Thank you for your interest in Total Visual SourceBook. FMS is pleased to provide you with this Reviewer’s Guide to assist you in your evaluation of this exciting new version of our award-winning code development tool set. The contents of this document are organized as follows:

Contents

• SourceBook Philosophy
• Rave Reviews
• Solves Source Code Writing Pain
• What's New
• Key Features and Benefits
• The Ultimate Source Code Library
• Using the Code Explorer
• Using the Code Repository
• Source Code Exchange Technology
• General Information
• Conclusion

Additional documentation in included with the Total Visual SourceBook product, including a printed User’s Guide and online help system.

SourceBook Philosophy

Total Visual SourceBook is based on our award-winning Total Access SourceBook and Total VB SourceBook products. Both the Access version and its VB counterpart are among our most successful products, despite the fact that developers are traditionally averse to commercial code libraries.

Indeed, if you keep track of third party offerings for these platforms, you have no doubt seen code libraries come and go for both Access and Visual Basic. Total Access SourceBook and Total VB SourceBook, on the other hand, have been going strong since they were introduced in 1996 and 1998 respectively.

What makes our SourceBook different? In our view, SourceBook has succeeded where others have failed for several reasons:

• ActiveX controls notwithstanding, you still have to write lots of code.
• No other product offers an integrated code solution.
• Existing code libraries require frameworks and complex dependencies, and do not represent realistic levels of testing and quality assurance.
• The breadth and quality of code is often lacking in code libraries that are often not much more than pieces from previous projects, magazine articles, and Internet newsgroups.
• Consistency and documentation is not up to the standards required by developers.
• Restrictive licensing in other products makes it difficult or cost-ineffective to use library code in projects.

Components are only a Partial Solution

The Access and Visual Basic tools market is saturated with component based solutions. The idea of inserting components into your VB project, whether in the form of ActiveX controls or DLL libraries, while attractive, is only a partial solution.

Regardless of how full featured a given component is, the bottom line remains: you have to write code. Additionally, writing applications that require multiple external OCX files leads to installation, deployment, and maintenance problems. Often, a pure code solution is the most reliable and distributable solution.

The over-reliance on components is exacerbated by the fundamental problems of code: it is hard to write, expensive to test, and represents the highest exposure to risk of defects and maintenance problems.

In our development efforts at FMS we have realized that components offer a good solution in limited situations. But the majority of functionality in any modern desktop application requires code.

Total Visual SourceBook addresses these issues by identifying coding as the key budgetary item in a development project and solving the problem with a completely integrated code solution.

Total Visual SourceBook is an Integrated Code Solution

Some code libraries get onto your desktop in the form of simple text files containing source code. Other approaches simply dump their entire code base into your project. Products based on such techniques are obviously less than optimal. Total Visual SourceBook takes another approach.

The product’s Code Explorer provides a complete user-interface for viewing, searching and storing code. Spend a few minutes using the Code Explorer and you will see what we mean. All code is visible in the treeview, with full details and examples of how the code works and how to use it.

The Search tool makes finding code a snap, and the Export tool is completely integrated with the Visual Basic integrated development environment.

Total Visual SourceBook's Code Repository is the natural extension of the Code Library. With the Code Repository, you can save your own customized versions of our code or add your own. Full support is included for adding classes, modules and procedures, and user-defined categories.

You can use the Code Repository to manage your code, example code, and reference documentation. And since the Total Visual SourceBook is multi-user ready, you can share your code within your programming team—the ultimate vehicle for code re-use!

No Complex Dependencies

How often do you search for code solutions in a book or magazine, only to find that the solution requires many dependent files and modules? Worse still, tracking down and fixing those dependencies can take longer than writing the code yourself.

For example, much of the code listed in books requires additional modules, DLL files, or other libraries. Code listings in magazines are usually incomplete and require that you visit the web to get the complete (and compilable) solution.

Even when you have all the code, add a simple module to your project may require adding another module or class to compile, which may require another module. A simple piece of code may end up requiring a huge amount of linked classes and modules, of which most of the code is unnecessary. Of course, trying to find what’s necessary and what’s not could take a great deal of time and effort, which is what you’re trying to avoid.

