T OOLS AND E NVIRONMENT U SED

APPLICATION : DATABASE MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

(STUDENT INFORMATION SYSTEM)

OPERATING SYSTEM : WINDOWS XP (Professional)

FRONT END /GUI TOOLS : VISUAL BASIC 6.0(Professional)

RDBMS/BACK END : ORACLE 8i

ODBC DRIVERS : (I) MICROSOFT ODBC FOR ORACLE

(II) ORACLE ODBC DRIVER

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 A W BOUT INDOWS XP

Features

Business Value: The Windows XP goes through beyond providing the

essential, such as File, Print and communication. It is engineered specifically

to let companies reliably and economically use emerging technologies to

improve business profitability and increase their agility in an ever-changing

market place.

Flexible Integration: You can deploy new servers into your existing network

one at a time, upgrade individual NT4.0 servers, upgrade top down through

out your organization or any where in between. You can add Windows NT 4.0

Servers to your existing Windows XP, Novell Netware or UNIX Based

Environments as see immediate improvements in performance, reliability and

manageability.

A faster operating system: Windows XP includes tools that help your

computer run faster than Windows 95 and Windows 98 without adding new

hardware. Windows XP includes a suite of programs designed to optimize your

computer’s efficiency, especially when used together.

Maintenance wizard: Maintenance wizard helps us get the best performance

from our system. We can run Maintenance wizard to make our programs run

faster, check our hard disk for problems, and free hard disk space. By

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 scheduling these utilities to run on a regular basis, we can make sure that our

computer is performing at its best. For example, by leaving our computer on

overnight, we can schedule them to run at a specified time each night, once a

week, or another interval of our choice. For more information about

Maintenance wizard.

Disk Defragmenter: Disk Defragmenter optimizes the speed with which our

programs load and run. With quick startup and shutdown, we can work, play

games, and explorer the Internet faster and more efficiently.

Entertainment with XP: Windows XP makes our computer more entertaining

by introducing new features such as enhanced television, video playback, and

support for new hardware such as digital cameras, CD writers etc. These

enhancements provide us with hours of fun.

New hardware and graphics: Windows XP supports a variety of new

hardware devices, such as DVD, force-feedback joysticks, digital audio

speakers, digital cameras, scanners, CD writers and recording devices.

Improved plug and play capabilities make installing new hardware even easier.

We can also enjoy improved graphics, especially 3-D graphics, and video

playback.

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 Windows XP supports the following hardware standards

Using USB devices: USB defines a class of hardware that makes it easy to

add serial devices to our computer. USB support is built to the WDM

specification so that future updates of Windows will support current drivers.

Using IEEE 1394 devices: IEEE 1394 defines a class of hardware that

makes it easy to add serial devices to our computer

Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP): A new interface specification that is

designed especially for the throughput demands of 3-D animation

Using DVD Player to play DVD discs: With DVD Player, we can play DVD

discs from a DVD drive connected to our computer.

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 A O BOUT RACLE8i

Oracle 8i

Oracle is structured query language (SQL), is the set of commands that

all program and users must use to access data within the Oracle Database.

Application program and Oracle tools often allow users to access the data base

without directly using SQL, but, these application in turn must use SQL when

Executing the users request.

History of SQL

The paper, “A relational model of data for large shared data

banks” by Dr. E F Codd, was published in June 1970 in the association of

Computer Machinery (ACM) journal, communication of the ACM. Codd’s Model

is now accepted as the Definitive Model for relational Data base management

System (RDBMS). The Language, Structured English Query Language

(SEQUEL) was developed by IBM corp., to use Codd’s Model. SEQUEL later

became SQL. In 1979, Relational Software Inc. (now ORACLE Corp.)

introduced the first commercially available implementation of SQL. Today SQL

is accepted as the standard RDBMS language.

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 Oracle 8i Features

Oracle 8i can handle ten times more data and ten times more users than

Oracle 8i by providing unprecedented scalability using network technology to

support tens of thousands of users. Oracle 8i can deliver speed and

performance for any user population while lowering the cost of the computing

infrastructure. Oracle 8i, the world’s most powerful object-relational database

is the heart of the open, standards-based Network Computing Architecture.

Network Computing Architecture allows IT organizations to spend less time

struggling with interoperability issues and more time focusing on deploying

solutions. Standards-based network architectures make it possible to

introduce objects into mainstream enterprise environments. Oracle 8i’s

development environment allows users to ease into object-relational

functionality while providing the industrial strength properties required by

network-based applications. Furthermore, because existing applications are

upward-compatible to Oracle 8i, investment protection in your legacy

applications is assured. Oracle 8i also provides Object Views, a unique object-

relational functionality within Oracle 8i, allowing object-oriented applications

to integrate with relational data, eliminating the need to rewrite existing

relational applications.

