Many Readers of this Book are former Visual Basic 6 developers who are moving on to the latest Microsoft flavor of the Basic language. If you’re one of those users, then this appendix probably isn’t for you.
Others, however, may be coming over to the Visual Basic language from some other development language. Perhaps you’re a COBOL mainframe developer new to Windows development in general, or maybe you’re a Java programmer unfamiliar with the syntax of Basic. This appendix serves as an introduction to the constructs used in the Basic language.
A third class of reader might be one who is new to programming altogether and wants Visual Basic .NET to become his first foray into the programming world. For that class of user, this book will help you ascend that mountain, but I also recommend some additional reading:
If you’re a beginner, check out How Computer Programming Works by Dan Appleman (Apress, 2000).
Also by Dan Appleman is Moving to VB .NET: Strategies, Concepts, and Code, Second Edition (Apress, 2001). This book gets into some of the origins of the language and why some features are the way they are.
If you’re into the “learn-by-doing” style, I recommend Karl Moore’s Visual Basic .NET: The Tutorials by Karl Moore (Apress, 2002).
If you want to focus on Web development, Programming the Web with Visual Basic .NET by Constance Petersen, Lynn Torkelson, and Zac Torkelson (Apress, 2002) is worth perusing.
If you have a background in mainframe programming, then COBOL and Visual Basic on .NET: A Guide for the Reformed Mainframe Programmer by Chris L. Richardson (Apress, 2003) will help you upgrade your skills.
For more background on object-oriented programming concepts, An Introduction to Object-Oriented Programming with Visual Basic .NET by Dan Clark (Apress, 2002) will be of great help.
Finally, if you’re into short, quick example programs that demonstrate specific concepts or techniques, then my first .NET book Visual Basic .NET Codemaster’s Library (Sybex, 2002) should prove useful.