Total Visual SourceBook solves this problem by following a simple cardinal rule: every class and module is completely self-contained. This means that you do not have to track down dependencies to use one of our solutions—just insert the single class or module into your project and you're ready to go!

Of course, within a class or module, there are likely to be dependencies, and Total Visual SourceBook clearly shows these. However, this is the exception, not the rule. You can always count on the ability to export a single class or module and have it work.

Consistent, Fully-Tested Code

Another trap that other code libraries fall into is a lack of consistency—the code uses different styles, naming conventions, and procedure interfaces throughout. You won't find this problem in Total Visual SourceBook. All of the code uses the same style, formatting, naming conventions and commenting style.

Most importantly, all of the code is extensively tested. You can use the code in your projects with confidence.

Complete, Standardized Documentation and Examples

Extensive documentation is included for each class and module. Details include reference material on how to use the code, common programming issues, and links to other information sources related to the code. Every class and module also has a fully functional example module that shows how to use the code in your project.

No-Nonsense, Royalty-Free Distribution Rights

What good would a code library be without redistribution rights that are non-restrictive and easy to understand? You can include our code in your projects on a royalty-free basis as many times as you like. Total Visual SourceBook is licensed on a per-developer basis, with cost-effective multiple license and site-license discounts. For complete information on Total Visual SourceBook license, visit our web site at www.fmsinc.com.

SourceBook Simply Does It Better

To make the SourceBook product line successful, we focused on overcoming the limitations and drawbacks of previous products and technologies. The results led us to our newest version of SourceBook: Total Visual SourceBook, the most comprehensive professional source code library ever assembled.

We are extremely pleased that our design goals have been validated by developers around the world through the success of our SourceBook product line. We invite you to read what our customers have to say about SourceBook.

Rave Reviews

"Total Visual SourceBook is a valuable tool that I refer to frequently. It is not only an easy to use reference for reliable code, it also uses good coding practices that have improved the quality of my own procedures and applications." 
- Norm Chezem, Roseville, CA

"I like to have such a great companion in a close environment. Excellent idea from FMS to share their knowledge and experience with other developers."
- Alex Dybenko, Russia

“SourceBook is my constant companion as I work on Visual Basic projects. I’ve never seen a product that addresses the exact needs of a Visual Basic developer as perfectly as Sourcebook. It’s truly a must-have for the up-to-date developer!”
- Michael Groh, Technical Editor-Access/Office VB Advisor Magazine

“I was very pleased with SourceBook. As a new VB developer, this product helped me climb the learning curve significantly faster. Seeing how other professionals approached the problem was like getting a personal tutorial.”
- Steve Boyd, HelpFactory, Inc.

“Congratulations on another great product! I am excited to see FMS entering the Visual Basic market. I have been using Total Access software for several years now. Each FMS product that I have purchased has been well designed, useful, and every one of them has garnered a permanent spot in my developer toolbox. SourceBook is no exception. Thoughtful design, tons of useful routines, and attention to details are just some of the highlights of this program.”
- Walt Ritscher, Crystal Design Software

“I have been a great fan of your product, Total Access SourceBook. Your new product, is even better! This is a MUST HAVE for all VB developers. There is probably no other product on the market that can save VB developers as much development time. I will be recommending this product to developers wholeheartedly.”
- Tom Howe, Control Center Computing, Inc.

“The product is an extremely valuable aid for anyone doing serious development in VB with the greatest feature being that you can customize/extend the code to meet your needs which is something that is not possible with most third-party products.”
- Jeremy Adams, ECX Programmers

“I was very impressed with SourceBook. It was very easy to merge our corporation’s code library into SourceBook. If you use one function from SourceBook, it pays for itself!”
- Stephen Forte, The Aurora Development Group

“The thing I liked best about the product is that it worked well for me, a novice VB user. I have been a heavy user of your Total Access Products and SourceBook has helped me make the transition into VB!”
- Nick Jongebloed, IMNET Systems

Solves Source Code Writing Pain

For the Developer:

