.

NET Fundamentals

Week 1

November 6, 2003
 Introduction

• Chip Schopp
• www.pondviewsoftware.com
• chipschopp@comcast.net
• (978) 779-5126
 Class Schedule – November 6, 2003
• Introductions and other beginning stuff…
• Review Class Syllabus / Class Goals
• Class Dates
• Introduction to .NET
• Introduction to C#
• Class Exercise(s)
• Homework Assignment
.Net Fundamentals
CT-186
 Text Books

• Applied .NET Framework Programming

by Jeffrey Richter

• Programming C# by Jessie Liberty

 Grades

• 5 take-home assignments (75%)

• Final Exam (part of last class) (25%)
 Prerequisites

Fundamental of Programming (CT100)

or
by permission of the instructor.
Class Goals

8
 Class Goals
• Provide an overview of the .NET Architecture
with Major Components
• Programming Languages
• ADO.NET
• ASP.NET
• Web Services
• XML Integration
 Class Goals

Understand the .NET Frameworks as an Object

Oriented Strongly Typed Computing
Environment
 Class Goals

• Work with various .NET Framework

components
• Common Language Runtime (CLR)
• .NET Framework Class Library (FCL)
• Assemblies
• Strong Names
• The Global Assembly Cache (GAC)
• Using the GACUTIL
 Class Goals

Introduction to the C# Programming Language

 Course Schedule
Week Topics
1 Introduction to .NET Framework, C#
2 Basic C# Windows Forms Programming
3 Types, Objects, and Classes in .NET
4 .NET ADO and XML
5 Exceptions, Intro to ASP.NET, Assemblies
6 Web Services, Final Exam

13
 Class Dates
• Class Dates ( 6, 7, or 8 classes ?)
• November 6, 13, 20 – December 4, 11, 18
• November 27, Thanksgiving, no class
• Other possible dates:
• Monday November 24th
• Monday December 1st
• Monday December 8th or Tuesday December 9th
• Monday December 15th or Tuesday December 16th
• Or ?
 Effective Learning
• First is Doing
• Class exercises
• Coaching
• Helping each other
• Homework
• Second is Discussing
• Class discussions
• Asking questions
• Sharing ideas and information
• Last is Listening
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 Learning Environment

• Learn something  Write some code

• Homework Assignments
Write some code

Programming is Fun!
The only dumb questions
are the ones not asked!

17
 Time to Address Open Questions

• Begin each class with a time for questions

• Questions left open from previous classes
• Questions emailed to me during the week
• Questions triggered by the homework
• Or other ???

18
 Your introductions

• Programming background
• Operating systems, languages
• Any exposure to .NET ? Other courses ?
• What do you expect to get out of this course ?
Please email me the following…
• Full Name, Nick Name, Student ID #
• Home Phone / Work Phone

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Email Address (s) [email gives me
one]
• Your background in computing/programming
• Any experience with .NET, other courses, ?
• Your objective or goals for this course
• Any material you have a special interest in
covering?
• Any issues or questions that you have?
• Additional dates you can attend classes on.
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22
 What Is the Microsoft .NET
Framework?
The Microsoft® .NET Framework is an
important new component of the
Microsoft Windows® family of operating
systems. It is the foundation of the next
generation of Windows-based
applications that are easier to build,
deploy, and integrate with other
networked systems.
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 The .NET Initiative

“To create rich applications…, businesses

must offer a programmatic interface to their
business logic services … [which] must be
callable remotely using a network like the
Internet. Simply stated, the .NET initiative is
about connecting information, people and
devices”
- Jeff Richter
 What Is the Microsoft .NET
Framework?
Most consumers will never notice that
the .NET Framework is running on their
Pocket PC, smartphone, or desktop
computer. But they may appreciate the
reliability, ease of use, and ability to
connect to other systems that the .NET
Framework helps bring to computers.

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What Is the Microsoft .NET
Framework?
The .NET Framework helps software
developers and systems administrators
more easily build and maintain systems
with improvements toward performance,
security, and reliability. Here's how.

