Chris's Event Programming with Visual Basic course.

Contents

Introduction Conventions Starting VB3 The development environment Help Documentation The "On-line" Tutorial Starting a new project Making an application Working with Forms Modal forms Multiple Document Interface (MDI) Building the interface Menus

Tool Bars & Control Arrays Building a Control Array Z Order Custom controls Handling Data Input Boxes Message Boxes Error Trapping The Data Manager Data Aware Components Debugging code Compilation of code

 
 
 
 

Compilation of code

VB3 is not really compiled in the sense of producing machine code, it is interpreted at run time by DLL’s , however, it is convenient to speak of it as being compiled. To compile a project, from the file menu choose ‘Make EXE file’  At this point you can associate an Icon from one of your forms to represent your application. This can be an existing icon or can be one made specifically using a tool such as ICON WORKS, supplied with VB3, but it should be associated with a form at design time using the icon property.

The EXE file relies upon the presence of various DLL’s, libraries of code utilities, in the operating environment to work on a PC, it will appear to function fine without these on your development computer but this is because they are already there! If you want to provide your applications for someone else to use on their PC and they do not have VB installed, you need the associated DLL's and these can be provided using the Set-up Wizard for distribution as a free standing application. Later versions of VB also require the DLL's and may also require other add-in code. The set-up wizard will also handle these and will produce an installation disk(s) for your application.
 
 
 
 

Visual Basic and all other Microsoft products mentioned in this series are trademarks of the Microsoft Corporation.