff

Editorial Director

Robyn B. Siesky

Editorial Manager

Mary Beth Wakefield

Marketing Manager

David Mayhew

Production Manager

Tim Tate

Vice President and Executive Group Publisher

Richard Swadley

Vice President and Executive Publisher

Barry Pruett

Associate Publisher

Jim Minatel

Project Coordinator, Cover

Lynsey Stanford

Proofreader

Jen Larsen, Word One

Indexer

Johnna VanHoose Dinse

Cover Image

© biffspandex/istockphoto

Acknowledgments

First and Foremost I Want to thank God for giving me the wisdom and knowledge to share with others and for the many talents that he has blessed me with. I would also like to thank all the people at Wiley who work so hard to bring this book to market. I'd be remiss if I didn't thank my good friend and co-author Bryan Newsome; thanks for your hard work and dedication.

—Thearon

Thanks to Everyone at Wiley who worked so hard to get this book on the shelves. Special thanks to Maureen Spears who went above and beyond to help me finish my review on schedule. Of course, thanks goes out to Thearon Willis for completing one more edition.

—Bryan

Introduction

Visual Basic 2010 is Microsoft's latest version of the highly popular Visual Basic .NET programming language, one of the many languages supported in Visual Studio 2010. Visual Basic 2010's strength lies in its ease of use and the speed at which you can create Windows Forms applications, WPF Windows applications, Web applications, WPF Browser applications, mobile device applications, and Web Services.

In this book, we introduce you to programming with Visual Basic 2010 and show you how to create these types of applications and services. Along the way you'll also learn about object-oriented techniques and learn how to create your own business objects and Windows controls.

Microsoft's .NET Framework provides Visual Basic 2010 programmers with the capability to create full object-oriented programs, just like the ones created using C# or C++. The .NET Framework provides a set of base classes that are common to all programming languages in Visual Studio 2010, which provides you with the same capability to create object-oriented programs as a programmer using C# or C++.

This book will give you a thorough grounding in the basics of programming using Visual Basic 2010; from there the world is your oyster.

Whom This Book Is For

This book is designed to teach you how to write useful programs in Visual Basic 2010 as quickly and easily as possible.

There are two kinds of beginners for whom this book is ideal:

You're a beginner to programming and you've chosen Visual Basic 2010 as the place to start. That's a great choice! Visual Basic 2010 is not only easy to learn, it's also fun to use and very powerful.You can program in another language but you're a beginner to .NET programming. Again, you've made a great choice! Whether you've come from Fortran or Visual Basic 6, you'll find that this book quickly gets you up to speed on what you need to know to get the most from Visual Basic 2010.

What This Book Covers

Visual Basic 2010 offers a great deal of functionality in both tools and language. No one book could ever cover Visual Basic 2010 in its entirety—you would need a library of books. What this book aims to do is to get you started as quickly and easily as possible. It shows you the roadmap, so to speak, of what there is and where to go. Once we've taught you the basics of creating working applications (creating the windows and controls, how your code should handle unexpected events, what object-oriented programming is, how to use it in your applications, and so on) we'll show you some of the areas you might want to try your hand at next:

Chapters 1 through 9 provide an introduction to Visual Studio 2010 and Windows programming.Chapter 6 provides an introduction to XAML and Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) programming.Chapter 10 provides an introduction to application debugging and error handling.Chapters 11 through 13 provide an introduction to object-oriented programming and building objects.Chapter 14 provides an introduction to creating Windows Forms user controls.Chapters 15 and 16 provide an introduction to programming with databases and covers Access, SQL Server, and ADO.NET.Chapters 17 and 18 provide an introduction to Dynamic Data Web Sites and ASP.NET and show you how to write applications for the Web.Chapter 19 provides a brief introduction to XML, a powerful tool for integrating your applications with others—regardless of the language they were written in.Chapter 20 introduces you to deploying applications using ClickOnce technology.

What You Need to Use This Book

Apart from a willingness to learn, all you'll need for the first 15 chapters are a PC running Windows 7 (preferred), or Windows Vista, Windows XP (Home or Professional Edition), Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2003; Internet Explorer; and of course:

Microsoft Visual Basic 2010 Professional Edition

or

Microsoft Visual Basic 2010 Premium Edition

or

Microsoft Visual Basic 2010 Ultimate Edition

or

Microsoft Visual Basic 2010 Team Edition

Conventions

To help you get the most from the text and keep track of what's happening, we've used a number of conventions throughout the book.

Try It Out

The Try It Out is an exercise you should work through, following the text in the book.

1. They usually consist of a set of steps.

2. Each step has a number.

3. Follow the steps through with your copy of the database.

How It Works

After each Try It Out, the code you've typed will be explained in detail.

Boxes like this one hold important, not-to-be forgotten information that is directly relevant to the surrounding text.

Tips, hints, tricks, and asides to the current discussion look like this.

As for other conventions in the text:

New terms and important words are highlighted in italics when first introduced.Keyboard combinations are treated like this: Ctrl+R.Filenames, URLs, and code within the text are treated like so: persistence.properties.

This book uses monofont type with no highlighting for most code examples.

This book uses bolding to emphasize code that is of particular importance in thepresent context.

