Introduction to Visual Basic.NET and C# Visual Basic (VB) is a programming language that has been in use for several years. At first VB was used only for building quick application prototypes, but it has grown tremendously throughout its lifetime. Now it's a powerful environment for building all types of full-blown standalone applications. VB.NET is the latest incarnation of this language, and it's fully supported by the .NET Framework and the CLR. It's one of the most popular languages for ASP.NET development, and best of all, its learning curve isn't very steep. For these reasons, you'll be using VB.NET throughout this book for your ASP.NET pages. C# (pronounced "see-sharp") is a new programming language from Microsoft that's fully supported by the .NET Framework. Since C# is derived from C++ and C, programmers who are familiar with those languages don't have to bother learning VB.NET to program their ASP.NET pages. C# also bears a close resemblance to the Java programming language, so even Java developers should feel comfortable moving to this new language. Many of the concepts covered today will be very similar to the VB.NET concepts. Both VB.NET and C# are powerful languages for ASP.NET development, so you can develop your pages with the language you're most comfortable with. | 
