Beginning Visual Basic 6 [Illustrated] [Paperback]

Peter Wright (Author)

Book Description

Series: Beginning | Publication Date: June 1998

Visual Basic 6 is the powerful new version of Visual Basic, which you will master in no time with this book. By using lots of hands on examples and hundreds of screenshots, this book will act as a roadmap for you to learn Viusal Basic programming. It will take you on a comprehensive and fun tour of everything you want to know about programming in VB - from your first programs through to ActiveX controls, graphics, and the important new ADO database tools. At the end of the book you will even be ready to look at some professional programs and case studies. All this will add up to a lot of fun as you build a solid foundation for your own future career as a professional VB programmer.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

If you have no Visual Basic experience but have a desire to learn about the language, you'll find Peter Wright's Beginning Visual Basic 6 useful. Furthermore, you'll find it useful for more than a week--the author covers advanced problems as well as language fundamentals. He begins with some introductory information about the development environment's interface and moves on to key aspects of the language, such as graphical controls, variables, arrays, loops, and other control structures. The book then explores different kinds of resources, one at a time, before ending with a series of case studies.

Throughout, Wright's style is clear and informed. He often inserts a program's source code into his commentary and then proceeds to examine it in depth. This Talmudic approach proves quite enlightening. His examples aren't overly academic, either. For example, you'll find a database-aware program to manage a library's collection in the text. Indeed, database programming--the bread and butter of professional Visual Basic programmers--is covered very well.

Coverage of ActiveX control creation, one of Visual Basic 6's most important features, isn't as lavish as that of other topics, but real-life Visual Basic development still focuses on stand-alone applications, after all. --David Wall

From the Publisher

Online discussion of the topics in this book available at Wrox's P2P site

Wrox Beginning Guides are fast, entertaining and realistic. They cover an immense scope of material by getting straight to the point. All learning is practical and hands on, using the high bandwidth absorption of detail that only experimentation can deliver.

This book is suitable for entry level programmers who are ambitious and want to get all the way to professional techniques in a single step. Its pace and scope also make it ideal for programmers coming to VB for the first time, but who have used another, maybe older language.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 900 pages
• Publisher: Wrox Press (June 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1861001053
• ISBN-13: 978-1861001054
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 7.3 x 2.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (101 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,033,574 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

45 of 45 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great book, but not for the "total" beginner, May 15, 2000

By 

Stephen Britton "tech writer and web developer" (A quiet suburb outside NYC, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Beginning Visual Basic 6 (Paperback)

Peter Wright's writing style may not suit everyone but it worked for me. Unlike many learn-to-program books, Wright doesn't spend much time explaining theory. He briefly explains complex topics like variants, arrays, and classes in a few pages, and then jumps right into coding. From the first chapter to the last, he brings the reader through a series of hands-on tutorials, which is great if you like to get your feet wet immediately.

Personally, I like this style. I learned more by following the exercises and trouble shooting them than I have from other learn-to VB books that spend the first few chapters explaining theory and then walk you through a few tutorials. There was a couple times when I was pulling hair from my head trying to get the examples to work, but in the end I was able to figure everything out.

But I could see where someone who doesn't have any programming experience might have trouble with this book. I am a self-taught JavaScript and Perl programmer and have some basic understanding of programming, but I think if I picked this book up without this background, I would have been frustrated. If you are a complete beginner, you might want to consider another book that does a better job explaining the basics, and if you are the type who learns best by doing, this is the book to buy.

29 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Well worth your time, August 29, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Beginning Visual Basic 6 (Paperback)

After a couple of months I finally finished this book. I have to admit that there were some places I felt lost (object variables, creating your own objects, creating your own controls). However, I feel like I've gotten a good grasp on the VB6 language through this book. I decided to write a simple application to help me out at work and ended up spending an entire week on it and using nearly everything (except database access) that I had learned in this book - pay special attention to error handling. I didn't read it that closely and when time came to create my own program, I had to bone up on error handling big time. I take points off for the subject of writing and reading the registry missing from the lessons of the book. It *is* covered, in one of the case studies, however, but I would think nearly every application would need to write to the registry to save application settings. All in all, there are probably not many better books for the VB beginner out there. For the next level, I've been finding 'Expert Guide to VB 6' from Sybex to narrow the gap between beginner and advanced.

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I would like to give it more than 5 stars, March 12, 2001

By 

Soudamini M. Nath (Murrieta, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Beginning Visual Basic 6 (Paperback)

I have been trying to learn VB for the past couple of years. I have been looking for a book that will do just that. I am a mainframe programmer (cobol) and therefore I am new to this type of programming. I searched and bought several books on how to learn VB, learn VB in 21 days, learn VB step by step etc. But none of them really taught me VB. I was so confused with all those books. Most of the time the author (after the 3rd chapter) will assume that you have become an expert on the subject. So I will be lost after that. What many authors do not know, is to TEACH a person who DOES NOT know the subject. But Peter is a true teacher. Reading this book is like sitting in a class and following the teacher step by step. He takes the time to re-iterate subjects covered before so that we can re-enforce what we have learned so far. The book is Sooooo organized that by the time you are done with the book, you have learned the VB beginning (basics). Initially VB was like a puzzle thrown at me with no pictures to follow up. But, this book was like showing a picture so that we can put that puzzle together. It helped me a lot. Now I am working on Peter's another book (VB6 Objects). I have not finished it yet. But these books have given be a good head start on VB 6. Great job Peter!!