Visual Basic 6.0: Introduction

Visual Basic 6.0: Introduction (Windows 95)

Course specifications

Course number: 047 503

Software version number: 1.0

Course length: 3 days

Hardware/software required to run this course

You will need a PC with at least a 486DX/66 MHz processor; a Pentium processor (or higher) is recommended. You will also need the Microsoft Windows 95 operating system (or later); 16 MB of RAM (32 MB recommended); approximately 76 MB for a Typical installation of Visual Basic; and approximately 29 MB for a Custom installation of MSDN Library Visual Studio 6.0. See your reference manual for hardware considerations that apply to your specific hardware setup.

Course description

Overview: Students will learn how to use Visual Basic 6.0 to develop Windows applications.

Prerequisites: Windows 95: Introduction or equivalent knowledge, and some programming experience.

Delivery method: Instructor-led, group-paced, classroom-delivery learning model with structured hands-on activities.

Benefits: Students will learn how to create Windows applications by using Visual Basic 6.0.

Target student: Students enrolling in this course should be familiar with the Windows environment and have some programming experience.

What's next: Visual Basic 6.0: Introduction (Windows 95) is the first course in this series. Visual Basic 6.0: Database Programming, the next course in this series, teaches students how to create database applications.

Performance-based objectives

Lesson objectives help students become comfortable with the course, and also provide a means to evaluate learning. Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to:

• Identify and describe the purpose of various components of the Visual Basic programming environment.
• Build and run a small application.
• Use the code editing tools in the Code Editor window to write conditional statements and other code constructs.
• Isolate, identify, and correct logic, compile, and run-time errors in a Visual Basic application.
• Develop multiple-form applications.
• Declare variables and constants.
• Examine and discuss Sub and Function procedures, and pass arguments by value and by reference.
• Create application interfaces with standard and custom controls.
• Build common and pop-up menus into an application.
• Write an error-handling routine.
• Create an application by using the VB Application Wizard, and create, install, and remove a setup program.
• Use the data control to access a database table and discuss the features of an MDI environment.

Course content

Lesson 1: Introduction to Visual Basic programming

• What is Visual Basic?
• Terminology
• Steps to create an application
• Modular environment

Lesson 2: Building an application

• Setting properties of objects
• Forms
• Introduction to controls
• Object-based, event-driven programming

Lesson 3: Coding

• The Code Editor
• Using the Object Browser to view properties and methods of objects
• Statements and functions
• Conditional statements
• Looping statements
• Native code

Lesson 4: Debugging

Lesson 5: Forms

• Showing and hiding forms
• Order of events
• Multiple forms
• Startup and end of applications

Lesson 6: Variables

• Data types
• Scope and lifetime of variables
• Constants
• Arrays and user-defined types

Lesson 7: Procedures

• Introduction to procedures
• Arguments and parameters
• Named arguments and optional arguments

Lesson 8: Controls

• Control formatting
• Standard controls
• Custom controls

Lesson 9: Menus

• Creating and coding menus
• Custom pop-up menus

Lesson 10: Error handling

Lesson 11: Wizards

• The Package and Deployment Wizard
• Application Wizard

Lesson 12: The next step

• Data access using the Data Form Wizard and the data control
• MDI forms
• Classes
• An introduction to ActiveX controls within Visual Basic