Platform Independent

Network based architectures involve multiple hardware and software

platforms and Oracle 8i delivers on all the major platforms, including UNIX

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 and NT. Enterprises that explorer the competitive advantages of network

computing will soon discover that Oracle 8i’s data management, security,

reliability, and ease of use, is uniquely designed to meet the new demands of

the network era. For mainframe systems, parallel servers’ environments, or

desktops, Oracle 8i is the database of choice.

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 A V B BOUT ISUAL ASIC

History of Visual Basic

Visual Basic evolved from BASIC (Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic

Code). Prof. - John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz of Dartmouth College as a

language for writing simply programs developed BASIC in the mid-1960s.

BASIC’s primary purpose was to held people how to program. The wide spread

use of BASIC with various types of computer and led to many enhancement to

the language. With the development of the Microsoft Windows Graphical User

Interface (GUI) in the late 1980s and the early 1990s, the natural evolution of

BASIC was Visual Basic. Microsoft Corporation creates Visual Basic in 1991.

Visual Basic greatly simplifies Windows Application development. Since 1991

six versions have been released. In year 1990s Visual Basic 1.0 version was

released. Visual Basic 2.0 version was faster, more powerful and even easy to

use than Visual Basic 1.0 version. Visual Basic 3.0 added simply way to control

the most powerful database. Visual Basic 4.0 version being to turn Visual Basic

into a fully object oriented language. Visual Basic 5.0 version added the ability

to male our own controls. Visual Basic 6.0 version has added some long

desired language features even more Internet power. Visual Basic is world’s

most widely used Rapid Application Development Language.

Features of Visual Basic

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 The Visual Basic language facilitates a structured and disciplined

approach to computer program design. Visual Basic is a GUI, therefore the

programmer creates the GUI and writes code to describe what happens when

the user interact with the GUI. A programmer can create application in Visual

Basic with impressive representation. The important features of Visual Basic

are summarized below:

 Visual Basic is an event driven programming language.

 Visual Basic is a Graphical User Interface.

 Visual Basic provides a strong set of Data types. It provides powerful

graphical facility.

 There is different type of control structure available in Visual Basic

and efficient looping commands.

 Visual Basic has a debugging and error handling facility.

 Visual Basic enables us to end the program of drop into the debugger

for isolation and repair.

Visual Basic as a Front end

Visual Basic is a powerful programming system for developing

sophisticated, graphical applications for Microsoft Windows environment. Its

productivity has been enhanced by addition of a complete set of tools to

simplify rapid application development and Internet tackling.

What exactly is Visual Basic? “Visual” refers to the method used to

create the graphical user interface (GUI), which uses illustration, rather than

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 writing numerous lines of code to describe the appearance, function and

location of interface elements. “Basic” refers to the BASIC programming

language, a widely preferred language by many programmers for its

simplicity. Visual Basic has evolved from the original BASIC language and now

contains several hundred statements, functions, and keywords, many of which

relate directly to the Windows GUI.

With the release of Visual Basic 6, it is possible to work with ADO

(ActiveX Data Objects) which features a simpler object model than DAO or

RDO. Data Environment is a new ActiveX designer that enables the user to

visually manage database connection and commands.

A Visual Basic Project

A project isn't the same as an application .A project is the thing we use

to create an application, such as a "traditional" program, a Dynamic Link

Library, or an ActiveX control. When we think of creating a Visual Basic

program like baking a cake: we mix ingredients together, bake them, and pull

a cake out of the oven. Similarly, we put forms, modules, and controls

together, compile them, and get a Visual Basic application. In Visual Basic, a

project is the group of all the files that make up our program. These might

include forms, modules (blocks of code not attached to a form), graphics, and

ActiveX controls. Other types of files may also be part of a project. The first

thing to keep in mind about a project is that as we create our program, each

form, module, graphic, and ActiveX control is saved as an individual file .

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 TABLE: Common file types in a Visual Basic 6 project

File Type Description

FRM Form
BAS Module
FRX Automatically generated file for every graphic in your project
OCX ActiveX control
CLS Class module
VBP Visual Basic project

Detailed information about all the program's files is stored in the project

file. The project file lists all the files our program uses, as well as details such

as the project name and how the IDE should be configured while we work on

this particular project. Project files have the extension VBP.

