"Babes-Bolyai" University of Cluj-Napoca
Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science

Rapid application development
Code
Semes-
ter
Hours: C+S+L
Credits
Type
Section
MI067
7
2+0+2
6
optional
Informatică
MI067
5
2+0+2
5
optional
Matematică-Informatică
Teaching Staff in Charge
Prof. PÂRV Bazil, Ph.D., bparv@cs.ubbcluj.ro
Aims
Learning, understanding, and using of the core concepts of Rapid Application Development by using visual development environments.
The course covers two main aspects of Rapid Application Development: the design of GUI - Graphical User Interfaces, and the manipulation of persistent data (database maintenance). The development environment used is Microsoft Visual Basic.
Content
1. THE MICROSOFT VISUAL BASIC DEVELOPMENT ENVIRONMENT AND PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE
1.1. GENERAL ISSUES
1.2. THE PROCESS OF DESIGNING A VB APPLICATION
1.3. THE VISUAL BASIC PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE
2. THE DESIGN OF GRAPHICAL USER INTERFACES (GUI)
2.1. THE WINDOWS INTERFACE. DESIGN PRINCIPLES
2.2. WINDOW OBJECTS
3. GUI: FORMS AND CONTROLS
3.1. USER INTERFACE DESIGN
3.3. THE FORM OBJECT IN VB 3.0
3.4. STANDARD (INTRINSIC) CONTROLS
3.5. THE EVOLUTION OF FORM AND INSTRINSIC CONTROL OBJECTS IN DIFFERENT VB VERSIONS
4. USING THE CONTROLS
4.1. THE FORM DESIGN AND THE USE OF CONTROLS. GENERAL ISSUES
4.2. THE USE OF CONTROLS
5. CONTROLS FOR ENTERING AND DISPLAYING TEXT
5.1. THE LABEL CONTROL
5.2. THE TEXT BOX CONTROL
5.3. SCROLLBAR CONTROLS
6. FRAME, CHECK BOX ŞI OPTION BUTTON CONTROLS
6.1. CONTROLS FOR SELECTION
6.2. HRUPUNG CONTROLS IN A FORM. THE FRAME CONTROL
6.3.THE CHECK BOX CONTROL
6.4.THE OPTION (RADIO) BUTTON CONTROL
7. LIST BOXES AND COMBO BOXES
7.1. SELECTING AN OPTION
7.2. THE LIST BOX CONTROL
7.3. TYPES (STYLES) OF COMBO BOX CONTROLS
7.4. THE FUNCTIONALITY OF COMBO BOX CONTROLS
8. MENUS
8.1. MENU-BASED USER INTERFACE
8.2 THE MENU CONTROL
8.3. THE MENU DESIGN PROCESS
8.4. CONTEXTUAL (POP-UP) MENUS
9. DIALOG BOXES
9.1. THE DIALOG BOXES AND THE GUI
9.2. SIMPLE DIALOG BOXES
9.3. CUSTOM DIALOG BOXES
9.4. THE FUNCTIONALITY OF DIALOG BOXES
9.5. INTRINSIC CONTROLS FOR FILE MANIPULATION
9.6. THE SYNCHRONIZTION OF INTRINSIC CONTROLS FOR FILE MANIPULATION
10. THE COMMON DIALOG CONTROL
10.1. GENERAL ISSUES CONCERNING THE COMMON DIALOG CONTROL
10.2. ERROR TRAPPING IN VB - AN INTRODUCTION
10.3. THE USE OF COMMON DIALOG CONTROL
10.4. TEXT FILES IN VISUAL BASIC - AN INTRODUCTION
10.5. THE PRINTER OBJECT - AN INTRODUCTION
11. THE GRID CONTROL
11.1. THE GRID CONTROL: DESCRIPTION, PROPERTIES, EVENTS, AND METHODS
11.2. PROGRAMMING TECHNIQUES
11.3. THE GRID CONTROL MANIPULATION
11.4. SOME WORDS ON MODULARIZATION
12. ACCSSING DATABASES IN VB
12.1. DATABASES. GENERAL ISSUES
12.2. THE USE OF VB PROGRAMMING ENVIRONMENT FOR ACCESSING DATABASES
12.3. RECORDSET OBJECTS
12.4. THE DATA CONTROL
12.5. EXAMPLES

Each chapter is presented in a two-hour lecture, with the only exception of chapter 12, which takes three two-hour lectures. The lectures take the form of PowerPoint presentations and live examples. The students are invited to read the course material in advance.

Lab work

In the first 7 weeks of the term, the lab activities are as follows:
1. The first contact with the VB programming environment
2. Creating a simple VB application
3. The design of a form for displaying and entering data
4. The design of an application with menus and multiple forms (2 weeks)
5. Accessing a database using Data Control and user-designed dialog boxes (2 weeks)

In the middle of the term (7th week), each student will choose a problem to be solved by writing a VB application and communicate the problem name to the lab advisor. The labs in the next 7 weeks are dedicated to the completion of the project work. The last week of the term will consist of presenting the individual projects.
The minimal requirements for an individual project are as follows:
- the problem to be solved is a real one;
- it uses persistent data stored in a database with at least five tables;
- it covers the following general functionality: database maintenance, problem-specific processing, report generation, on-line help and/or user documentation.

The course and lab materials are available on the Computer Science Department's server, in the folder ..\labor\romana\an3\rad.
References
1. Chip Anderson, Windows UI Standards for Visual Basic Programmers, Microsoft TechNet CD, 1995.
2. Michael Halvorson, Visual Basic 4 for Windows Step by Step, Microsoft Press, 1995.
3. Adrian King, Inside Windows 95, Microsoft Press, 1995
4. Microsoft Corp., The Windows Interface - An Application Design Guide, Microsoft Press, 1993.
5. Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0. Ghidul programatorului, Teora & Microsoft Press, Bucuresti, 1998.
6. Microsoft Corp., Windows Interface Guidelines for Software Design, Microsoft Press, 1995 (inclusa în MSDN Library - Microsoft Visual Studio 6.0)
7. Bazil Pârv, Interfete Windows, PC-Report, Decembrie 1996.
8. Bazil Pârv, Visual Basic în serial, PC-Report, ianuarie 1997 - octombrie 1998.
9. D.F. Scott, Visual Basic for Windows Developer's Guide, SAMS Publishing, 1992.
Assessment
The assessment method is practical exam, which consists of the presentation (including a demonstration) of the chosen software project. The final mark (on a ten points scale, one point by default) will be obtained as:
a) Lab activity: 2 pts
b) Practical exam: 7 pts
1. Functionality 2 pts
2. User interface: 2 pts
3. The solution for accesing database: 1 pt
4. User friendliness: 1 pt
5. Documentation and/or on-line help: 1 pt