Beginning Visual Basic 2005

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Beginning Visual Basic 2005

Beginning VisualBasic 2005 by Thearon Willis and Bryan Newsome targets two groups ofdevelopers: new programmers who have chosen Visual Basic 2005 as their firstlanguage, or experienced programmers making their first foray into .NETdevelopment. At almost 800 pages, the book provides plenty of resources forboth camps.

Wrox has a reputation for covering a topic in both depthand breadth, meaning someone unfamiliar with a topic can not only learn thebasics, but also gain a detailed understanding of the subject and use the bookas a reference in the future. This title is no different; it walks the readerstep-by-step through everything a developer needs to build Windows Formsapplications, including the basics of data types, controlling program flow, theVisual Studio 2005 IDE, object-oriented programming, Web services, debugging,and deployment.

Beginning VisualBasic 2005 is not aimed at ASP.NET developers, as it only dedicates twochapters to a brief overview of Web Forms development. However, itsstep-by-step approach makes it an ideal candidate for someone interested inlearning Windows programming from scratch, regardless of whether they havesoftware development experience.

The first five chapters serve as an introduction to .NETprogramming, including the installation and setup of Visual Studio 2005, anintroduction to its interface through creation of a HelloUser application, alook at the .NET Framework, writing software for Windows, and the CLR. Chapters3 and 4 target beginning programmers by exploring the basics of writingsoftware: algorithms, variables, comments and whitespace, data types,debugging, scope, methods, and controlling program flow. Chapter 5 looks atarrays, for...each loops, enumerations, constants, structures, ArrayLists, andother collections.

In the next section, chapters 6-9 describe the specificsof Windows Forms development, including event-driven programming, forms, dialogboxes, and menus. Chapter 9 examines debugging applications in Visual Studio2005, as well as structured error handling using exceptions and try-catchblocks.

Chapters 10-12 focus on object-oriented concepts,including encapsulation, methods, events, polymorphism, inheritance,namespaces, and garbage collection. Chapter 11 puts the object-orientedconcepts to work as it walks through the creation of an Internet bookmarkapplication. Chapter 12 covers class libraries, and chapter 13 explores thecreation of custom controls.

The remainder of the book covers database programming withSQL Server and ADO.NET, takes a cursory look at ASP.NET Web Forms programming,Forms Authentication, Login Controls, XML, Web services, .NET Remoting, and applicationdeployment, and briefly delves into building mobile applications.

It s obvious the authors put a lot of work into compilingall the information contained in this book, and even more time into honingtheir message to the intended audience of beginners. In roughly 800 pages, theauthors cover every major aspect of .NET development. The one aspect I dislikedwere the somewhat unrelated chapters on programming custom graphics, FormsAuthentication, and mobile applications. Because the book is so heavily focusedon Windows Forms development, these chapters take the reader a little offcourse from the focus of the book.

Overall, the book is a weighty tome that requires a fewweeks to read and digest. I was highly satisfied with the writing quality,sample applications, and code samples.

Rob Walling

Rating:

Title: Beginning Visual Basic 2005

Authors:Thearon Willis and Bryan Newsome

Publisher: Wrox

ISBN: 0-7645-7401-9

Web Site: http://www.wrox.com

Price: US$39.99

Page Count: 799