Visual Basic 6 How to Program, 1/e

• Gives students cutting-edge exposure to today's hottest topics.

• Provides students with convenient finger-tip access to the tools and resources needed for working efficiently with the text, and beyond.

• Guarantees that students can follow concept and application development step-by-step, with no vague or confusing “black holes.”

• Provides students with: Good Programming Practices; Common Programming Errors; Software Engineering Observations; Portability Tips; Performance Tips; Testing and Debugging Tips; Look-and-Feel Observations, etc.

• Provides students with an interactive environment for learning the course material.
  
  

1. Computing Concepts.

Introduction. What Is a Computer? Computer Organization. Evolution of Operating Systems. Personal Computing, Distributed Computing, and Client/Server Computing. Machine Languages, Assembly Languages, and High-level Languages. History of Visual Basic. Other High-level Languages. Structured Programming. What Is Visual Basic? General Notes About Visual Basic and This Book. A Tour of the Book.

2. Integrated Development Environment.

Introduction. Integrated Development Environment Overview. Project Window. Toolbox. Form Layout Window. Properties Window. Menu Bar and Tool Bar. A Simple Program: Displaying a Line of Text.

3. Introduction to Visual Basic Programming.

Introduction. Visual Programming and Event-Driven Programming. A Simple Program: Printing a Line of Text on the Form. Another Simple Program: Adding Integers. Memory Concepts. Arithmetic. Operator Precedence. Decision Making: Comparison Operators.

4. Control Structures: Part I.

Introduction. Algorithms. Pseudocode. Introduction to Control Structures. If/Then Selection Structure. If/Then/Else Selection Structure. While Repetition Structure. Do While Repetition Structure. Do Until Repetition Structure. Formulating Algorithms: Case Study 1 (Counter-Controlled Repetition). Formulating Algorithms with Top-down, Stepwise Refinement: Case Study 2 (Sentinel-Controlled Repetition). Formulating Algorithms with Top-down, Stepwise Refinement: Case Study 3 (Nested Control Structures).

5. Control Structures: Part II.

Introduction. Essentials of Counter-Controlled Repetition. For Repetition Structure. Examples Using the For/Next Repetition Structure. Select Case Multiple-Selection Structure. Do/Loop While Repetition Structure. Do/Loop Until Repetition Structure. Exit Do and Exit For Statements. Data Type Boolean. Constant Variables. Logical Operators. Structured Programming Summary. Visual Basic Data Types.

6. Sub Procedures and Function Procedures.

Introduction. Form Modules. Sub Procedures. Function Procedures. Call-by-Value vs. Call-by-Reference. Exit Sub and Exit Function. Storage Classes. Scope Rules. Random Number Generation. Example: A Game of Chance. Recursion and the Factorial Function. Another Recursion Example: The Fibonacci Series. Recursion vs. Iteration. Optional Arguments. Named Arguments. Visual Basic Math Functions. Code Modules.

7. Arrays.

Introduction. Arrays. Declaring Arrays. Examples Using Arrays. Passing Arrays To Procedures. Sorting Arrays. Searching Arrays: Linear Search and Binary Search. Multidimensional Arrays. Control Arrays. Dynamic Arrays. Variable Arguments: Param Array. Function Array.

8. Strings, Dates and Times.

Introduction. Fundamentals of Characters and Strings. String Data Type. String Concatenation with & and +. Comparing Character Strings. Operator Like. Manipulating the Individual Characters in a String: Mid$. Left$, Right$, and InStr. Searching for Substrings in Strings using InStr and InStrRev. LTrim$, RTrim$ and Trim$. String$ and Spaces$. Replacing Substrings in a String with Function Replace. Reversing Strings with Function StrReverse. Converting Strings to Uppercase and Lowercase. Conversion Functions. String Formatting. Date and Time Processing. Date and Time Formatting. String Arrays.

9. Graphics.

Introduction. Coordinate Systems. Drawing Methods. Drawing Properties. Line Control and Shape Control. Colors. Images. Printer Object.

10. Basic Graphical User Interface Concepts.

Introduction. Controls. TextBox Control. MaskEdit Control. ComboBox Control. ListBox Control. Scrollbars. Slider Control. Menus. Pop-up Menus. Function MsgBox.

