The document discusses best practices for using multiple forms in a Visual Basic .NET application, including: 1. Using templates to create splash screens and about boxes that provide information to users. 2. Displaying and hiding forms using methods like Show, ShowDialog, and Hide. 3. Declaring variables with the appropriate scope and access level to make them available across multiple forms. 4. Handling events like Load and Activated that occur when switching between forms.

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2. Multiform Projects Chapter 6 McGraw-Hill © 2006 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.

3. Objectives Include multiple forms in an application Use templates to create splash screens and about boxes Use the Show, ShowDialog, and Hide method s to display and hide forms Understand the various form events and select the best procedure for your code Declare variables with the correct scope and access level for multiform projects

4. Using Multiple Forms Projects can appear more professional when using different windows for different type of information The first form a project displays is a summary form Projects can contain as many forms as desired

5. Creating New Forms Select Add Windows Form from the Project menu and select from many installed templates

6. Switching Between Forms (1 of 2) In design time there are several ways to switch between forms: Solution Explorer window-select a form name and click the View Designer button or the View Code button Double-clicking a form name opens the form in designer Easiest way is to use the tabs at the top of the Document window that appear when the form is displayed Each form is a separate file and a separate class

7. Switching Between Forms (2 of 2) Using Tabs Selecting from drop down list

8. Adding Existing From Files Forms may be used in more than one project-an existing form maybe used in a new project Each form and information for the form is saved as three separate files: Code procedures Visual interface Property settings for the controls To add an existing form to a project use the Add Existing Item command on the Project menu Select only one filename: FormName.vb; all three files are automatically copied into the project folder

9. Removing Forms from a Project Select the file name in the Solution Explorer of the file to be removed Either click the Delete key or right-click on the filename to and choose Delete form the context menu Additional option is to choose Exclude from project to remove the form from the project but not delete the files

10. An About Box (1of 2) One popular type of form in a project is an About box -found in most Windows programs under Help/About Usually provides the name and version of the program and information about the programmer or company Users can create About boxes by creating a new form and entering the information in labels Windows controls can be used on a new form

11. An About Box (2 of 2)

12. Using the About Box Template Visual Studio’s About Box template can be used to create a new About box Choose Add Windows Form from the Project menu and select About Box

13. Setting Assembly Information Users can manually set the Text properties of the controls --OR-- Open the Project Designer from Project/ProjectName Properties or double-click the My Project in the Solution Explorer Click the Assembly Information button and fill in the desired information in the Assembly Information dialog box

14. Assembly Information Dialog Box

15. A Splash Screen The initial screen containing a logo or window that is seen while a program is loading Professional applications use splash screens to tell the user that the program is loading or starting Makes a large application appear to load and run faster since something is displaying on the screen while the rest of the application loads

16. Splash Screen Example

17. Using the Splash Screen Template Visual Studio contains splash screen templates Select Project/Add New Item to display the Add new item dialog box and choose Splash Screen Modify the form to fit current needs A splash form created using the Splash Screen template

18. Making the Splash Form Display First Display the Project Designer from the Project menu and set the Splash screen drop-down list to the created splash screen Do not change the setting for Startup object or Shutdown mode Then the project is run, the splash screen should display while the startup form is loading and then disappear At times the startup forms loads so quickly that it is nearly impossible to see the splash screen

19. Setting the Splash Screen Example Set the Splash screen drop-down list to the new form in the Project Designer

20. Showing a Form New forms are displayed in response to a user clicking a button or a menu item In the event procedure for the button or menu item use either the Show method or ShowDialog method to display the new form

21. Modal versus Modeless Forms Show method displays a form as modeless -means that both forms are open and the user can navigate from one form to the other ShowDialog method displays a new form as modal -the user must respond to the form in some way, usually by clicking a button No other program code can execute until the user responds to and hides or closes the modal form With a modeless form the user may switch to another form in the project without responding to the form

22. Show Method General Form Example The Show method creates a form object from the specified class and displays it modelessly-the formName is the name of the form to be displayed f ormName .Show () summaryForm.Show ()

23. ShowDialog Method General Form Example Use the ShowDialog method when the user is wanted to notice, respond to, and close the form before proceeding with the application-this code is generally placed in a menu item or a button’s click even procedure f ormName .ShowDialog () summaryForm.ShowDialog ()

24. Hiding or Closing a Form The Close method behaves differently for a modeless form compared to a modal form Modeless-Close destroys the form instance and removes it from memory Modal-the form is only hidden Choosing a form’s Hide method sets the form’s Visible property to False and keeps the form instance in memory ready to be re-displayed An example would be for form with instructions or Help text

25. Hide Method General Form Example formName .Hide() summaryForm .Hide()

26. Responding to Form Events Two primary events that code might be needed for are: FormName.Load-form loaded into memory FormName.Activated-occurs when control is passed to form First time a form is shown in an application the form generates both the Load and Activated events If a form is displayed multiple times, initializing steps can be placed into the Activated event procedure; same for setting the focus in a particular place on a new form

27. The Sequence of Form Events Occurs after the form is closed FomClosed Occurs as the form is about to close FormClosing Occurs when the form is no longer the active form Deactivate Occurs each time any portion of the form is redrawn Paint Occurs each time the form is shown Activate Occurs before the form is displayed for the first time-usually happens only once Load

28. Writing Event Procedures From the Code Editor In the Editor, drop down the Class Name list and choose the entry that shows the events for the selected form In the Method Name list select the event for which to write a procedure—events already having a written procedure appear in bold

29. Writing Event Procedures From the Properties Window in the Designer Select an event using the Properties window Click the form to show properties and click Events button Double-click the event to create an empty event procedure

30. Holding the Splash Screen Display If application are very small the splash screen disappears before it can be read Code can be written to hold the splash screen longer

31. Variables/Constants in Multiform Projects For module-level variables to be available in more than one form in a project it must be declared as Friend or Public and not as Private Scope can be expanded for variable and constants and is the set of statements that can access a variable or constant without qualifying its name

32. Access Level Specifies the permission required to make use of the variable or constant To make a variable available to other forms use either the Public or Friend keywords Friend-allows other forms in the project to access the variable Public-allows all other programs to access variables Private keyword allows access only in the class (form) in which it is declared Only use access level keywords for module level variable

33. Lifetime The period of time that a variable or constant remains in existence Module and namespace variables exist as long as the application runs

34. Static Variables Use to declare local and block level variables Retain their value for the life of the project If the value in a variable needs to be retained for multiple calls to a procedure such as running count, declare it as Static If the variable is used in multiple procedures, declare it at the module level

35. The Static Statement General Form Examples Static Identifier As DataType Static personCountInteger As Integer Statis reportTotalDecimal As Decimal

36. Namespaces VB projects are automatically assigned to a namespace Namespaces can be viewed and modified which is called the root namespace

37. Declaring Variables/Constants Guidelines Place all local declarations at the top of a procedure Use named constants for any value that doesn’t change during the program execution Keep the scope of variables and constants narrow Consider making variables local if possible Make variables Static if needed for multiple executions within a procedure If variables are needed for more than one procedure, declare it as local and pass it as an argument Use Private module level variables if using a variable in multiple procedures and displaying in another If using the value of a variable in more than one form declare it as Friend

38. Running a Program Outside the IDE The .exe file can be moved to another computer, placed on the system desktop, or used as a shortcut just like any other application If copying the .exe file to another system make sure it has the Microsoft.NET Framework Can download the framework for free from the Microsoft Web site Change the icon if desired