Pro VB 2010 and the .NET 4.0 Platform

Be the first to understand .NET 4.0 and Visual Basic 2010. Pro VB 2010 and the .NET 4.0 Platform provides developers with a complete guide to the new technology, explaining the importance of all the key VB 2010 language features. This new edition has been comprehensively revised and rewritten to make it accurately reflect the VB 10 language specification for the .NET 4.0 platform. You’ll find new chapters covering the important concepts of dynamic lookups, named and optional arguments, Parallel LINQ (PLINQ), improved COM interop, and variance for generics.

The first edition of this book was released at the 2001 Tech-Ed conference in Atlanta, Georgia. At that time, the .NET platform was still a beta product, and in many ways, so was this book. This is not to say that the early editions of this text did not have merit—after all, the book was a 2002 Jolt Award finalist and it won the 2003 Referenceware Excellence Award. However, over the years that author Andrew Troelsen spent working with the common language runtime (CLR), he gained a much deeper understanding of the .NET platform and the subtleties of the VB programming language, and he feels that this sixth edition of the book is as close to a “final release” as he’s come yet!

If you’re checking out this book for the first time, do understand that it’s targeted at experienced software professionals and/or graduate students of computer science (so don’t expect three chapters on iteration or decision constructs!). The mission of this text is to provide you with a rock-solid foundation in the VB programming language and the core aspects of the .NET platform (assemblies, remoting, Windows Forms, Web Forms, ADO.NET, XML web services, etc.). Once you digest the information presented in these 25 chapters, you’ll be in a perfect position to apply this knowledge to your specific programming assignments and explore the .NET universe on your own terms.

• Discover the ins and outs of the leading .NET technology.
• Learn from an award-winning author who has been teaching the .NET world since version 1.0.
• Find complete coverage of the WPF, WCF, and WF foundations that support the core .NET platform.

This book is for anyone with some software development experience who is interested in the new .NET Framework 4.0 and the VB language. Whether you are moving to .NET for the first time or are already writing applications on .NET 2.0 or .NET 3.5, this book will provide you with a comprehensive grounding in the new technology and serve as a complete reference throughout your coding career.

1. Introducing VB 2010
2. Building Visual Basic 2010 Applications
3. Core VB 2010 Programming Constructs, Part I
4. Core VB 2010 Programming Constructs, Part II
5. Defining Encapsulated Class Types
6. Understanding Inheritance and Polymorphism
7. Understanding Structured Exception Handling
8. Understanding Object Lifetime
9. Working with Interfaces
10. Understanding Generics
11. Delegates, Events, and Lambdas
12. Advanced VB 2010 Language Features
13. LINQ to Objects
14. Configuring .NET Assemblies
15. Type Reflection, Late Binding, and Attribute-Based Programming
16. Processes, AppDomains, and Object Contexts
17. Understanding CIL and the Role of Dynamic Assemblies
18. Dynamic Types and the Dynamic Language Runtime
19. Multithreaded and Parallel Programming
20. File I/O and Object Serialization
21. ADO.NET Part I: The Connected Layer
22. ADO.NET Part II: The Disconnected Layer
23. ADO.NET Part III: The Entity Framework
24. Introducing LINQ to XML
25. Introducing Windows Communication Foundation
26. Introducing Windows Workflow Foundation 4.0
27. Introducing Windows Presentation Foundation and XAML
28. Programming with WPF Controls
29. WPF Graphics Rendering Services
30. WPF Resources, Animations, and Styles
31. WPF Control Templates and UserControls
32. Building ASP.NET Web Pages
33. ASP.NET Web Controls, Master Pages, and Themes
34. ASP.NET State Management Techniques
35. Programming with Windows Forms
36. Platform-Independent .NET Development with Mono