26
A New Approach to Building
Windows Software
The .NET Framework simplifies Windows
software development. It provides developers
with a single approach to build both desktop
applications—sometimes called smart client
applications—and Web-based applications. It
also enables developers to use the same tools
and skills to develop software for a variety of
systems ranging from handheld smartphones
to large server installations.
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A New Approach to Building
Windows Software
Software built on the .NET Framework
can be easier to deploy and maintain
than conventional software. Applications
can be designed to automatically
upgrade themselves to the latest
version. The .NET Framework can also
minimize conflicts between applications
by helping incompatible software
components coexist.
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 Benefits of the .NET
Framework
• Helps IT professionals better integrate
existing systems with its native support for
Web services.
• Assists with the deployment of software to
both users and Web servers.
• Facilitates the development of software with
improved reliability, scalability, performance,
and security.

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 Helps developers be more
productive by:
• Making it easier for them to reuse existing
code.
• Enabling them to more easily integrate
components written in any of the more than
20 supported programming languages.
• Helping them more easily build software for
a wide range of devices using same skills
and tools.

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 The Development Environment –
Visual Studio.NET
• Finally , Visual Studio truly becomes an
Integrated Development Environment, with
multi-language development.
• Runs on Windows 2000, NT, XP and the .NET
server family.
• Support for building 32 and 64 bit applications
• Usual gamut of wizards, debuggers, linkers…
• Plenty of good documentation
• Free .NET Framework SDK – compilers, tools,
documentation
 The Development/Runtime
platform – the .NET Framework
• The new runtime environment in .NET
• Provides a set of base classes for
developers to build on
• A unified type system to allow language
inter-operability
• This course deals with the fundamentals of
programming this framework
 To summarize, .NET is…
• An OS platform
• The .NET Enterprise Servers.NET building
block services
• .NET Device Software
• The Development Environment – Visual
Studio.NET
• The Development/Runtime platform –
the .NET Framework
 The .NET Framework

• Think of what device drivers do in terms of

abstracting access by an application
Application

Windows

Mouse Scanner

Driver Driver
 The .NET Framework
• If we abstract the underlying OS in the
same way…

Application

.NET Framework

Windows FreeBSD Windows

XP
UNIX 2000
 The .NET Framework

• The .NET Framework introduces a layer of

abstraction (and obviously, some overhead)
to the OS as we currently know it.
• Is this reason enough to move to it ? Let’s
look at the state of Windows development
without .NET…
 The current state of affairs
• Win32/C programming
• Fairly low-level, not object oriented, interoperability
with other languages is hard, memory leaks an
issue.
• C++/MFC programming
• Large language, complex idioms, prone to abuse,
interoperability with other languages and other C+
+ implementations still hard, memory leaks still an
issue
• Visual Basic programming
• Object aware, but not object oriented.
• Interop with other languages possible, but ugly.
 The current state of affairs
• COM programming
• Allows you cross language integration at the binary
level.
• Interface based programming encouraged
• Fairly complex to understand and set up
• Deployment is registry based, fairly fragile.
• Distributed COM was notoriously hard to set up
because of the security issues involved
• A Microsoft-only solution
• Java programming
• Great language, but no cross language integration.
• Interpreted byte-code did have performance issues
 The current state of affairs
• Into the mix just discussed, throw in
JavaScript, ASP, HTML, DHTML
• Everything we just talked about has it’s
own runtime engine/environment, it’s
own set of libraries and it’s own set of
development tools.
• In a highly connected world, our
solutions need to span languages,
machines and network boundaries.
 What the .NET Framework gives us
• Consistent programming model
• A simple OO programming model
• Application component isolation
• Newer versions can be installed safely
• Goes a long way in helping improve DLL Hell
• Simplified installation model
• Xcopy, no registry entries
• Uninstalls involve just deleting files/folders
• Shared components easier to install than COM
components
 What the .NET Framework gives us
• Multi-platform support
• The fact that the OS is abstracted away, with code
compiled to an intermediate language makes this
possible
• Cross language integration
• This is in contrast with COM’s cross-language
interoperation. Types can be used between
languages.
• This also makes cross language debugging
possible.
• Automatic memory management
• Reduces the incidence of memory leaks . The
Visual Basic runtime has done this for sometime,
but it is now available to all languages
 What the .NET Framework gives us
• Code verifiability
• Rich type information gives us the ability to check
that code is operating safely
• e.g. Buffer overflows prevented.
• Consistent error handling mechanism
• Exceptions used instead of error codes and
HRESULTS
• Exceptions have to be handled – cannot ignore
them
• Code security
• Signing allows the runtime to verify that code has
not been tampered with.
• Code access security associates permissions with
code.
43
Basic Components of the .NET
Framework

