Customised Visual Basic Training

 Closed In-House Course

Course Synopsis

This outline contains a number of modules which may be combined to form a course to match your exact requirements. A common short course is a 3 day 'upgrade' for people moving from VB6. Courses combining the language, databases, XML and a user-interface methodology, ASP.Net, Forms or WPF, work well as 4 day courses, with 5 days being beneficial to cover more advanced aspects of ASP.Net or WPF. Modules from our Advanced Visual Basic course can also be included.

All variations on the course are highly practical with several standard projects and a large number of optional exercises. Versions of Visual Basic from 2002 onwards are supported, and we can also provide training for VB6, VB Script and classic ASP if required.

Publicly scheduled dates, locations, and prices

Outline Course Contents

Windows and .Net

• The .Net platform
• The Common Language Runtime (CLR) and Intermediate Language
• Visual Basic, its alternatives and variations

Creating a Visual Basic Application

• The Visual Basic Environment
• Introducing object orientation
• Good practice

The Visual Basic Programming Language

• Variable Types, Scope and Lifetime
• Nullable types
• Arrays
• Control flow: If, For Next, Do While/Until, For Each, Select Case
• Other Language Features
• Subroutines and functions
• Argument passing mechanisms, named and optional arguments
• Public, Private and the use of modules

Object Oriented Programming

• Classes, objects and the use of 'New'
• Encapsulation
• Namespaces and assemblies
• Benefits of object orientation
• Inheritance
• The use of 'Overridable' and 'Overrides'
• Benefits of inheritance
• Hiding and Shadows
• Abstract classes
• Constructors and initialization
• Casting
• Collections Collection classes
• Generics
• Collection examples
• Interfaces
• The benefits of interfaces
• Interfaces vs classes
• Defining and implementing an interface
• Common interfaces
• Exception Handling
• Comparison with 'Err' and 'On Error'
• Try and Catch
• Finally
• Custom Exceptions

Windows Forms, Controls & Properties

• Beginning an application
• Windows Forms and properties
• Forms and controls as classes and objects
• Events
• Handling user input
• Control interaction and focus
• Special events
• Controls & Methods
• Designing and implementing menus
• The standard control set
• Validation techniques
• Dialogs
• Producing an elegant and foolproof user interface
• MDI Applications
• The use of the Multiple Document Interface for single and multiple document types
• Dynamic forms and controls
• Timers, Dates, Times and Formatting
• The Timer Control - its importance, limitations and the Tick event
• Using, manipulating and displaying dates and times
• Date/Time Pickers
• Graphics and Printing
• Simple output
• The System
• Drawing Namespace
• Printing techniques

The Windows Presentation Framework (WPF)

• XAML and code-behind
• Properties and event handling
• Preview and bubbling events
• Panels and layouts
• Attached properties
• Styles and scrolling
• Menus, lists and selection
• Complex content
• Using mouse events
• Shapes and drawing
• 2D vs 3D

ASP.Net

• Event-driven programming
• Code-behind vs inline
• PostBack and cross page PostBack
• ViewState
• Standard folders
• Master pages
• Compile on demand
• Validation
• Client-side and server-side validation
• The Validator controls
• Regular expression and custom validators
• Validation groups and summaries
• Keeping State - why state is an issue
• View, control, session and application state
• Cookies
• Keeping state across servers
• Caching and cache state
• The TreeView and Menu controls
• Using XML data sources
• Site navigation
• Other controls
• Personalization
• Web parts
• User profiles
• Themes
• Security, authentication and authorization
• Credentials and configuration
• SSL
• Security controls
• Membership
• Cookieless authentication
• Organizing the Site
• Standard folder structure
• Exploiting master pages
• Resources and internationalization
• Tracing, monitoring and instrumentation
• Error events and pages
• User, composite and server controls

Multitasking

• The System
• Threading classes
• Starting and controlling threads
• Using locks and monitors for synchronization
• Sleeping and timers

ADO and Databases

• Connections, commands and readers
• DataSets and adapters
• Typed DataSets
• DataSource controls
• Data-aware controls and grids
• Stored procedures and transactions
• Designing a multi-tier architecture

LINQ

• How LINQ works
• Implicitly-typed variables and Lambda expressions
• The LINQ syntax
• Using LINQ with collections, databases and XML

XML and Web Services

• Introducing XML
• XmlTextReader
• Using the Document Object Model (DOM) and XMLDocument
• XMLDataDocuments
• Creating XML using XmlWriter
• LINQ and the 'X' classes
• XML and SOAP
• WSDL and UDDI
• Writing Web Services
• Passing and returning complex objects
• Introducing the Windows Communication Framework (WCF)

Files, Streams and Networking

• The .Net Stream architecture
• Streams, Readers and Writers
• Serialization and SOAP
• The socket and Tcp classes
• Basic network communication
• Clients and multithreaded servers

Pocket PCs

• The Compact Framework
• Pocket PC limitations
• Using databases with a pocket device
• Remote Data Access