BUS2011

Programming for business applications II

S B Huxford

6 points
* Two 1-hour lectures and one 1-hour tutorial per week
* First semester
* Clayton
* Prohibitions: RDT1301, SFT1122

Objectives At the completion of this subject students should have developed the skills necessary to create non-trivial, PC-based, business applications and be familiar with the features of a typical application development environment including commonly offered advanced features and capabilities. Students should also have gained a practical knowledge of an application's capabilities and responsibilities in the Windows environment.

Synopsis Although not a formal prerequisite for this subject some application development experience is assumed. Such experience can be typically gained in a first-year programming course. Students wishing to take the subject without such experience should expect to do some extra background reading. The emphasis in this subject is on the development of business applications. Within this context the following topics are examined. Accessing creating and manipulating foreign databases, file processing (random, sequential and binary access), Multiple Document Interfaces, communication between applications including via clipboard, DDE, OLE and OLE automation, calling procedures in DLL's, building context sensitive help systems, distributing completed applications, yielding the CPU to other applications, COM and ActiveX. Throughout the subject existing practical examples are first analysed then modified and finally new applications are created. Although modern application development analysis, design and implementation techniques are discussed and encouraged, the emphasis in this subject does not permit detailed theoretical discussion of such techniques. Such discussion is waived in favour of strictly practical topics.

Assessment Tutorial and assignments: 30%
* Examination (2 hours): 70%

Recommended texts

Visual BASIC on-line help (This is not a book but an electronic document that can be accessed by students in laboratory classes. Students are not required to purchase.)