Introduction to Visual Basic

By Stephen Bucaro

Visual Basic has been the most popular programming environment for more than twelve years. If you want to learn how to program, Visual Basic is the language for you. It is very easy to use, yet very powerful in the Windows Environment.

Visual Basic is an Integrated Development Environment (IDE). That means when you start Visual Basic, you have everything you need at your command. You can design your application's interface, write the code, test the code, compile the code, and create an installation package all from within Visual Basic's IDE.

Visual Basic is a "visual" development environment. That means you don't write code to design your applications interface. Instead you use your mouse pointer to drag objects such as buttons, text boxes, and scrollbars from the toolbox to your form, and then use your mouse to place and size the objects.

Visual Basic is a Rapid Application Development (RAD) tool, which means that you can whip out a working program in a matter of minutes. Many software organizations use Visual Basic to create a quick prototype, which they can later optimize by converting parts or all of the application to C++ language. Most software organizations use Visual Basic from start to final product.

Sounds good. So what are the draw backs?

Visual Basic has a reputation for being slow. The fact is that no quick 3D shooter game will ever be created with Visual Basic. If you plan to develop a quick 3D shooter game, use C++ (better yet C) optimized by converting parts the code to assembly language.

Visual Basic requires the run-time DLL. That means the computer that you install your application on must have the file msvbvm60.dll installed (For Visual Basic 6). You can distribute the run-time DLL with your application, but that adds about 1.5 Meg to your distribution disc. Or you can assume the user will already have the DLL installed on their computer, which is almost a sure thing since run-time DLL's for the last several versions of Visual Basic are installed with the Windows Operating System. Or the user can download the required DLL from the Internet (It's readily available).

Visual Basic is made easy to use by hiding the complexity from you. Some C++ programmers consider Visual Basic programmers to be dummies. In fact some C++ programmers say Visual Basic not a real programming language, it's a dialog box designing application. Of course assembly language programmers consider C++ programmers to be dummies.

Despite Microsoft's attempt to pass Visual Basic.net off as a "web programming tool", it's not. All the latest web technologies, like XML and SOAP, can be programmed using a simple text editor. As a web programming tool, Visual Basic is still in the business of hiding complexity.

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