Using the Project Explorer

We can keep track of all the files in our project with the Project Explorer, a

window found on the right side of the Visual Basic IDE. The Project Explorer

provides a method to organize our project's files and allows us to access them

individually in form or code view. We can use the Project Explorer to keep

track of files in your project. Note that OCX and FRX files aren't listed in the

Project Explorer. Most of your interaction with the Project Explorer will be with

its context menu. When you right-click one of your project's files, you'll see a

menu similar to that shown in Figure 5.2. Most of the interaction with project

will be through the Project Explorer's context menu. The context menu allows

us to:

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 • View the file in a form window or code window

• View the properties of the file

• Add a form or module to the project

• Save the current file

• Delete the file from the project

• Print the file

• Make the Project Explorer float or dock it to the IDE

• Hide the Project Explorer

Using Project Groups

Visual Basic 6 allows us to work with more than one project at a time. As we

might imagine, working with multiple forms and modules that are used in

different projects can get pretty confusing. To keep track of everything, we

can use the Project Explorer and a project group, which is a collection of

projects. Project Groups can be saved as a file, just like a form, module, or

project. They have the extension .vbp

Some important terms of Visual Basic

Project: The project holds together the various forms and the module that

make up a program. Its prime purpose is that, I can open the one project file

marked with VBP (Visual Basic Project) rather than a whole set of forms and

modules.

Forms: The form is the central unit or main focus point of the Visual Basic. In

another way, I say that it take a part of the center of the screen. It is a

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 window initially it appears blank on which we can place of paste control to

create our Visual Basic Application. The form can be any size or color.

Control: There are the objects which can be pasted or placed on to a form to

create our Visual Basic application. These may be TEXT BOX, COMMAND

BUTTON, CHECK BOX, LABLE etc. Properties and events can be handled vary

to suit there nature. The Visual Basic tool box contains the tool used to draw

application on our form. Each control can have code attached to it, though not

all we have. Visual Basic has by default 20 different types of control in the tool

box. In tool box the control pointer is also available but, it is not a VB control.

It works only to move to, resize other controls. The different types of controls

are as follows:

1. Text Box: The text box control provides an area to enter or

display text. Sometimes it is called edit field also. Most of the code we write

for textboxes ID to process information, user enter into them. Text can word

wrap automatically or can display a multiple line of text. The usual limit of a

text box in Visual Basic is 32,000 characters.

2. Command Button: The command button can carries out a

command or action when a user push any button or click the mouse. The idea

behind these controls is that when the user moves the mouse to the command

button and click them some assigned function executed. Whatever the task we

required to perform, we just write down the code to the command button.

These will happens when we write the event procedures that tells visual basic

how to respond to the mouse click.

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 3. Label: The label control displays text, a user cannot interact with

or modify

4. Frame: The frame control provides a Visual and functional

container for control.

5. Picture Box: The Picture Box control displays bitmaps, icons or

windows metafiles. It displays text or acts as a Visual Container for other

controls.

6. Check Box: The check Box control displays a True/False or

Yes/No option. We can check any number of check boxes on a form at run

time.

7. Option Button: The Option Button control are as a part of an

option group with other option buttons displays multiple choices, from which

user can choose only one.

8. Combo Box: The Combo Box control combined a text box with

a list box. Allows a user to type in a selection or select any item from a drop

down list.

9. List Box: The list box displays a list of items that a user can

choose from.

10. Horizontal & Vertical Scroll Bars: The Horizontal & Vertical

Scroll Bars allows a user to select a value within a range of values.

11. Timer: The Timer control executes timer events at the specified

time intervals.

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 12. Drive List Box: The Drive List box control displays and allows a

user to select valid disk drive from the available one.

13. Directory List Box: The directory list box control displays and

allows a user to select directories and their sub directories.

14. File List Box: The file list box control displays and allows a user

to select from a list of files of current directory.

15. Shape: The Shape control adds a rectangle, square, oval or circle

to a form.

16. Line: The line control adds a straight line segments to a form.

17. Image Box: The Image box control displays bitmaps, icons and

metafiles etc.

18i. Data: The Data control enables us to an existing database

and displays information from it on forms.

19. OLE: The OLE container embeds data into a Visual Basic

Application.

20. Pointer: The Pointer provides a way to move and resize forms and

controls.