The .NET Framework consists of two

main parts:
• common language runtime
• .NET Framework class library

44
 The heart of the Framework
• The most important elements of the
franework are:
• The Common Language Runtime (CLR)
• The Framework Class Libraries (FCL)
ASP.NET WinForms

Framework Class Library

Base Data XML …

Common Language Runtime

OS Services
Common Language Runtime
•Provides the common services for .NET
Framework applications.
•Programs can be written for the common
language runtime in just about every language,
including C, C++, C#, and Microsoft Visual
Basic®, as well as some older languages such
as Fortran.
•The runtime simplifies programming by
assisting with many mundane tasks of writing
code, including memory management—which
can be a big generator of bugs—security
management, and error handling.
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Common Language Runtime (CLR)
• Locates, loads and runs code written in
runtime-aware languages.
• Handles object creation, memory
management, making method calls, enforces
code security and provides a process
abstraction.
• Code that targets the CLR is called managed
code, while code that uses the native OS
services directly is called unmanaged code.
• Languages that can produce managed code
(or .NET programming languages)
• C#, VB.NET, VC++ with managed extensions,
Fujitsu COBOL.NET, Jscript.NET, Eiffel, Python,
Perl…
 Managed Module

A Managed Module is a standard windows

portable executable (PE) file that requires the
CLR to execute.

48
 Managed Code
Code executed and managed by the Microsoft® .NET
Framework, specifically by the .NET Framework's
common language runtime.
Managed code must supply the information necessary
for the common language runtime to provide services
such as memory management, cross-language
integration, code access security, and automatic
lifetime control of objects.
All code based on Microsoft Intermediate Language
executes as managed code.
.NET Framework Class Library

The library includes prepackaged sets of

functionality that developers can use to more
rapidly extend the capabilities of their own
software. The library includes three key
components:
• o  ASP.NET to help build Web applications and
Web services.
• o  Windows Forms to facilitate smart client user
interface development.
• o  ADO.NET to help connect applications to
databases. 50
Framework Class Library (FCL)
• Provides base class libraries available to
all .NET programming languages.
• Access to primitive types, file I/O, graphical
rendering, crypto, GUI, XML support, etc.

Think of the CLR as abstracting the underlying

OS (e.g. Windows), and the FCL as
abstracting the OS libraries. (e.g. Win32)
 Platforms the CLR runs on
• Windows 98, Windows 98 SE, Windows Me
• Windows NT 4.0 with SP 6.0a or greater
• Windows XP family
• Windows .NET Server (Whistler)
• Windows PocketPC 2002 (with the .NET
Compact Framework).
• FreeBSD Unix (Rotor)
• Linux (Ximian’s Mono)
53
 An introduction to C#

• C# is a language that was developed by

Microsoft specifically targeted for the .NET
platform.
 C# Features
• No pointers
• Automatic memory management
• Completely object-oriented
• Supports interface-based programming
• Both implementation inheritance and interface
inheritance supported
• Support for overloaded operators
• Support for aspect-based (attribute-based)
programming
• Can only produce managed-code
Let’s try a simple program.

56
• Create a Working Directory
mkdir k:\week1\hello
• Copy corvars.bat
copy
c:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio.NET
\FrameworkSDK\bin\corvars.bat
k:\week1\hello\corvars.bat
• Set up environment, run covars.bat
Cd k:\week1\hello
Type corvars.bat <hit return>
57
Open notepad, create the following file and
save it in the k:\week1\hello directory as
hello.cs.
class Hello
{
static void Main()
{
System.Console.WriteLine("Hello World");
}
}
• Compile the program
k:\week1\hello>csc Hello.cs

• Run the program

K:\week1\hello>Hello.exe
K:\week1\hello> Hello World

59
60
 C#.NET Language Basics
•Types in C#
•Defining integer types
•A Bit About Strings
•Reading From and Writing To The Console
•If Then Statement
•Looping – The For Next Statement 
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 Primitive Types

C# Type .NET Framework type

bool System.Boolean

byte System.Byte

sbyte System.Sbyte

char System.Char

decimal System.Decimal

double System.Double

float System.Single
 Primitive Types (contd.)

