Microsoft® Visual Basic® .NET Step by Step--Version 2003 (Step by Step (Microsoft)) [Paperback]

Michael Halvorson (Author)

Book Description

Series: Step by Step (Microsoft) | Publication Date: April 23, 2003

Get on the fast track to professional application development with Visual Basic .NET 2003. This practical, hands-on tutorial expertly guides you through the fundamentals—using step-by-step exercises, code samples, optimization tips, and real-world advice to accelerate your productivity. Work at your own pace, learning core programming skills by selecting just the chapters and lessons you need. Upgrade your Visual Basic 6 applications quickly with the help of “Upgrade Notes” sidebars, a special upgrading index, and insights into the enhanced Visual Basic .NET Upgrade Wizard. It’s everything you need to start creating .NET-connected software now!

Discover how to:

• Create a compelling user interface with Toolbox controls, menus, and dialog boxes
• Use methods in the .NET Framework 1.1 class libraries
• Utilize the new debugging tools and structured error handlers to build robust code
• Manage data in your programs using collections, arrays, and string processing techniques
• Automate Microsoft Office applications and manage processes
• Manage Windows® Forms and create graphics and animation effects
• Use inheritance and other new object-oriented programming capabilities
• Write custom code for printers and dialog boxes for printing
• Manage Access databases and create custom database applications with Microsoft ADO.NET
• Display HTML documents using Microsoft Internet Explorer
• Use Web Forms to build Internet interfaces
• Deploy Visual Basic .NET applications
• Port Visual Basic 6 programs to Visual Basic .NET

CD features:

• Code examples in Visual Basic .NET 2003
• All the book’s practice files
• Fully searchable eBook

A Note Regarding the CD or DVD

The print version of this book ships with a CD or DVD. For those customers purchasing one of the digital formats in which this book is available, we are pleased to offer the CD/DVD content as a free download via O'Reilly Media's Digital Distribution services. To download this content, please visit O'Reilly's web site, search for the title of this book to find its catalog page, and click on the link below the cover image (Examples, Companion Content, or Practice Files). Note that while we provide as much of the media content as we are able via free download, we are sometimes limited by licensing restrictions. Please direct any questions or concerns to [e-mail].

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

For the several million developers using "traditional" Visual Basic 6, Microsoft Visual Basic .NET Step by Step will put the new VB .NET within reach with a very approachable tour of the new version's features used to build traditional client-side software. If you've been put off by the newfangled books on .NET that spin the new VB as Internet-focused and unrelated to your existing expertise, this title shows you how to leverage your knowledge to get going with Microsoft's newest platform.

The salient feature of this text is the author's patient presentation style, which stresses "traditional" VB programming. (While VB 6 did technically support Web programming, the unarguable reality is that most developers have built form-based programs for years.) This volume shows you how to use the same techniques for the new VB .NET. The author begins his presentation here with a clever slot-machine application to get you started. Other early sections cover the basics of VB .NET from a language perspective, including basics like variables, data types, and flow control statements. This handsomely printed volume makes use of two-toned color (in blue) to highlight differences between VB 6 in VB .NET, making it an invaluable resource for programmers making this transition.

Other essential technologies get their due here as well, from basic control programming with Windows Forms, integrating with ActiveX controls, to a very approachable guide to the new ADO.NET APIs for databases. Coverage of how to bind data to a variety of controls, plus using the new VB .NET DataGrid control, will show you how to do all you did in VB 6 in the new .NET. Instead of getting bogged down in details, the author does a good job of presenting what working programmers need to know. Later chapters delve into .NET APIs for working with files, strings, and collections. This title doesn't pretend to cover ASP.NET in any detail, though there is a useful introduction to the subject, as well as how to use the Microsoft Internet Explorer Object to build VB applications that display HTML and other Internet content.

The reality is that most VB 6 programmers will have to learn a lot when it comes to .NET. Before launching into a whole new paradigm of Web development, this book shows that today's VB has a lot to do with the older VB 6 standard. This text will be nearly indispensable for any VB 6 programmers making the leap to .NET. It even suggests that rumors of the death of the traditional client-side VB application may be somewhat exaggerated. This title shows you that the new easier deployment and productivity features of VB .NET may extend the life of such applications in one of the best-available tutorials for learning VB .NET, bar none. --Richard Dragan --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Michael Halvorson has written more than 30 books, including the popular Microsoft Visual Basic 2008 Step by Step, Microsoft Office XP Inside Out, and Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 Professional Step by Step. A former Visual Basic localization manager at Microsoft, Michael is a professor at Pacific Lutheran University.

Product Details

• Paperback: 688 pages
• Publisher: Microsoft Press (April 23, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0735619050
• ISBN-13: 978-0735619050
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7.2 x 1.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (65 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #844,859 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Some basics with lots of Visual Studio.net!, February 19, 2002

By 

Reviewman (San Diego) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Microsoft Visual Basic .NET Step by Step (Step by Step (Microsoft)) (Paperback)

If your looking for book that will start to make sense of the new .net technology, this book is the one to start with.

It's a beginners level book that teaches both vb.net basics and the Visual Studio environment you'll be using to make your applications. Existing VB6 programmers will find this an easy read (100+ pages in a couple hours).

Lessons are short, clear and goal orientated. There are numerous sceenshots to help guide the way and great charts in the places where you'll need them. Notes and tips are placed throughout the book and add real value to it. Differences between VB6 and VB.net are pointed out.

I'd purchase other books in this series based on my experience with this book. It gives you the solid understanding of the basics you'll need when you go into more advanced programmming levels.

88 of 97 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Fostering the dangerous illusion of knowledge, April 4, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Microsoft Visual Basic .NET Step by Step (Step by Step (Microsoft)) (Paperback)

As an experienced VB developer seeking to learn VB.NET this was the first book I read. After reading this book I came to the conclusion that VB.NET was not much of a change from VB 6!! Well having since gained greater knowledge I now know that that conclusion was just plain wrong. This book gives people the wrong impression of what VB.NET really is. Most of the examples in this book just review the basics of VB in general and worse, far far worse, this book often uses the old VB 6 coding techniques instead of the new .NET ones where newer techniques exist. But the old techniques are merely allowed in .NET for backward compatibility!

Is this a good book for beginners? No, it is too much of an odd hybrid between VB 6 and true VB.NET programming. It does not describe any actual existing language as it *should* be programmed. I will concede that many of the basics it teaches are still valid. However ,they are mixed in with techniques that are obsolete to .NET and a beginner is going to have a hard time sorting this out.

I still give it a few stars because it contains some useful information. It's not completly worthless. However there are better books out there on which to spend your time and money. There are many books are there which have a far higher information to page ratio.

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Beginners Start here, April 4, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Microsoft Visual Basic .NET Step by Step (Step by Step (Microsoft)) (Paperback)

This book is an excellent starting point for anyone who has never programmed with VB or is returning to it after a long absence (like me). It does not delve into object orient programming or drill down on ADO.Net. I does provide a lot of simple exercises that can be built on. After completing this book I highly recommend Coding Techniques for Microsoft Visual Basic .Net by John Connell.