Visual Basic 2012 Programmer's Reference

SUMMARY

The Visual Basic code editor is one of the most important IDE windows for Visual Basic developers. You can use the Windows Forms Designer alone to place controls on a form but the form can’t do much without code behind those controls.

The Visual Basic code editor lets you type code into a module, but it also does much more. It provides tooltips that let you view variable values; outlining that lets you expand and collapse code, so you can focus on your current task; IntelliSense that helps you remember what methods are available and what their parameters are; code coloring and highlighting that immediately flags errors; and code snippets that let you reuse complex pieces of code that perform useful tasks. Architectural tools let you quickly find symbol and type definitions, jump to specific pieces of code, and easily see where a symbol is being used in the currently visible code. The code editor can even automatically generate stubs for classes, constructors, properties, and methods.

Many of these tools help you understand how the code works as you write it. Chapter 6, “Debugging,” explains IDE tools that help you understand the code when it runs. Those tools let you walk through the code as it executes to see exactly what it is doing and what it is doing wrong.