int System.Int32

uint System.UInt32

long System.Int64

ulong System.UInt64

object System.Object

short System.Int16

ushort System.UInt16

string System.String
 A word on types
• All types in .NET derive from System.Object
• They are provided implementations of ToString()
and GetType()
• To get a string with the type of any variable, you
can call <var>.GetType()
• Whenever you call Console.WriteLine(obj) the
ToString() method on obj is implicitly called. The
default ToString implementation for classes simply
returns the name of the class.
 What Are Integers
0, 432, -5, 10000000, -10000000
Integers are whole numbers

Integer variables are stored as signed 32-bit

(4-byte) integers ranging in value from
-2,147,483,648 through 2,147,483,647.
 Defining Integers
int i;
int i, j, k;
int i = 12;
j = i;  j is now equal to 12
i = 15;
k = i + j;  k is equal to 27
To write an Integer, convert it to a String using:
k.ToString();
A Bit About Strings

67
 What are strings?
“abcdef” “Abcdef” “aBcdEf” “A23+-/*789” “q”
“John J. Smith”
“How do you do?”
“123 South Street, Calais, ME 04235”
“ Are we there? ”
“”  an empty string
 How do we define strings?
string strTmp;
strTmp = “time will tell”;
string strTmp = “time will tell”;

strTmp = Console.ReadLine();

string strTmp2;
strTmp2 = strTmp;
strTmp2  “time will tell”
 Concatenating Strings
string strCity = “Calais”;
string strState = “ME”;
string strZip = “04270”;
string strLoc;
strLoc = strCity + “, ” + strState + “ ” + strZip;
strLoc  “Calais, ME 04270”
 Some String Functions

string strTmp;
strTmp.Trim(); – removes leading and trailing spaces
strTmp.ToUpper(); – converts string to all upper case
strTmp.ToLower(); – converts string to all lower case
strTmp.Length; – returns string length as an integer
strTmp.SubString() – extracts a substring
 String Function Examples

string strTmp = “ Hello World ”;

strTmp.Trim();
strTmp  “Hello World”

string strTmp = “Hello World”;

strTmp.ToLower();  “hello world”
strTmp.ToUpper();  “HELLO WORLD”
 String.Length Function

string strTmp;
strTmp = “in the beginning”;
The value of strTmp.Length is 16.
int i;
i = strTmp.Length;

The value of i is 16.

 String.SubString() Function
String.Substring(startIndex , length );

Parameters (are Integers)

startIndex – Where the substring starts.
startIndex is zero-based.
length – The number of characters in the
substring.
 Substring Examples
string strTmp;
strTmp = “around the world”;
strTmp.Substring(0,6);  “around”
strTmp.Substring(11,5);  “world”
strTmp.Substring(0,strTmp.Length);
 “around the world”
 Writing to the Console
Console.WriteLine(String); write with line return
Console.WriteLine(“Hi There”)
C:\>Hi There
C:\>
Console.Write(String); – write with no line return
Console.Write(“Hi There”)
C:\>Hi There
 Reading from the Console
Console.ReadLine(); – returns a string
string tmp;
Console.Write(“What is your name? ”);
tmp = Console.ReadLine();
Console.WriteLine(“Hi “ + tmp);
C:\>What is your name? Chip
C:\>Hi Chip
C:\>
 if Statement

if (some condition is true)

{
do something in here,
using one or more lines of code…
}
What is difference between = and ==?

= is for assignment of value

String tmpString = “Hello world”;
int i = 12;

== is for equivalence
if (str1 == str2) { some code }
if (str.Length == 0) { some code }
if (str1 != “end”) { some code }
79
 Sample if Statement

string strInput ;
strInput = Console.ReadLine();
if (strInput == “”)
{
Console.WriteLine(“Input required.”);
}
The For Loop

81
 A Simple For Loop
int i;
for (i = 1; i<10; i++)
{
Console.WriteLine("The value of i is " + i.ToString());
}

The Value of i is 1
The Value of i is 2
The Value of i is 3
…
The Value of i is 9
The Value of i is 10
 Or You Could Reverse It…
int i;
for (i = 10; i>0; i--)
{
Console.WriteLine("The value of i is " + i.ToString());
}

The Value of i is 10
The Value of i is 9
The Value of i is 8
…
The Value of i is 2
The Value of i is 1
 To Walk Through a String

string tmp = “hello world”;

for (int k = 0; k< tmp.Length-1;k++)
{
Console.WriteLine(tmp.Substring(k,1));
}
To Walk Through a String Backward

string tmp = "hello world";

for (int k =tmp.Length-1;k>-1;k--)
{
Console.WriteLine(tmp.Substring(k,1));
}
 What About?

