Visual Basic Essentials

Microsoft .NET is an advance in programming technology that greatly simplifies application development, both for traditional, proprietary applications and for the emerging paradigm of Web-based services. .NET is a complete restructuring of Microsoft's entire system infrastructure and represents a major learning challenge for programmers developing applications on Microsoft platforms.

This two-day intensive course is designed for the experienced programmer to help you quickly come up to speed on the Visual Basic language. It is current to Visual Studio 2012 and .NET 4.5, which continues the introduction of new features in the language, making Visual Basic increasingly parallel to C#.

This course concisely covers the essentials of .NET programming using Microsoft's Visual Basic programming language. It starts with a brief chapter, ".NET: What You Need to Know," which gets you up and running in the .NET environment with a minimum of fuss. The next two chapters cover Visual Basic language essentials and object-oriented programming in Visual Basic. The next chapter discusses how Visual Basic relates to the .NET Framework. The following chapter covers delegates and events. The course includes a succinct introduction to creating GUI programs using Windows Forms. The course concludes with a chapter covering newer features in Visual Basic. These include iterators and keywords to support asynchronous programming using the Task class, which were introduced in Visual Basic 2012. An appendix provides a tutorial on Visual Studio 2012.

The course is practical, with many example programs and a progressively developed case study. The goal is to quickly bring you up to speed in writing Visual Basic programs. The student will receive a comprehensive set of materials, including course notes and all the programming examples.

• The student should be an experienced application developer or architect. Some background in object-oriented programming would be helpful.

• Acquire a working knowledge of Visual Basic programming
• Learn about important interactions between Visual Basic and the .NET Framework
• Learn how to implement simple GUI programs using Windows Forms
• Gain a working knowledge of auto-implemented properties, local type inference, object initializers, anonymous types, extension methods, collection initializers, LINQ, iterators, async keywords, and other newer features in Visual Basic

• 1. NET: What You Need to Know
  • .NET Executables and the CLR
  • A .NET Testbed for Visual Basic Programming
  • Visual Studio 2012

• 2. Visual Basic for the Sophisticated Programmer
  • First Visual Basic Console Application
  • Namespaces
  • Data Types
  • Conversions
  • Control Structures
  • Subroutines and Functions
  • Strings
  • Arrays
  • Console I/O
  • Formatting
  • Exception Handling

• 3. Object-Oriented Programming in Visual Basic
  • Classes
  • Access Control
  • Methods and Properties
  • Auto-Implemented Properties
  • Shared Data and Methods
  • Inheritance
  • Overriding Methods
  • Polymorphism
  • Operator Overloading

• 4. Visual Basic and the .NET Framework
  • Components
  • Interfaces
  • System.Object
  • .NET and COM
  • Collections
  • IEnumerable and IEnumerator
  • Copy Semantics in Visual Basic
  • Generic Types
  • Type-Safe Collections

• 5. Delegates and Events
  • Delegates
  • Random Number Generation
  • Events

• 6. Introduction to Windows Forms
  • Creating Windows Applications Using Visual Studio 2012
  • Partial Classes
  • Buttons, Labels and Textboxes
  • Handling Events
  • Listbox Controls

• 7. Newer Features in Visual Basic
  • Local Type Inference
  • Object Initializers
  • Array Initializers
  • Anonymous Types
  • Partial Methods
  • Extension Methods
  • Collection Initializers
  • Variance in Generic Interfaces
  • Language Integrated Query (LINQ)
  • Iterators
  • Asynchronous Programming Keywords
  • Appendix A. Using Visual Studio 2012
  • Overview of Visual Studio 2012
  • Creating a Console Application
  • Project Configurations
  • Debugging
  • Multiple-Project Solutions
  • Appendix B. Learning Resources

Course examples require Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 and Windows 7 or higher. See the appropriate course Setup Guide for details.

A good minimal hardware profile for this course consists of a 2 GHz or better CPU, 1 GB of RAM, and at least 10 GB of free disk space for tools installation and courseware.