• The built-in code library ships with hundreds of ready to run modules, covering every aspect of application development. Given the time it takes to write, debug, and document code, Total Visual SourceBook pays for itself even if you only use a few of the included routines!
• All our code is fully tested and uses a consistent set of standards. You can plug in the code and its ready to go!
• Total Visual SourceBook stores your code for you. Add your code from files, other developers, or directly from your VBA project. Code is stored with detailed management information, and our powerful search feature means you will never again have to dig through your hard disk to find code.
• Because it’s source code, it’s entirely open. Developers can treat the code as a black box and just call it, or enhance it to their specific needs. No ActiveX control can provide this kind of flexibility!
• No one will use all the code we provide, but many developers will learn a great deal by simply examining our code. Just seeing examples of handling ADO, Outlook, FTP sites, or XML files can result in better insight into the issues and inspiration to implement new features.
• Total Visual SourceBook works in Visual Basic 6, and every Office program that supports VBA. You have instant access to ready-to-run code, plus all your code from VB, Access, Excel, Outlook – you name it!

For the Development Team:

• Total Visual SourceBook is a multi-user system. All members of your team can share code in real time. New project code can be merged into Total Visual SourceBook with the press of a button.
• Leverage your valuable existing source code assets by putting it into the Code Repository. Give every member of your development team access to the code your the team has written.
• Stop reinventing the wheel. Between the extensive code library in Total Visual SourceBook and your code, chances are good that your developers can lookup lots of code they need.
• Eliminate the hassles of junior team members asking senior members every time they need to write new code since they can look it up themselves. More importantly, eliminate the mistakes junior members make by writing code that already exists (and is better).
• Store your code with confidence. Authors can freely add and edit their code while preventing others from editing it so the new hire doesn’t damage your code.

For the Entire Enterprise:

• We spent thousands of developer-hours creating the code you need today. Your entire enterprise can become more productive instantly, as you shave months off your enterprise product timelines.
• With built-in multi-user functionality, all teams within the enterprise can share a common source-code library.
• With our new Code Packaging technology, entire teams can share code, especially among disconnected developers who may not have access to your internal network.

The Astonishing Breadth of the Code Library

Our library offers an extensive collection of VBA routines that address every major area of application development in VB. The Code Explorer makes it easy to find the code you need and integrate it directly into your VB projects.

The Code Library contains:

• Over 160 modules and classes
• Over 40 Categories
• Over 85,000 lines of code

Unlike the code found in books, magazines, and on the web, our code is fully tested, thoroughly documented, and is written specifically for Visual Basic 5 and 6 using the latest development techniques. Best of all, you can use the code in your projects royalty-free.

What's New

Host Enhancements

The latest in our line of SourceBook products includes full support for Visual Basic 6 as well as Access/Office 2000, 2002 (XP), and 2003. Now you have one central source for VBA source code regardless of which development platform you use.

Browser Enhancements

Total Visual SourceBook allows you to customize the error handling in the included code to match your coding style.

Code Enhancements

Total Visual SourceBook includes tons of new code, including code for Access/Office 2003, enhanced code for HTTP, and more.
View a partial list

Key Features and Benefits

The Ultimate Source Code Library

Total Visual SourceBook's source code library contains an extensive set of ready to run code. This section highlights the solutions that are available.

 ActiveX Data Objects (ADO)
ADO is now established as the data access layer of choice. Total Visual SourceBook has thousands of lines of code for working with ADO against both SQL Server and the Jet database engine. Code is included for working with connections, commands, queries, recordsets, and more.

 Data Access Objects (DAO/Jet Engine)
Work with Jet/Access databases and objects, attached/linked tables, ODBC data sources, and security. Repair, compact, encrypt, and decrypt databases. Extract minimum, maximum, average, and other statistical results from tables. Find duplicates in tables, retrieve random records, and use recordsets in index order. Detect record numbers and counts, and export data to external files. Get object definition information including table structures, index layouts, and query definitions.

 Access 2003
New code for working with Access 2003 is included. Code for working with forms, reports, macros and modules makes it easy to get you Access application up to speed in record time. Also included is a full set of information routines to find out exactly how your database is structured.