11. Advanced Graphical User Interface Concepts.

Introduction. Multiple Document Interface (MDI). Multiple Forms. Template Forms. Rich TextBox Control. UpDown Control. ImageList Control. ImageCombo Control. FlatScrollBar Control (Professional and Enterprise Editions). Native Code Compilation (Professional and Enterprise Editions).

12. Mouse and Keyboard.

Introduction. Changing the Shape of the Mouse Pointer. Mouse Events. Mouse Buttons. Shift, Ctrl and Alt Keys. Drag-and-Drop. Key Events. Key Preview Property.

13. Error Handling and Debugging.

Introduction. When Error Handling Should Be Used. A Simple Error-Handling Example: Divide by Zero. Nested On Error Statements. Err Object. Resume Statement. Error Handlers and the Call Stack. Rethrowing Errors. Break Mode, the Immediate Window, and the Debug Object. First Steps in Bug Prevention. Debugging Strategies. Debugger. Debugger and Error Handlers.

14. Sequential File Processing.

Introduction. DirListBox, FileListBox, and DriveListBox Controls. Data Hierarchy. File System Objects. Creating a Sequential Access File. Reading Data from a Sequential Access File. Updating Sequential Access Files.

15. Records and Random-Access Files.

Introduction. Random-Access Files. Records as User-Defined Types. Creating a Random-Access File. Writing Data Randomly to a Random-Access File. Reading Data Sequentially from a Random-Access File. Reading Randomly from a Random-Access File. Example: A Transaction Processing Program.

16. Object-Oriented Programming.

Introduction. Data Abstraction and Information Hiding. Implementing a Time Abstract Data Type with a Class. Class Members. Composition: Objects as Instance Variables of Other Classes. Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming. Software Engineering with Components. Type Fields and Select Case Statements. Polymorphism. Visual Basic Interfaces. Polymorphism Examples. Case Study: IShape, CPoint, Ccircle. Case Study: A Payroll System Using Polymorphism. Case Study: Polymorphic Processing of Shapes. Simulating Implementation Inheritance with Interface Inheritance and Delegation. Object Browser. Events and Classes.

17. ActiveX.

Introduction. Components, COM and DCOM. ActiveX Control Types. ActiveX Control Lifetime and Events. UserControl Object. Creating an ActiveX Control That Contains Constituent Controls. ActiveX Control Example: Clock Control. ActiveX Control Interface Wizard. Property Pages and the Property Page Wizard. ActiveX DLLs. ActiveX EXEs. Friend Access.

18. Database Management.

Introduction. Database Systems. Relational Database Model. Introducing the Microsoft ADO Data Control 6.0 and Microsoft DataGrid Control 6.0. Relational Database Overview: The Biblio.mdb Database. Structured Query Language. Revisiting the A DO Data Control and DataGrid Control. Hierarchical FlexGrid Control. DataList and DataCombo Controls. Using the Data Environment Designer. Other Programmatic Capabilities of Recordsets. Transaction Processing.

19. Networking, the Internet and the World Wide Web.

Introduction. Visual Basic Internet Controls. WebBrowser Control. Internet Transfer Control. Other Properties, Methods and Events of the Internet Transfer Control. Winsock Control. Example: Client/Server Interaction with the Winsock Control . Winsock Control and UDP-Based Client/Server Computing. Other Properties, Methods and Events of the Winsock Control. Visual Basic Script (VBScript): An Overview.

20. Multimedia: Images, Animation, Audio.

Introduction. Microsoft Agent Control. Multimedia MCI Control. Animation Control. RealAudio ActiveX Control Library. Marquee Control Library. Microsoft ActiveMovie Control.

21. Data Structures, Collections and Dictionaries.

Introduction. Type Variant. Self-Referential Classes. Dynamic Memory Allocation. Linked Lists. Stacks. Queues. Trees. Collection Object. Dictionary Object.

Appendix A: Operator Precedence Chart.
Appendix B: ANSI Character Set.
Appendix C: Visual Basic Internet and World Wide Web Resources.
Appendix D: Number Systems.
Bibliography.
Index.