Visual Studio supports development using several languages such as Visual Basic .NET and Visual C# .NET.

The .NET Framework provides a rich class library for developing various types of applications such as Windows-based applications, Web applications, XML Web services and server components.

Classes inherit the members of their parents, limited as public, private, protected, or friend. Custom properties can be created within the Integrated Development Environment (IDE). Form classes inherit visual display members through visual inheritance.

Namespaces are logical groupings of related class types. System is the root namespace.

Visual Studio .NET includes the Windows Forms Designer for drag-and-drop form design.

Event handling specifies the actions to be taken when an event occurs, by overriding a protected method or by attaching a delegate method to handle the event.

The System.Drawing namespace provides graphic-manipulation classes such as Graphics, Font and Brush.

Most controls that are used in a Windows application are derived from the System.Windows.Forms.Control and have many common properties such as Anchor, Dock, Enabled, Font, Location, Name, Size, Height, Width, TabIndex, TabStop, Text and Visible.

The GroupBox control and Panel control can be used to contain other controls. The Panel control provides scrollbars, while the GroupBox includes a caption.

The Label control and LinkLabel control display read-only data. LinkLabel includes hyperlink capability.

The TextBox control and RichTextBox control allow single-line or multiline input. The RichTextBox control allows input of (.rtf) formatted data.

Picturebox controls can display graphical data in .ico, .bmp, .wmf, .jpg, .png, and .gif formats.

The Button, RadioButton, and CheckBox controls can be used for selection input.

The ListBox control and CheckedListBox control allow single or multiple selections from a list.

ComboBox controls allow selection from a list or input of a new value.

The DomainUpDown control and NumericUpDown control allow indexed selection from an ordered list using up and down buttons for navigation. DomainUpDown returns a string, while NumericUpDown returns a numeric value.

The MonthCalendar control and DateTimePicker control allow selection of data values.

The TreeView control and ListView control support hierarchical node options.

The Timer, TrackBar, and ProgressBar controls display progress-related data.

The HscrollBar control and VscrollBar control provide basic scrolling capability.

The TabControl contains tab pages, which are represented by the TabPage objects that you add through the Controls property.

The ToolTip control extends the properties of other controls to support a mouseover ToolTip.

DialogBox components are used to prompt user input. Default DialogBox components include ColorDialog, FontDialog, OpenFileDialog, PageSetupDialog, PrintDialog, PrintPreviewDialog, and SaveFileDialog.

Display bars display information to the user via the StatusBar control and the ToolBar control.

You can add controls to a Windows form either visually using the Design view or programmatically by writing code in the Code view.

The DataGrid control allows you to display data in a tabular format.

Exceptions are handled using try-catch blocks within the code.

A finally block will run whether an exception occurs or not.

The throw statement raises an exception.

Unhandled exceptions fire the UnhandledException event.

Validating user input includes restricting available values, restricting access to controls by enabling or disabling them and by allowing only valid keystrokes.

Control-based validation uses properties such as CharacterCasing, MaxLength, ReadOnly, and Enabled.

Keystroke validation involves the KeyDown, KeyPress, and KeyUp events.

Field-level validation involves the Enter, GotFocus, Leave, Validating, Validated, and LostFocus events.

Testing should include evaluation of correctness, reliability, and robustness.

Unit-level, integration, and regression testing should be used. Integration testing can involve bottom-up, top-down, or umbrella methodologies.

The System.Diagnostics namespace includes the Trace class and the Debug class.

Conditional compilation, step-through execution, and breakpoints can be used for runtime testing.

Testing windows include Autos, Call Stack, Immediate, Locals, This, and Watch.

Custom components can be created by inheriting from the Component class, the Control class, and the UserControl class. The Component class is used for nonvisual components, the Control class is used for components with a visual user interface, and the UserControl class is used as a container.

Controls can be hosted in an .exe application or in Internet Explorer.

