Chapter 3 - Introduction to Visual Studio .NET

8/9/2019 Chapter 3 - Introduction to Visual Studio .NET

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Introduction to Visual Basic .NET

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Objective

This chapter will give an introduction to Visual

Studio .NET and Visual Basic .NET along with its

features, development environment and its building

blocks. At the end of this chapter students should beable to write their first simple application in Visual

Basic .NET.


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Scope

Introduction

System Requirements

Visual Studio .NET Features

Visual Basic .NETIntroduction

Features of Visual Basic .NET

Development Environment of Visual Basic .NET


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Introduction

.NET Framework covers all the layers of software

development above the operating system. When

using the .NET Framework for the application

development, there is a choice of wide variety oflanguages to use.

Microsoft NET Framework SDK is required for

these languages to function which includes the

compilers for all these languages.


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Introduction

The overall vision of Microsoft .NET is to create a

common platform for building applications that can

be delivered as reusable, interoperable services over

the Internet and corporate Intranets. Getting therewill require a new programming environment in

which developers are free to mix and match

components from multiple programming languages

to create the computer applications of tomorrow.


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System Requirements

Visual Studio comes in four edition namely Visual

Studio .NET Professional Edition, Enterprise

Developer Edition, and Enterprise Architect Edition.

Computer/Processor PC with Pentium II-class processor, 450 MHz

PC with Pentium III-class processor, 600 MHz

Operating System MS Windows 2000 Server or Professional

MS Windows XP Professional, NT 4.0 Server

Windows Me and 98


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While Visual Studio.NET will install on all the

above platforms, Windows 2000 is required to use

all the features of the .NET framework. Some

features such as GDI+ are only supported inWindows 2000. In Windows Me and 98 some

features of Visual Studio is not supported.

Memory

Windows 2000 Professional: 96 MB of RAM

Windows 2000 Server: 192 MB of RAM (256 MB

recommended)

System Requirements


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Hard Disk

500 MB on System Drive and 2.5 GB on installation

drive

Drive CD-ROM drive

Display

VGA or higher resolution monitor

System Requirements


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Installation of Visual Studio .NET

Visual Studio comes with a Pack of five CDs.,

which contains the setup files needed to complete

the installation of .NET Framework, Visual

Studio.NET and MSDN. The pack also performsWindows Component Update that ensures that the

operating system meets the minimum requirements.

To start the installation, insert the Installation CD

and run the Setup.EXE program or allow auto run tokick in from the CD. This brings a dialog box as

shown below


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From this dialog box, choose the Windows

Component Update option. Notice that all other

options are not available. This ensures that the

operating system and software components meet theminimum requirements.

By clicking the Windows Component Update

option it will prompt for Windows Update CD.

Insert the CD labeled with Windows ComponentUpdate and then click OK. This brings a dialog box

as shown below



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From this dialog box, click

Continue. This shows a

screen that asks the

username and password as

shown below to use as thesystem is restarted. This is

optional. Actually the

install process of Windows

Component Update requiresmultiple reboots.



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Giving the username and

password in the dialog box

allows the setup program to

automatically log back into

the system after eachreboot. The process of

Install will beginrunning

from top to bottom till

complete. The followingwindows show the progress

bar indicating the

installation status.



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While installing the

windows component the

machine will restart after

installing Windows 2000

Service Pack 2 andMicrosoft Internet

Explorer 6.0. When the

Windows Component

Update is complete thefollowing screen will pop

up.



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At this point system isready to use the .NETFramework SDK. Theapplications can bedeveloped by using texteditors and can be deployedand run. Now, the VisualStudio.NET installation canbe done.

Now, you are taken to themain installation startscreen. See the figure givenbelow



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Click on the link 2 to start

installing the Visual

Studio.NET.

Here a window will appear

asking the Product Key andto accept a license

agreement at this point for

Visual Studio.NET as

shown below



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After accepting the license

agreement, click Continue.

Now, a dialog is presented

to choose the different

components of VisualStudio.NET to install. The

screen looks like as shown

below


d l


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Click the Install Now

link. The install will

now take some time.

During installation it

shows some statusinformation as well as a

list of major features of

Visual Studio.NET as

shown in the figuregiven below


I d i Vi l B i NET


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After the installation is

complete, go to the Start

menu, from the Programs

menu, select Microsoft

Visual Studio.NET 7.0.Further select the same

option to open the Visual

Studio.NET development

environment. This bringsthe IDE as shown below


I d i Vi l B i NET


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From the screen shown

above, existing projects can

be opened or a new project

can be started with the help

of the link provided on theleft side of the screen

namely Get Started. On

choosing the option New

Project in the Get Started

page, the screen as shown

below will appear from

which the language in

which project is to be done

can be selected.