What If We Want To Enter More Data?

What If No String Is Entered?
What If The Entered String Is Too Long?
How Do We Know When We Are Done?
 What If We Want To Enter More Data?
Labels
A Label is Defined with a Colon  ReturnHere:

goto Statements
goto Statements Direct Program Flow To A Label
goto ReturnHere;

GoTo Statements are Evil and High Risk!!!

 What If No String Is Entered?

Checking for a zero length string.

if (tmpStr.Length == 0)
{
Console.WriteLine(“No String Entered”);
goto ReturnHere;
}

Note: You could also check for tmpStr == “”

 What If The Entered String Is Too Long?
Let’s only work with strings up to 10 characters…
if (strTmp.Length > 10)
{
strTmp = strTmp.SubString(0,10);
}
 How Do We Know When We Are Done?
Let’s check for the string “end” to end the program…

if (strTmp == “end”)
{
return;
}

Note: return tells the program to exit the subroutine, which in this
case will end the program.
 Comments in C#

• Both /* … */ and // can be used for

comments.
• VS provides comment/uncomment
selections.
• Use the menu bar, or Ctrl-K Ctrl-C for comment
and Ctrl-K Ctrl-U for uncomment

91
92
Now let’s redo hello.cs as a
Visual Studio project.

93
 Visual Studio.NET
• The newest version of Visual Studio
• Multiple language development finally in one
environment.
• Can program in
• Visual C#
• Visual Basic.NET
• Visual C++.NET
• Can build
• Desktop console and GUI applications
• Web services
• ASP.NET Web applications
• Mobile applications
 To get Visual Studio.NET

• You need to purchase either:

• An MSDN subscription
• A copy of Visual Studio.NET
• Academic editions are available (in or
through the bookstore ?)
 Visual Studio.NET
• Start up Visual Studio.NET
• Open a new project by either:
• Clicking on the New Project button on the Start
Page OR
• File-> New-> Project from the Menu Bar
• In Visual C# Projects, create a Console
Application
• Implement the Main() method
• Notice you now have IntelliSense
• Add the Console.WriteLine… line of code.
• Compile using the Build menu.
• Run using the Debug menu
Your code should look like this…
using System;

namespace HelloVS
{
/// <summary>
/// Summary description for App.
/// </summary>
class App
{
/// <summary>
/// The main entry point for the application.
/// </summary>
[STAThread]
static void Main(string[] args)
{
System.Console.WriteLine("Hello World");
}
}
}
 Class Exercise (time permitting)
Using the Visual Studio.NET write an interactive
console program to accept information from the
keyboard and then format and display the
information back. It might be a person’s name and
address or a variable list of favorite pets including
name and type of animal or whatever. Focus on
formatting the data, looping to accept multiple
entries, testing for missing information and also
testing for an at end condition. A sample, somewhat
simplified example is in the Class Collections zip file
on the web (i.e. www.PondviewSoftware.com).
98
99
 Homework Part 1
Send Me An Email  ChipSchopp@comcast.net, include the
following: 
1. Full Name, Nick Name, Student ID #
2. Home Phone / Work Phone
3. Email Address (s) [email gives me one]
4. Your background in computing/programming
5. Any experience with .NET, other courses, ?
6. Your objective or goals for this course
7. Any material you have a special interest in covering?
8. Any issues or questions that you have?
9. Which additional dates you would attend classes on.
 Homework Part 2

C#.Net Programming
Homework Assignment – Week 1
Assignment Due: November 13, 2003 5:30 PM
 
 

101
Write a C#.NET Console Application, which
performs the following:
1. Accepts a first name string, a middle name string, and a last name
string from the console. The first name and last name are required.
The middle name is optional.
2. Concatenates the two or three fields together creating a full name
string.
3. Truncates the full name to 20 characters if the length of the full name
is longer than 20 characters.
4. Provides the capability of displaying the full name either vertically or
horizontally and forward or backward as desired.
5. Allows the full name field to be displayed in either of these four ways
as many times as desired.
6. Allows the user to go back to the top and start over, entering a new
name.
7. Terminates gracefully.
 Note:
  There was enough information discussed in today’s class to complete
this assignment. Feel free to use any additional commands,
102
structures, or functions you wish.
103