 Outlook 2003
Need to send a simple email? No problem: code is included for sending mail with Outlook 2003. What about advanced emailing with multiple destinations, cc/bcc addresses and attachments? That's covered too, along with code for dealing with the Calendar, Contacts, and event scheduling.

 Excel 2003
Fully-functional class modules make working with Excel data super easy. Code is included to create, modify and save workbooks, transfer data from tables to cells, and a full range of printing and formatting options.

 Word 2003
Need to customize your mail merges? How about programmatically creating documents, or modifying existing ones? Our code for Word makes document management and creation as easy as plugging in a module.

 VB Application Techniques
Launch and monitor programs, access e-mail and web pages, handle multiple instances of programs, close forms on exit, and handle debugging from VB’s editor.

 VB Forms and Controls
Move captionless forms with a mouse. Save and restore size and position. Make forms transparent. Supercharge treeview and listbox controls. Enhance VB controls with binary searches, dropdown routines, incremental searches, and string finds. Set text box controls to filter alpha or numeric values, force upper or lower case, and save/retrieve values to/from disk.

 Graphics
Use the Windows Graphical Device Interface (GDI) to draw arcs, chords, ellipses, flood fills, and more. Draw control edges and individual pixels, fill rectangles, perform gradient fills, and tile and rotate pictures and text. Simulated control routines make it easy to blast lightweight windowless controls onto your forms for optimum performance.

 Date & Time
Perform business day math including user-defined holidays. Work with dates and times using native VB commands. Provide your application with date conversion and validation routines. Use code-based high resolution timers to get around VB’s internal timer limitations.

 Error Handling
Maintain state information about your application for current procedure name, the call stack, error information, and system information. Implement our error handler to provide detailed information written to a file when your application encounters an error.

 Encryption and Compression
Compress and decompress data using Huffman, LZ, RLE, and UUEncode algorithms. Encrypt data with serialized passwords. Generate checksums using CRC16 and CRC32 techniques.

 Abstract Data Types
Create a history list to manage recently used items, or a bit array to efficiently manage storage. Manage data with queues and stacks.

 Data Type and Unit Conversion
Work with bits, bytes, and binary numbers. Safely convert between data types, convert units of measure, and convert to and from EBCDIC and overpunched formats. Convert among binary, octal, and hexadecimal, and convert to/from Roman numerals.

 File and Disk Operations
Manipulate files, disks, and folders using native VB commands. Use the Windows API to get file and disk information, including drive type, label, serial number, and free and total space. Change drive labels and detect if a floppy disk drive is ready. Call the Win32 API to use the Windows Explorer shell to provide file and folder manipulation, work with the Recycle Bin, and get the paths of various system directories.

 Internet and Web
Work with HTTP and FTP sources and the Internet Explorer and Web Browser controls for flexible web-enabled applications.

 Search and Sorting
Quick and efficient searching techniques such as Boyer-Moore, fuzzy matching, MetaPhone and Soundex phonetic matching, and binary and variant searches. Sorting code is rounded out with the standard bubblesort, quicksort and shell sort algorithms.

 String Handling
Parse, tokenize, and de-tokenize string data. Perform search and replace operations, evaluate command line arguments, and concatenate strings much faster than standard VB string routines. Generate random passwords, get number suffixes as text, pad, strip, and remove nulls from strings.

Plus Hundreds of additional solutions including:

   Printing and Fonts
   Windows Common Dialogs
   Math and Statistics
   Multimedia Extensions
   VB Menus
   Windows Registry
   System Information
   Clipboard Operations
  Windows Help
  Screen Capture
  Enhanced MessageBox
   INI File Operations
   Windows Shutdown
   Change Resolution
   Dictionary Support

Code Explorer

Total Visual SourceBook is a completely integrated source code solution, offering quick access to built-in and user-defined code through a common interface, called Code Explorer. Use Code Explorer to find, export, search, manage and store code.