I d i Vi l B i NET


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Visual Studio .NETFeatures

Visual Studio.NET has a new, almost completely

customizable shell that brings various languages into

a common integrated development environment. The

functionality found in Visual InterDev for webdevelopment, which was separate from Visual

Studio, is now a core part of the environment itself

and is accessible from the various language

products. The common IDE supports highproductivity development via drag and drop visual

designers for HTML, XML, data, server side code

and more.

I t d ti t Vi l B i NET


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The main features can be summarized as follows:

Shared Integrated Development Environment

Visual Studio.NET supports a shared single

integrated development environment for all languageswithin it.

Start Page

The Start Page as shown above provides a central

location for setting preferred options, reading productnews, accessing discussions etc.

Based on the development experience, the developers

can quickly customize the look and feel of the IDE.

Visual Studio .NETFeatures



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Solution Explorer

Solution Explorer window can be selected from

View | Solution Explorer

Solution Explorer displays an organized list of

projects as well as the files and directories that arepart of the current solution. The solution can consist

of projects in different languages.



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Enhanced Toolbox This option can be selected from View |Toolbox

A variety of items that can be used in Visual Studio

projects are displayed in the toolbox. The items

available change depending on which designer or

editor the developer is using. The items can include

Web and Windows based form controls, ActiveX

Controls, Web Services, HTML elements, objectsand items from Clipboard.

Code snippets from the code window can also be

dragged onto the toolbox for later use.



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Server Explorer

This Server Explorer window can be opened from

View | Server Explorer

One of the biggest challenges in writing a middle-

tier component is discovering what applicationservices are available on the corporate network and

after that integrating them into the application.

Server Explorer of Visual Studio.NET shows an

entire computer including databases, messagequeues, performance counter services, processes,

event logs and all other installed server elements.

Introduction to Visual Basic NET


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Dynamic Help

This option can be selected from Help |

Dynamic Help

Dynamic Help provides appropriate help on a single

click. It provides pointers to relevant informationspecific to the current development task.



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Enhanced Intelligence

Web Developers can get immediate help on tags,

properties and even values within the code editor

using the IntelliSense technology. Developer can

gain benefits of automatic statement completion andsyntax notifications when they write their code.

Enhanced Integrated Debugger

End-to-end debugging of web applications across

languages, projects, processes and stored procedurescan be performed from within the IDE.



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Command Window

This window can be selected from View | Other

Windows | Command Window

Using the Command Window developers can

directly interact with the IDE, bypassing the menusystem, and avoiding dialog boxes by executing

command parameters, switches and arguments.



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Window Management

More code can be viewed on screen at one time

when using Visual Studio.NET.

Auto Hide option allows to hide tool windows along

the edges of the IDE so that valuable space is notoccupied. To view the hidden window, simply place

the mouse over the appropriate tab.

Various information windows in Visual Studio.NET

are dockable.

When developers edit multiple documents in the

editor or designer, all the documents appear as tabs

on the top.



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Back and Forward button allows developers to

navigate through the open windows in the

environment.

Visual Studio.NET provides support for multiplescreens so that more windows can be opened at the

same time without sacrificing screen space.

Links can be added to Web browser Favorites from

within the Visual Studio. This can be done byselecting View | Other Windows |

Favorites.

Window Management



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Visual Database Tool

For working with databases, VS.NET includes

comprehensive features. From within the VS.NET,

databases and schemas, indexes, triggers and otheritems can be created.

The following features can be selected from Tools |

Options | Database Tools



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Other Window

Database Designer

It allows working with physical database schemas

for Oracle and SQL Server without leaving the

Visual Studio.Query Designer

It enables to create complex queries quickly and

easily.

Database Project

All the elements relating to data can be grouped and

placed at one location using the Database Project.



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Web Hosting

Developers wanting to deploy web applications and

XML web services by using Visual Studio.NET will

be at ease by the inclusion of new Web Hosting tab

on the Start page in Visual Studio.NET. The Web

Hosting tab gives developers access to a list of

ASP.NET Web hosters to provide free Web space

and are integrated with Visual Studio.NET to

facilitate the deployment of completed applicationsthrough a wizard.