A .NET assembly is a logical group of files sharing an Assembly Manifest.

Assemblies can be single-file or multifile, static or dynamic, private or shared, as well as satellite or resource-only.

Legacy code such as ActiveX and COM+ components can be used in a .NET application by encapsulating them in a Runtime Callable Wrapper (RCW). Similarly, the .NET code can be used in a COM application using the COM Callable Wrappers (CCW).

Simple data binding refers to connecting a single entity in the data model to a single property of a control on the user interface. Any class that implements the IBindingList, ITypedList, or IList interface can deliver data via simple data binding.

Complex data binding binds a user interface control to an entire collection of data. To use complex data binding with a ListBox control or a ComboBox control, you set the control's DataSource and DisplayMember properties.

The .NET Framework uses BindingContext and CurrencyManager objects to manage data binding. You can use events of the CurrencyManager object to help react to changes in bound data.

In one-way data binding, data from the data model is displayed on the form, but changes to the form do not affect the data model. In two-way data binding, data from the data model is displayed on the form, and changes to the form are written back to the database.

Transforming data involves changing it to a human-readable format, while filtering involves presenting only a useful subset of all possible data.

Classes for data access are organized into the System.IO, System.Data, System.Data.Common, System.Data.OleDb, System.Data.SqlClient, System.Data.SqlTypes, and System.Xml namespaces.

Transact-SQL is the Microsoft SQL Server dialect of the ANSI SQL-92 standard query language.

You can execute T-SQL statements from a variety of interfaces, including the Visual Studio .NET IDE, osql, SQL Query Analyzer, or custom applications.

T-SQL queries use the SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, and DELETE SQL statements.

Ad-hoc queries are compiled at execution; stored procedures are precompiled and stored on the server to improve performance.

To retrieve data from disk files as raw bytes, you use the FileStream object. To retrieve data from disk files in a line-oriented fashion, you use the StreamReader object. To retrieve data from disk files that are formatted for binary storage, you use the BinaryReader object.

ADO.NET uses Data Provider objects and DataSet objects.

Data providers contain implementations of the Connection, Command, Parameter, DataReader, and DataAdapter objects that are optimized for a particular database product. For example, OleDbConnection, OleDbCommand, OleDbParameter, OleDbDataReader and OleDbDataAdapter are designed to work with any database that supports OLEDB while SqlConnection, SqlCommand, SqlParameter, SqlDataReader and SqlDataAdapter classes are optimized for SQL Server. There is a separate implementation optimized for Oracle database, too.

The DataSet object represents an entire relational database in memory. It's composed of DataTable, DataRelation, DataRow, and DataColumn objects.

To read data from XML files quickly, in a forward-only manner, where memory is a constraint, you use XmlTextReader. When memory is not a constraint and you want flexibility in retrieving, inserting, deleting, and updating data in any direction from XML files, you use XmlDocument.

When memory is not a constraint and you want flexibility in retrieving, inserting, deleting, and updating data in any direction from XML files, you use XmlDocument.

To persist changes from the data model to the underlying database, you must call the Update() method of the SqlDataAdapter object.

The UpdateCommand property of the SqlDataAdapter object specifies a SqlCommand object to be executed for all changed rows. The InsertCommand property of the SqlDataAdapter object specifies a SqlCommand object to be executed for all new rows. The DeleteCommand property of the SqlDataAdapter object specifies a SqlCommand object to be executed for all deleted rows.

Web Services use the Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) to encapsulate object-oriented messages between the clients and the servers. Discovery documents are retrieved using the Disco standard, while the Universal Description, Discovery and Integration (UDDI) provides a standard protocol for discovery of Web services.

UDDI is a multivendor standard for discovering online resources, including Web Services. Disco is Microsoft's standard format for discovery documents, which contain information about Web services.

Localization involves translating the user interface text, character encodings, and data and currency formatting, along with support for the direction of text display and management of different alphabetical sorting methods. Localization involves the globalization, localizability, and localization phases. Resource files are used to provide culture-specific settings.

