Visual Basic 2012 Unleashed, 2nd Edition

Fully updated for Windows 8 support, .NET 4.5, and Windows Phone development, this is the most comprehensive, practical reference to modern programming with Visual Basic 2012. Written by Visual Basic MVP Alessandro Del Sole, a long-time leader of the global VB community, this book illuminates the core of the VB language and demonstrates its effective use in many current programming scenarios.

Del Sole covers both Visual Basic 2012 Professional Edition for professional developers and the Express Edition for hobbyists, novices, and students. Writing for VB programmers at all levels of experience, he walks through using VB 2012 for data access, Windows desktop/Windows Phone user interface development, networking, communication, and much more.

For those moving from structured languages—including VB 6—Del Sole offers detailed guidance on building effective object-oriented code. He also demonstrates how to make the most of Microsoft’s updated .NET 4.5 platform to write more robust and powerful software.

Detailed information on how to…

• Understand the Visual Studio 2012 IDE, .NET Framework 4.5, and the anatomy of a VB 2012 application
• Debug VB applications and implement error handling and exceptions
• Build efficient object-oriented software with classes, objects, namespaces, and inheritance
• Work with advanced object-oriented features, including interfaces, generics, delegates, events, and collections
• Access data with LINQ—including LINQ to Objects, SQL, DataSets, Entities, XML, and Parallel LINQ
• Build modern Windows applications with WPF
• Develop web-centric applications using ASP.NET, Silverlight 5, and Windows Azure Services cloud computing
• Use advanced .NET 4.5 platform capabilities, including asynchronous programming, multithreading, parallel programming
• Build apps for Windows Phone
• Test code with unit tests, TDD, and code contracts
• Deploy apps efficiently with InstallShield for Visual Studio and ClickOnce

Table of Contents

Part I Learning the Basics of VB
Chapter 1 Introducing the .NET Framework 4.5
Chapter 2 Getting Started with the Visual Studio 2012 IDE
Chapter 3 The Anatomy of a Visual Basic Project
Chapter 4 Data Types and Expressions
Chapter 5 Debugging Visual Basic 2012 Applications
Chapter 6 Handling Errors and Exceptions

Part II Object-Oriented Programming with Visual Basic 2012
Chapter 7 Class Fundamentals
Chapter 8 Managing an Object’s Lifetime
Chapter 9 Organizing Types Within Namespaces
Chapter 10 Modules
Chapter 11 Structures and Enumerations
Chapter 12 Inheritance
Chapter 13 Interfaces
Chapter 14 Generics and Nullable Types
Chapter 15 Delegates and Events
Chapter 16 Working with Collections and Iterators
Chapter 17 Creating Objects: Visual Tools and Portable Libraries

Part III Advanced Language Features
Chapter 18 Manipulating Files and Streams
Chapter 19 The My Namespace
Chapter 20 Advanced Language Features

Part IV Data Access with ADO.NET and LINQ
Chapter 21 Introducing ADO.NET and DataSets
Chapter 22 Introducing LINQ
Chapter 23 LINQ to Objects
Chapter 24 LINQ to SQL
Chapter 25 LINQ to DataSets
Chapter 26 Introducing ADO.NET Entity Framework
Chapter 27 Manipulating XML Documents with LINQ and XML Literals

Part V Building Windows Desktop Applications
Chapter 28 Creating WPF Applications
Chapter 29 WPF Common Controls
Chapter 30 Brushes, Styles, Templates, and Animations in WPF
Chapter 31 Manipulating Media and Documents
Chapter 32 Introducing Data-Binding
Chapter 33 Localizing Applications

Part VI Building Web Applications
Chapter 34 Building ASP.NET Web Applications
Chapter 35 Publishing ASP.NET Web Applications
Chapter 36 Building Rich Internet Applications with Silverlight 5
Chapter 37 Building and Deploying Applications for Windows Azure
Chapter 38 Building Apps for Windows Phone 7.5

Part VII Networking and Exposing Data Through Networks
Chapter 39 Creating and Consuming WCF Services
Chapter 40 Implementing and Consuming WCF Data Services

Part VIII Advanced .NET Framework with VB 2012
Chapter 41 Serialization
Chapter 42 Processes and Multithreading
Chapter 43 Parallel Programming and Parallel LINQ
Chapter 44 Asynchronous Programming
Chapter 45 Working with Assemblies
Chapter 46 Reflection
Chapter 47 Coding Attributes
Chapter 48 Platform Invokes and Interoperability with the COM Architecture
Chapter 49 Documenting the Source Code with XML Comments

Part IX Applications Deployment
Chapter 50 Understanding the Global Assembly Cache
Chapter 51 Setup and Deployment Projects with InstallShield for Visual Studio
Chapter 52 Deploying Applications with ClickOnce

Part X Mastering the Visual Studio 2012 IDE
Chapter 53 Advanced IDE Features
Chapter 54 Introducing the Visual Studio Extensibility
Chapter 55 Advanced Analysis Tools
Chapter 56 Testing Code with Unit Tests, Test-Driven Development, and Code Contracts

Appendix A Useful Resources and Tools for Visual Basic