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Third-party downloads

Hundreds of software component vendors, training

companies and other partners have already adopted

and created .NET based software that is available for

developers to extend their solutions with Visual

Studio.NET. These third party resources can easily

be found on the Whats New tab on the Start page

in Visual Studio.NET.

It provides a place for developers to learn about thenew features in Visual Studio.NET as well as a place

to learn about the third party vendors



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Shared Event Logs

Writing Application errors to shared event log

Event logs supply the user interface for viewing the

logs and a programming interface for examining the

logs. Event logging, thus, provides a standardcentralized way for Windows and applications to

record important software and hardware events.



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Visual Basic. NET

In 1991, Visual Basic came as a fast, powerful and

easy-to-use front-end tool used for developing

simple user interfaces. Since then, Visual Basic has

gone through many up-gradations. Visual Basic 3

added a simple way to control the most powerful

databases available. Visual Basic 4 added support

for 32-bit development and also began the process of

turning Visual Basic into a fully object orientedprogramming language. Visual Basic 5 added the

ability to create true executables and even the ability

to make custom controls.



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To enable Visual Basic developers to benefit from

object-oriented design and to simplify the

development of enterprise Web applications, full

object-oriented language features, including

implementation inheritance, are supported in the

next version of Visual Basic - Visual Basic .NET.

The main task of a .NET environment is to create a

common platform for building applications that canbe considered as reusable, interoperable services

over the Internet and intranet.

Visual Basic. NET



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This allows developers to write their applications in

any programming language and to access any

component easily, regardless of what programming

language it was developed in. For example, a VB

application can call a method in a component written

in C++ and can catch events from an application

written in COBOL.

VB.NET enables the user to develop a scalable codefor web applications and windows applications using

a Visual Studio.NET environment.

Visual Basic. NET



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Features of Visual Basic .NET Visual Basic .NET provides a first class object-

oriented programming language with the features

such as inheritance, overloading, and parameterized

constructors. Additionally, developers will be able to

create highly scalable code with explicit free

threading and highly maintainable code with the

addition of modernized language constructs like

structured exception handling. VB.NET provides all the language characteristics

that developers need to create robust, scalable,

distributed Web applications with the following

features:



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Object Oriented Programming Features Earlier versions of Visual Basic were not fully object-

oriented in nature. VB.NET now supports almost all the

object-oriented features. To understand these features,

first see the advantages of the Object OrientedProgramming.

There are several weaknesses with traditional structured

programming where data is stored separately from

procedural code. Any code that is written as structuredcode is not modular. Because data elements are

accessible from any code, it is possible for data to be

modified without the developer's knowledge.




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This can result in runtime errors that are very difficult todebug. Additionally, maintenance can become a

substantial task. Trying to understand the global impact

of changing a single line of code with structured

programming can be very difficult. Finally, this relianceon the programmer to manage both code and data results

in much lower rates of reuse.

Object oriented approach packages data as well as the

methods/procedures that act upon that data into a single

unit called an object. Lets see how Object-oriented

Programming (OOP) solves these problems.




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Data hiding

The data can be insulated from direct access by the

program. This is called as data hiding. This prevents

unauthorized modification of the code.

Inheritance

It is the process by which objects of one class acquire

the properties of objects of another class. By inheriting

from predefined objects, developers can more rapidlyconstruct complex applications. Since writing new code

always has the potential for incorporating bugs, reusing

tested code minimizes the chances of additional bugs.




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Encapsulation

The wrapping up of data and methods into a single unit

(called class) is encapsulation.

Reusability Concept of inheritance provides the idea of reusability.

OOP allows developers to reuse code and data together

through inheritance.

Polymorphism It allows objects having different internal structures to

share the same external interface.




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Overloading

It gives developers the ability to create different versions

of a Sub or Function that have the same name, but

different argument types.

Parameterized constructors

It allows you to create a new instance of a class while

simultaneously passing arguments to the new instance.

Constructors are essential for object-orientedprogramming since they allow user-defined construction

code to be passed parameters by the creator of the

instance.




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Exception Handling

Exception is an error occurred due to any abnormalbehavior of the code. Developers need to trap these

errors and send the control of the code to another

part of the program accordingly.

With VB.NET, exception handling has become more

structured. Developers can nest their exception

handling, and there is a control structure for writing

cleanup code that executes in both normal andexception conditions.



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Strict type checking

It generates compile-time errors for any data typeconversions that may cause an error at runtime.