Cultures are identified by culture codes. A neutral culture code specifies only a location and cannot be used for localization. A specific culture code specifies both a location and a language, and it provides enough information for localization.

Character encodings are used to specify different character sets. Unicode is the default encoding within .NET.

Mirroring is the reversal of text and controls display direction.

The CultureInfo object represents a culture in the .NET Framework.

User assistance involves providing help within an application. You can use HTML Help files to display help to the user. The HelpProvider component is the bridge between a .NET Framework Windows application and an HTML Help file. You can use HelpProvider component to display topics from a help file, Web pages, or pop-up help strings. ToolTips let you provide quick help for individual controls.

HTML Help provides topic files, a table of contents, and a searchable index.

Accessibility planning includes flexibility, input methods, output methods, consistency, and compatibility with accessibility aids. Control properties that you should set to ensure accessibility include AccessibleDescription, AccessibleName, AccessibleRole, BackColor, ForeColor, FontSize, BackgroundImage, TabIndex, and Text.

Printing is handled by the System.Drawing.PrintDocument class.

Text printing uses the PageSettings class and the PrintPageArgs class; graphical printing involves the System.Drawing namespace.

The PageSetupDialog, PrintPreviewDialog, PrintPreviewControl, and PrintDialog components are used for print display and enaction.

Although .NET supports XCOPY deployment, XCOPY is not sufficient for advanced deployment requirements. For advanced requirements, you should instead use the Microsoft Windows Installer to deploy applications.

Microsoft Windows Installer 2.0 is the built-in installation and configuration service of the Windows operating system. In addition to providing several advanced installation features, it also provides the ability to roll back the installation process, uninstall an application, and repair a component or an application.

Visual Studio .NET provides four types of deployment templates—Setup Project (for Windows-based applications), Web Setup Project (for Web-based applications), Merge Module Project (for shared components and assemblies), and CAB Project (for ActiveX components to be downloaded over the Internet). It also provides the Setup Wizard, which helps you create installation packages for any of these deployment projects.

Setup file customization includes the output file name, package file type and size, bootstrapper inclusion, compression type, and authenticode signing.

Customization editors include File System, Registry, File Types, User Interface, Custom Actions, and Launch Conditions.

Shared assemblies must be digitally signed to provide a strong name for unique registration in the Global Assembly Cache (GAC). A public and private key pair is used to sign and verify the hashed value of the Assembly Manifest.

Assemblies can be registered in the Global Assembly Cache (GAC) using Windows Installer, Windows Explorer, the .NET Framework Configuration tool, and the Global Assembly Cache tool.

The Windows Logo program requires packages to meet minimum requirements to display the Windows certified logo. Programs include the Certified for Windows, Designed for Microsoft Windows XP, and .NET Connected logos.

Projects that create an executable (.exe) file can use dynamic properties that read from an XML configuration file at runtime.

The .NET security model involves both code-access and role-based security.

Code-access security involves permissions for code group access. These permissions are grouped into code access, identity, and role-based types.

Code permission requests can be in the form of one of the following: RequestMinimum, RequestOptional, RequestRefuse, or Demand.

Code group membership conditions include application directory, cryptographic hash, software publisher, site, strong name, URL, and zone.

Default permission sets include Nothing, Execution, Internet, LocalInternet, Everything, SkipVerification, and FullTrust.

Authorization can be accomplished using None, Forms-based, Windows integrated, Passport, and Custom methods.

The IIdentity and IPrincipal classes are used for role-based authorization. The IsInRole() method allows testing of the WindowsIdentity (current user) object's membership.

Information on application execution can be provided using the Process, EventLog, and PerformanceCounter classes.

Process data can be accessed on remote and local systems, but only local processes can be started and stopped.

The Default EventLogs are the system, application, and security event logs. The security event log is empty.

Published performance data can be read from local and remote systems.