NET Architecture and Programming Using Visual C

From the Book: For several years, Microsoft Visual C++ has been used the ultimate power tool for Windows software development. Although it requires a substantial investment in acquiring the necessary skills, Visual C++ allows you to do certain things that are just not possible in other programming languages. Now that the .NET world upon us, it exciting to know that you can continue to apply Microsoft Visual C++, along with its new managed C++ extensions, to new development efforts to achieve the highest possible power and performance. Managed C++ can be used to develop .NET assemblies and to create amazing new desktop programs, web applications, and web services. Unmanaged C++ can also be used to build ATL Server based Web sites and services. .NET represents a sea change for Microsoft Windows software development. .NET also represents a significant learning challenge for Microsoft Windows programmers. The new platform includes new C++ language extensions well an enormous class library, the .NET Framework. This book practical, with many examples and a case study that used a realistic demonstration that continues through many of the chapters. The goal to equip you to begin building significant applications using Visual C++ and the .NET Framework. The book part of The Integrated .NET Series from Object Innovations and Prentice Hall PTR. Organization The book organized into five major parts and structured to make it easy for you to navigate to what you need to learn. The first part, chapters 1 and 2, provides an overview that should be read by everyone. It answers the big question, What Microsoft .NET?, and outlines the programming model ofthe .NET Framework. The second part, chapters 3 to 5, covers programming with managed C++. Even if you are familiar with traditional C++, you will want to read these chapters. Chapter 4 introduces the C++ managed extensions. The case study, which elaborated throughout the entire book, introduced in Chapter 4. Chapter 5 covers the important topics of interfaces, delegates, and events. This chapter also describes important interactions between managed C++ and the .NET Framework. The third part, chapters 6 to 9, covers important fundamental topics in the .NET Framework. Chapter 6 covers user interface programming using the Windows Forms classes. Chapter 7 discusses assemblies and deployment, which constitute a major advance in the simplicity and robustness of deploying Windows applications, ending the notorious situation known DLL hell. Chapter 8 introduces important .NET Framework classes, including the topics of metadata, serialization, threading, attributes, asynchronous programming, remoting, and memory management. Chapter 9 covers ADO.NET, which provides a consistent set of classes for accessing both relational and XML data. The fourth part of the book provides an in-depth introduction to Web programming using ASP.NET and SOAP. Chapter 10 introduces the fundamentals of ASP.NET, including the use of Web Forms, for development of Web sites. Chapter 11 covers SOAP and Web Services, which provide an easy-to-use and robust mechanism for heterogeneous systems to interoperate. Chapter 12 shows how to program with the ATL Sever template library to create both Web servers and Web Services. The final part of the book covers additional important topics in the .NET Framework. Chapter 13 covers the topic of security in detail, including code access security and declarative security. Chapter 14 introduces the debug and trace classes provided by .NET. Chapter 15 covers interoperability of .NET with legacy COM and with Win32 applications. Sample Programs The only way to really learn a major framework to read and write many programs, including some of reasonable size. This book provides many small programs that illustrate pertinent features of .NET in isolation, which makes them easy to understand. The programs are clearly labeled in the text, and they can all be found in the software distribution that accompanies this book. A major case study, the Acme Travel Agency, progressively developed in most of the chapters 4 through 12. It illustrates many features of managed C++ and .NET working in combination, they would in a practical application. The sample programs are provided in a self-extracting file on the book's Web site. When expanded, a directory structure created, whose default root c:\OI\NetCpp. The sample programs, which begin with the second chapter, are in directories Chap02, Chap03, and so on. All the samples for a given chapter are in individual folders within the chapter directories. The names of the folders are clearly identified in the text. An icon in the margin alerts you to a code example. Each chapter that contains a step of the case study has a folder called CaseStudy, containing that step. If necessary, there a readme.txt file in each chapter directory to explain any instructions necessary for getting the examples to work. This book part of The Integrated .NET Series. The sample programs for other books in the series are located in their own directories underneath \OI, so all the .NET examples from all books in the series will be located in a common area you install them. These programs are furnished solely for instructional purposes and should not be embedded in any software product. The software (including instructions for use) provided as is without warranty of any kind. Caveat The book and the associated code were developed with Beta 2 of the .NET Framework. Microsoft has indicated that this version of .NET close to what will be the final version. Nonetheless, changes will be made before .NET released. The code in the examples has been verified to work with Windows 2000. Database code has been verified with SQL Server 2000. Several examples in the database and security chapters have machine names embedded in connection strings or role names. When trying to run these examples, you will have to replace those names with the appropriate name for your machine. To make installation easy, the database examples run with user name and without a password. Needless to say, in a real system you should never have any login id without a password or have a database application use sa to log into a database. Websites The web site for the book series www.objectinnovations.com/dotnet.htm A link provided at that Web site for downloading the sample programs for this book. Additional information about .NET technology available at www.mantasoft.com/dotnet.htm The book sample programs are available at this Web site well. The Web site for the book will also have a list of .NET learning resources that will be kept up to date.