Option Strict improves type safety by generating

errors when a conversion is required which could

fail at runtime or which is unexpected by the user,

like the automatic conversion between numeric

types and strings.



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Shared members

Shared members are data and function members ofclasses that are shared by all instances of the class.

Sharing a single instance of a data member or

function among all instances of a class is required in

a Visual Basic application with inheritance.



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IDE of Visual Basic .NET

This section deals with the user interface in VisualBasic. NET environment and its components.



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See the figure given below ofStart Page. There are 2

hyperlinks provided, which

are

Open Project: - This link

opens a project, which has

been developed earlier.

Project is a set of files that

make up an application under

construction. New Project: - This link

allows user to start with a new

project in desired

programming language.




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The window also shows thehyperlinks with file names

of recent projects

developed and their last

modification date. User candirectly open the required

project using these links.

Whats New

This link provides theinformation about

enhancement in Microsoft

technologies.




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Online Community

This link allow user to

access Microsoft

Newsgroup.

Headlines

This links gives the latest

MSDN news as shown

below




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Search Online

Using this link user can search for the topic for which he

need to access MSDN help.

Downloads

This page provides links to product updates, sample code,

and SDK releases available for download from the internet.

XML Web Services

This link enables us to search for registered XML Web

Services to include it in our applications. This link also

enables us to publish a users created XML Web Services to

the community




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Web Hosting This link quickly post Web

applications and Webservices created in VisualStudio directly to theInternet.

My Profile

This link allows us topersonalize the settings of

the GUI by selectingappropriate option of thecombo box.




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Solution Explorer Solution Explorer window provide an organized view of the

project and their files. To access Solution Explorer select

Solution Explorer on the View menu

A solution logically contains the projects in different

languages and files needed to build a Visual Studioapplication. Solution Explorer helps us to view the different

projects contained in a solution.

A solution can contain multiple projects that can be open,

close, and save together. Each project in a solution mightcontain multiple files or items. The types of items contained

within a project vary according to the development language

used to create them.



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Server Explorer Server Explorer is the

server management console

for Visual Studio .NET. It

is used to open database

connection and log on tothe servers and explores the

databases and system

services. To access server

explorer select Server

Explorer on the view menu.



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Using Server Explorer one can do the followingthings:

Connect to servers and view their resources

Make data connections to SQL Server or other typesof databases.

Configure and integrate Exchange 2000 Servers into

your application.

Find out information about processes, services, andDLLs loaded on a server.

Server Explorer



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Properties Window Property window is used to

view and change the design

time properties and events

of selected objects that are

located in editors anddesigners. This window can

also be use to edit and view

the file, project and solution

properties. Properties

Window can be access by

selecting Properties

Window on the View

menu.



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Toolbox The toolbox displays a

variety of item for use in

Visual Studio .NET

projects. The tabs and items

available from the toolboxchange, depending upon the

designer or editor currently

in use. Toolbox can be

accessed by selecting

Toolbox on View menu.



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Summary

Key points covered in this chapter are:

Visual Studio.NET (VS.NET) is a powerful

development tool and provides an IDE for various

different languages. Visual Studio .NET makes the development process

substantially easier and more productive by

providing a drag-and-drop rapid application

development solution for developers Server Explorer (as shown below) is the server

management console for Visual Studio .NET.



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While Visual Studio.NET will install on all 2000,NT, Me, 98, Windows 2000 is required to use all the

features of the .NET framework. Some features such

as GDI+ are only supported in Windows 2000.

For working with databases, VS.NET includes

comprehensive features. From within the VS.NET,

databases and schemas, indexes, triggers and other

items can be created.

Summary



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Self Assessment

Fill in the blanks: _________________ of Visual Studio.NET shows an entire

computer including databases, message queues,performance counter services, processes, event logs and all

other installed server elements Wrapping up of data and methods into a single unit is called

______________

The ________________ can also be used to performadministrative tasks on Microsoft Windows services like

starting, stopping and pausing services. Visual Studio.NET supports a _____________environment

for all languages within it.

Server Explorer

Encapsulation

Server Explorer

SharedIDE



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State True or False:

Event logs supply the user interface for viewing the

logs and a programming interface for examining

the logs The data cannot be insulated from direct access by

the program

A solution can contain multiple projects that can be

open, close, and save together

Self Assessment

True

False

True

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Chapter 3 - Introduction to Visual Studio .NET

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