Microsoft Visual Basic 2010 Step by Step eBook

466 Part IV Database and Web Programming

Since the names are listed alphabetically from A to Z, Zimprich is now last in the list of

faculty members.

13. Scroll through the remainder of the records, and then verify that it is now in ascending
    alphabetical order.


14. Click the Close button to end the program.

You’re on your way with building custom queries by using SQL statements and Query Builder.

Database programming is a complex topic, but you have already learned much that will help

you build datacentric applications—highly personalized collections of data that benefit the

user and his or her computing needs—in Visual Basic. You will continue exploring the theme

of rich data access in Chapter 19. And in Chapter 20, your final project will be displaying

database records on a Web site.

Chapter 18 Quick Reference

To Do This

Establish a connection

to a database

Click the Add New Data Source command on the Data menu, and then

use the Data Source Configuration Wizard to browse to the database you

want to provide access for by building a connection string.

Create a dataset Using the Data Source Configuration Wizard, specify a name for the

dataset in the DataSet Name box, expand the Tables node in the tree

view of your database presented by the wizard, and then specify the

tables and fields that you want to include in your dataset. (A dataset

need not include all database tables and fields .)

Create bound objects

capable of displaying

data from a dataset

on a Windows form

After running the Data Source Configuration Wizard, open the Data

Sources window, and drag tables, fields, or both to the Windows form.

To control the type of bound control created by Visual Studio for a

table or field, click its arrow and select a control from the list box before

dragging it. If you placed a control on the form before adding data sources

to the project, bind a database object to the control by dragging the

database objects from the Data Sources window onto the control on the

form. Alternatively, set an object’s DataBinding properties to a valid field

(column) in the dataset. (One of the most useful DataBinding properties

is Text .)

Add navigation controls

to a Windows form

When a valid database object is dragged from the Data Sources window

to a Windows form in the Designer, a navigation toolbar is added

automatically to the form. To customize the buttons on this toolbar,

right-click the BindingNavigator object in the component tray, and then

click Edit Items.

Format database

information on a form

Use a MaskedTextBox control to format the content of string data in

the dataset. The MaskedTextBox control offers many useful input masks

and the ability to create custom string formats.

Filter or sort database

information stored

in a dataset

Use SQL statements to create custom queries in the Visual Studio Query

Builder, and then add these queries to a toolbar on a Windows form.

After you master Query Builder, you’ll be ready to experiment with LINQ.