Source Code

As you work through the examples in this book, you may choose either to type in all the code manually or to use the source-code files that accompany the book. All of the source code used in this book is available for download at www.wrox.com. Once at the site, simply locate the book's title (either by using the Search box or by using one of the title lists) and click the Download Code link on the book's detail page to obtain all the source code for the book.

Because many books have similar titles, you may find it easiest to search by ISBN; this book's ISBN is 978-0-470-50222-8.

Once you download the code, just decompress it with your favorite compression tool. Alternately, you can go to the main Wrox code download page at www.wrox.com/dynamic/books/download.aspx to see the code available for this book and all other Wrox books.

Errata

We make every effort to ensure that there are no errors in the text or in the code. However, no one is perfect, and mistakes do occur. If you find an error in one of our books, like a spelling mistake or faulty piece of code, we would be very grateful for your feedback. By sending in errata, you may save another reader hours of frustration, and at the same time you will be helping us provide even higher-quality information.

To find the errata page for this book, go to www.wrox.com and locate the title using the Search box or one of the title lists. Then, on the book details page, click the Book Errata link. On this page you can view all errata that have been submitted for this book and posted by Wrox editors. A complete book list, including links to each book's errata, is also available at www.wrox.com/misc-pages/booklist.shtml.

If you don't spot “your” error on the Book Errata page, go to www.wrox.com/contact/techsupport.shtml and complete the form there to send us the error you have found. We'll check the information and, if appropriate, post a message to the book's errata page and fix the problem in subsequent editions of the book.

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At http://p2p.wrox.com you will find a number of different forums that will help you not only as you read this book, but also as you develop your own applications. To join the forums, just follow these steps:

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Chapter 1

Welcome to Visual Basic 2010

What You Will Learn in this Chapter

Using event-driven programmingInstalling Visual Basic 2010A tour of the Visual Basic 2010 integrated development environment (IDE)Creating a simple Windows programUsing the integrated Help system

This is an exciting time to enter the world of programming with Visual Basic 2010 and Windows 7. Windows 7 represents the latest Windows operating system from Microsoft and is packed with a lot of new features to make Windows programming fun. Much has changed in the Windows user interface, and Visual Basic 2010 makes it easy to write professional-looking Windows applications as well as web applications and web services. Haven't upgraded to Windows 7 yet? No worries, Visual Basic 2010 also enables you to write professional-looking applications for previous versions of Windows as well.

The goal of this book is to help you use the Visual Basic 2010 programming language, even if you have never programmed before. You will start slowly and build on what you have learned in subsequent chapters. So take a deep breath, let it out slowly, and tell yourself you can do this. No sweat! No kidding!

Programming a computer is a lot like teaching a child to tie his shoes. Until you find the correct way of giving the instructions, not much is accomplished. Visual Basic 2010 is a language you can use to tell your computer how to do things; but, like a child, the computer will understand only if you explain things very clearly. If you have never programmed before, this sounds like an arduous task, and sometimes it can be. However, Visual Basic 2010 offers an easy-to-use language to explain some complex tasks. Although it never hurts to have an understanding of what is happening at the lowest levels, Visual Basic 2010 frees the programmer from having to deal with the mundane complexities of writing Windows applications. You are free to concentrate on solving real problems.

Visual Basic 2010 helps you create solutions that run on the Microsoft Windows operating systems, such as Windows 7, Windows Server 2008, and Windows Mobile 6.1. If you are looking at this book, you might have already felt the need or desire to create such programs. Even if you have never written a computer program before, as you progress through the Try It Out exercises in this book, you will become familiar with the various aspects of the Visual Basic 2010 language, as well as its foundations in the Microsoft .NET Framework. You will find that it is not nearly as difficult as you imagined. Before you know it, you will feel quite comfortable creating a variety of different types of programs with Visual Basic 2010.

Visual Basic 2010 can also be used to create web applications and web services, as well as mobile applications that can run on Pocket PCs or smartphones. However, you will begin by focusing on Windows applications before extending your boundaries to other platforms.

Event-Driven Programming

A Windows program is quite different from yesteryear's MS-DOS program. A DOS program follows a relatively strict path from beginning to end. Although this does not necessarily limit the functionality of the program, it does limit the road the user has to take to get to it. A DOS program is like walking down a hallway; to get to the end you have to walk down the entire hallway, passing any obstacles that you may encounter. A DOS program would only let you open certain doors along your stroll.

Windows, on the other hand, opened up the world of event-driven programming. Events in this context include clicking a button, resizing a window, or changing an entry in a text box. The code that you write responds to these events. In terms of the hallway analogy: In a Windows program, to get to the end of the hall you just click the end of the hall. The hallway itself can be ignored. If you get to the end and realize that is not where you wanted to be, you can just set off for the new destination without returning to your starting point. The program reacts to your movements and takes the necessary actions to complete your desired tasks.

Another big advantage in a Windows program is the abstraction of the hardware, which means that Windows takes care of communicating with the hardware for you. You do not need to know the inner workings of every laser printer on the market just to create output. You do not need to study the schematics for graphics cards to write your own game. Windows wraps up this functionality by providing generic routines that communicate with the drivers written by hardware manufacturers. This is probably the main reason why Windows has been so successful. The generic routines are referred to as the Windows , and most of the classes in the .NET Framework take care of communicating with those APIs.