1. Computing

Chapter 10 - Using Modules and Procedures - Part 2

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DOS Lives On in VB.NET!
Console Project

Console Project

There is another missing topic that probably should be in this chapter. But the About Visual Basic Complete Course will fill the gap. Some very technical VB.NET books present nearly all of their examples using Console Programs. These are programs that only require the basic operating system to run. Or, put another way, they're DOS programs.

In VB 6 and earlier, the main goal was to make it possible for programmers to create a Windows program in less time than it took to build Rome. That meant that these versions were focused on creating Windows Forms and inserting your program code in them. Creating a console program in VB 6 was actually not too easy.

When you start a new project, you have your choice of different templates that you can use. Console Application is one of the templates. VB.NET 'supports' Windows applications, but it's not really 'built around' them like VB 6 is. VB.NET was built for the future where many ... many most ... programs just won't need or use Forms anymore. Maybe not even Windows!

(By the way, if you installed the VB.NET Learning Edition that is packaged with our text book, you might be wondering why you don't have all the different projects pictured above. These extra project templates are one of the things that are left out of that edition.)

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