Visual Basic 6 Primer — A 1-Day Course

 Open Public Course Closed In-House Course

Course Synopsis

Microsoft Visual Basic is a powerful and popular programming tool for Windows application development. For programmers accustomed to more traditional languages, the event-driven style of Visual Basic may be unfamiliar. For those new to application development, Visual Basic is an ideal first programming language.

We recommend this course as an introduction to Visual Basic for developers, who do not have experience of programming in a Windows environment, and that is followed up by the four-day Application Development using Visual Basic course. Development managers may also find the Primer course a useful insight into the fundamentals of Visual Basic. Delegates with little previous programming background are not recommended to attend both courses in the same week, but are instead advised to consolidate their knowledge with practical work before proceeding.

The course is made up of a mixture of lectures and hands-on sessions. Delegates will use Visual Basic to build a small application in four stages. Each stage uses concepts and material covered in the four technical chapters.

Course Objectives

On completion of this course, delegates will be able to:

• Build and test Visual Basic applications
• Program in an event-driven environment and appreciate how it differs from procedural programming
• Implement some fundamental object concepts
• Use some of the advanced features of Visual Basic

Intended Audience

Anyone requiring to develop Windows-based applications, who has no previous programming experience - but see Prerequisites, below. Procedural programmers (such as COBOL programmers) who are not familiar with programming in a Windows event-driven environment and who want to go on to the Application Development using Visual Basic course, and, development managers who want a hands-on introduction to Visual Basic.

Course Prerequisites

Before attending this course, students must meet the following prerequisites:

• Delegates must have experience of running Windows-based software packages and be familiar with Windows objects like Buttons, Check Boxes, Option Buttons, Menus, etc. You should know how to create and manipulate text files using a visual editor and be able to analyse, describe and formalise a simple problem. It is an advantage to have written some macros or batch commands.
• If you also have a good working knowledge of a block-structured language, such as C/C++/Java, Pascal/Modula2, Fortran, Algol or PL/1, then you should go straight to the Application Development using Visual Basic course.

Publicly scheduled dates, locations, and prices

Outline Course Contents

Introduction

Objectives and assumptions

Creating and Building Forms

The VB Integrated Development Environment; The form as a window and container; Placing controls; Setting properties

Writing Event Handlers

The Code Window; Events; Run-time processing; Changing properties

Essentials of Basic Program Structure

Subroutines and functions; Flow of control; Basic scope rules

Building Larger Applications

Multi-form applications; Basic modules; Further controls

A Look at the Future

Further sources of information; A look at the future