Variables in Visual Basic

Variables are defined as the space where we store the values

temporarily when performing calculation with Visual Basic. Variables are

pieces of memory in which the computer store values that are used in

calculation. A Variable in VB can be defined by DIM:

DIM <Variable Name> [as <Data type>]

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 Where <Variable Name> is an identifier with the following rules:

1. A variable must begin with an Alphabet.

2. Variable must not exceed 255 Characters.

3. It should be unique within the same scope which is the range from

which the variable can be referenced a procedure, a form and so on.

4. A variable name cannot contain an embedded period or embedded

type declaration character.

[As <Data Type>] Clause is optional in DIM statement and may be of

type:

Type Storage Size (In Range

Name Bytes)
Integer 2 -32767 to+32767
Long 4 -21474836748 to +21474836747
Single 4 -3.02823E398 to -1.401298E-45

(Negative Values)

1.401298E-45 to 3.028i23E38 (Positive

Values)
Double 8 -1.79769313486231E308 to

-4.94065645841247E-324

4.94065645841247E-324 to

1.79769313486231E308
Currency 8 -922337203685477.5808 to

922337203685477.5807
String 1 byte per 0 to 2 billion characters

character
Byte 1 0 to 255
Boolean 2 True or False

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 Date 8i 1 Jan 100 to 31 Dec 9999
Object 4 Any Object Reference

Constant: A constant is a meaningful name that not changed during the

execution. It is either system defined or user defined constants.
Operators: The symbols used within the data/object are called operators.
1. Arithmetic Operator 2. Relational Operator 3. Logical Operator

Symbols Purpose Symbols Purpose Symbols Purpose

= Equal To AND Logical AND
+ Addition
< Less than
- Subtraction OR Logical OR
> Greater Than
*
<= Less than NOT Logical NOT
Multiplication
Equal to
/ Division
>= Greater Than
% Modulus
Equal to
^ E2000onent
<> Not Equal to
MOD Modulus

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 1. MSGBOX: This method displays a message in a dialog box and waits for

the user to click a button and return a value indicating the button which is

clicked by user. Syntax is as follows:

MsgBox (Prompt [, Button [, Title [, Help file, Context]]])

Where: Prompt is a string expression displayed as message in the dialog box.

Button is the numeric expression displays the type of button on the

dialog box.

Title is the string expression displayed in the title bar of dialog box.

Help File denotes the help file to be used to provide context sensitive.

2. INPUTBOX: This method displays a dialog box with a message and a text

box control, and, waits for the user to enter the data and click on the

command buttons given there. The Syntax:

InputBox(Prompt [, Title [, Default [, xpos [, Ypos [, Help File,

context]]]]])

Where Prompt: The message appear in the dialog box.

Title: The Title of the dialog box

Default: The Default Input (if any)

Ypos: The coordinates of the upper left corner of the Dialog Box.

Help File: the Name of the help file.

Context: The page number within the help file.

Control Structure: Control Structure allows us to control the execution of the

program. Sometimes we face such situation where we may have to change the

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 order of execution or repeat groups of statement until any specified condition

not meet. This keeps the decision structure to check whether any condition

occurred or not then direct computer to contain condition accordingly.

Branching Condition Control Statements:

1. IF…THEN…END IF Statement

2. IF…THEN…ELSE…ENDIF Statement

3. SELECT CASE…CASE…END SELECT Statement

Looping Conditional Control Statement:

1. FOR…NEXT Looping statement

2. DO WHILE…LOOP Statement

3. DO…LOOP WHILE Statement

4. DO UNTIL…LOOP statement

5. DO…LOOP UNTIL statement

MENU

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 Most of the simple application of one form and several controls on can

enhance VB application by adding menus. If you want your application provide

a set of commands to user’s menus offer a convenient and consistent way to

group commands and an easy way to go users access them. MDI (Multiple

Document Interface) applications are used to launch their documents from a

main document as in case of WORD, EXCEL Etc.

Menu Editor of VB can be accessed from Tools menu in the Forms Design

Screen. This utility is used for creating menus. It allows us to create menus for

our application and to define their properties.

MDI APPLICATION

The multiple-document interface (MDI) allows us to create an application

that maintains multiple forms within a single container form known as Parent

From. Application such as Microsoft Excel and Word for Windows have

multiple document Interfaces.

An MDI application allows the user to displays multiple documents at

the same time with each document displays in its own window. Document

windows are contained in a parent window, which provides a workspace for all

the document windows in the application. Our application can have only one

MDI form, which contains all the application’s child forms. At runtime, child

forms are displayed within the internal area of the MDI form. When a child

form is minimize it icon appeared on the MDI form.

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