|
The
New IDE
The
Integrated Development Environment (IDE) is what
we use to write our programs in - it is the program
we're paying our money for really. It is possible
to write VB code in notepad and then use the command-line
compiler through a DOS prompt, but that's really
awkward and not much fun! I never thought of the
Visual Studio 6 IDE as being bad, it never really
annoyed me (except for when tool windows got in
the way) and it did the job fine. But, it's actually
using 4 year old interface design methods - look
at some of the new features in other programs,
and notice that they dont really exist in VB6
or VC++6. So it cant be a bad thing when we get
treated to the very best in interface design,
can it?
Well,
in my opinion the new IDE is the star of the show
- having used it for a week or so now it is most
definitely an improvement. As much as it is the
new features that I'm impressed by. Its the tiny
little differences that I've noticed here and
there that now having used Visual Studio .Net
I wish I could also use in Visual Studio 6. I'll
send a bit of time now running through the best
new features.
|
| (1)
Visual Studio .Net's startup screen |
First
up, and probably the most noticable change to
the IDE is that there is only one. If you have
a full version of Visual Studio You'll know that
you launch a different program for each language
you want to use (VB, VC++, VJ++ etc...), and there
would be a different entry in the start-menu for
each one. Now there is one, and only one, program
to run - Visual Studio .Net. There are additional
programs for the supporting tools, and one for
the "Combined Help Collection" (a bit
like the MSDN library of Visual Studio 6). Once
you've loaded the program (very fast) you get
a pretty welcome screen and can then get to work
on a project of any language you have installed.
|
| (2)
Hiding Unwanted information |
The Second most important change has to be the
tool windows. There are upwards of 15 windows
displaying various pieces of information and properties
that exist in Visual Studio .Net (all the old
VB6-like ones and some new ones that were only
in VC++6 before), therefore organising these windows
is of top priority, and has to be done well. Even
though there were only usually 4 additional windows
(properties, toolbox, immediate window and project
explorer) in most VB6 interfaces, I always felt
that this left little space for the actual code-editing,
and I often closed the windows to get more space
(only to find I needed to get at them quickly
to change a property/go to a different file).
Click on the image to the right (number 2) to
get a better look at what I'm going to be talking
about. In order as marked on the screenshot; number
1 is the active document tab - when you have several
code windows open they stack up along here (click
on them to change), as well as the MSDN help files
and the object browser (in this instance). This
makes it very easy to jump from file to file with
little effort, and you can always see what files
you have open, and you can easily jump from the
help page to your source code - a very useful
feature. Number 2 is shown in 3 places here -
in particular, the left, bottom and right sides
of the screen. These 3 locations act as docking
bays for all the possible windows that exist in
the IDE, when you hover over the relevent icon/tab
it'll slide out onto the screen (as you can see
with the solution-explorer on the right hand side
of this screen). This alone is extremely useful,
and I've really come to love it (one of the features
I'd really like to use in VB6/VC++6 now!), it
is possible to stop the windows from being hidden
by clicking on the little pin icon in every window,
but I personally prefer to hide them. The only
annoying thing I've found with this method (and
it is minor) is that when I knock my mouse to
one side to begin typing it often hits the edge
of the screen, displaying the appropriate window
- which can see you typing your code into one
of the text boxes in the relevent tool window.
Third, and finally for this screenshot is number
3 - which at first doesn't look like anything
special at all. Look again and you'll notice a
small [+] sign in the margin of the code window,
if you click on this button (or the box with 3
dots) it'll expand a section of code (in this
case a repetative bunch of File-writing calls).
This is collapsable code, and can be quite useful
once you get used to it, being nothing like anything
in VB6 it is quite easy to go about ignoring it
and continuing as normal (perfectly acceptable
I suppose!). All functions, modules and classes
come with a set of [+]'s and [-]'s, so you can
"roll up" an entire function if you
dont want to look at it, I've found this to be
useful when browsing through large projects -
hiding entire functions that are either complete,
or dont need any work done to them makes browsings
the source file very easy indeed.
Okay,
the final things I want to point out is the code
editing functions - as you're probably aware,
VB6 had intellisense that went along and provided
tooltips, suggestions and capitalized variable
names etc... This is still present in .Net, but
its gone up a level so to speak. One of the first
annoying things from past versions of VB to be
removed is the error-checking when you finish
a line (if you type something bad, it goes red
and you get a message box saying why), now all
it does is draw a blue "squiggle" under
the bad code (much like spelling mistakes in Microsoft
Office), and if you hover over the text it'll
give (in tooltip form) a brief explanation of
why its marked that code. I like this more subtle
approach, and it allows you to hop around your
code much easier without having to complete the
current line first.
|
|
| (3)
An example of the subtle error-warnings. If
you dont correct this now it'll come back
when you attempt to compile the program |
The
other noticable change is the indenting/collapsing
of code - users of Visual C++ 6 will be familiar
with this, but it's new for editing VB code. Basically,
when you type "If ... Then" and press
enter it'll automatically add a blank line then
an "End If", and when you type in the
blank line it'll indent it for you. This can be
a blessing and a curse, a blessing because once
you get used to it you can really write code very
fast without having to worry about forgetting
little pieces. A curse because if you're not used
to it, it'll drive you mad, and if you dont like
it, you're just gonna have to get used to it!
For the first few projects I wrote in VB.Net I
kept on typing my own "End If"'s and
"Next" statements, thus doubling up
- and causing it to "blue-line" my line
of code because it doesn't actually mean anything.
Also, the auto-indentation feature messes with
my typing style quite alot, I often like to indent
functions and lines of code that are related to
each other - if I do this now, it often likes
to undo this and put it in its own style!
|
|
| (4)
The New improved intellisense tooltips, the
description at the bottom changes as you type
different parameters. (click to enlarge) |
The
tooltips and intellisense, whilst much better
are still not perfect, I've gotten some noticable
delays while the program loads the relevent tool-tip
into memory (or whatever its doing!); it's not
usually more than 1/2 a second, and if I'm typing
it doesn't "loose" what I type so no
real harm is done; however, this is on my 700mhz
Athlon / 288mb SysRAM - not the fastest computer
around, but far from being a slow computer,
so if I'm getting a noticable pause on this system
it may well prove to be much more annoying on
a properly slow system (450mhz and below
I'm guessing).
As
you can see, there are lots and lots of features
to talk about in the new IDE, and if you get a
chance to / decide to use this software you'll
probably find a whole host of other features (I'm
still finding the occasional short-cut/clever
feature). I think I can safely say that all of
the above covers the ground-breaking new tools,
and apart from the code-indenting and the slight
delay with intellisense it's a general all-round
improvement. I know that it is a definite improvement
because I still have (and use) Visual Studio 6
on this computer - and when I go back into the
older versions and start working away I find that
I'm really missing some of the short-cuts and
interface features that I've started getting used
to in VisualStudio.Net.
To
continue with the review click here
or click here
to return to "Getting Started with Visual
Studio .Net"
•
Introduction:
Introducing the software, and the aims of this
review.
• Getting
Started With Visual Studio .Net:
The installer, version, prices etc...
• The new IDE: New
things in the Integrated Development Environment,
and is it an improvement?
• Learning
to Talk the Talk:
Learning the new language (C#) and the changes
to Visual Basic
• Visual
Studio .Net in the Real World:
Performance and real world capabilities
• Conclusion:
Summing everything up in a neat way
|