On the left of the Code Explorer, a treeview control allows you to browse through all categories, modules, classes, and procedures. As you select items in the treeview, the information pane on the right displays the code, reference material, example code, and details about the code.

The bottom pane shows search results and user-defined bookmarks. Full menu, toolbar, and tooltip support makes the entire interface intuitive and easy to learn.

To make code readable, Code Explorer support full syntax color-coding, just like your Visual Basic editor.

Finding Code with the Search Tool

Although navigating through code is easy with the treeview pane, there are times when you want to find specific code by searching for keywords or phrases.

Total Visual SourceBook provides full searching capability. You can search by keyword or phrase, and narrow searches using any of the following criteria:

• Search in one or all categories of code
• Limit searches to whole word or partial word
• Search for the specified keyword(s) in the code description text, the code itself, or the example code

In addition, the code you enter into the Total Visual SourceBook repository can be searched by:

• Creation and modification dates
• The name of the developer who created or last modified the code

Using the Code in Your Visual Basic Projects

Once you locate the code you need, exporting the code to your Visual Basic project is easy. Code Explorer's Export Tool allows you to specify which object in your project should receive the code. Or, you can send the selected code into a new class or module.

The following screen shows how the Export dialog lists all objects in your open project and allows you to create a new object, or add the selected Total Visual SourceBook code to an existing object:

Additionally, you can export to the clipboard, a file, or to Windows Notepad.

Other Features

Code Explorer also supports a variety of additional features:

• The Bookmark feature allows you to add bookmark notes to any category, module, class, or procedure for easy reference.
• The Details tab shows code dependencies of a procedure on other procedures.
• Filter the treeview to display built-in code, user code, or both.
• Built-in administration features allow the code databases to be repaired and compacted.
• Toolbars are customizable.
• Code can be printed directly from Code Explorer.
• Use the Options menu to customize almost all aspects of the interface.

Using the Code Repository

In addition to providing a comprehensive set of built-in Visual Basic code, Total Visual SourceBook also provides powerful repository features. Using the repository, you can add your own categories, modules, classes, and procedures.

Additionally, since Code Repository is multi-user ready, you can share your code with your entire development group, and use other developer’s resources. Code is tracked by author, creation date, and modification date—this means you can quickly locate code you need, or manage code across a multiple developer team.

Major Code Repository Features
Total Visual SourceBook allows you to add:

• Categories: organize your code by areas of application development, or store your code in one of the built-in categories.
• Class modules: full support is provided for class modules with storage of declarations, properties, methods, and private procedures.
• Standard modules: add entire modules, including declarations, and sub and function routines.
• Procedures: add any type of procedure: property Let/Get/Set, Function, Sub, or method.
• User Notes: add your own notes that explain how to use the code or other implementation notes.
• Example code: add your own example code to illustrate to other developers the best way to use your code.
• New import support in Total Visual SourceBook makes it easy to import existing code from a file or a VB Project.

Manage Code Groups
Total Visual SourceBook stores source code in two Microsoft Access databases that make up the Code Group:

• The built-in code (the library source code that ships with the product) is stored in the FMS Code Database.
• The code you add through the Code Repository is stored in the User Code Database.

In this configuration, you have access to the built-in code, along with your own code even when you are not connected to the network. You can also connect to the Code Group stored on the network to access your organization&'s shared code assets.

As another example, you can install the product on your local computer and create several Code Groups on your local drive to manage code for each project you work on. Then, as you work on each project, you can connect to that project's individual Code Group. Of course, this scenario eliminates the usefulness of a common shared repository of code, but does allow such compartmentalization if you need it.

To manage the use of multiple Code Groups, Total Visual SourceBook offers a Join option. This option allows you to “join” any Code Group that you can see on your file system.

This feature eases the management tasks associated with code that crosses several projects, or several development groups. With Total Visual SourceBook, you have complete control over your enterprise code assets.

Source Code Exchange Technology

SCE Distribution is ideal for working in disconnected environments.

Although Total Visual SourceBook provides seamless code sharing for your entire team, there are situations where you or other developers may not have access to the same shared drive. In this case, you can simply package your latest codebase as an SCE file and distribute it to remote team members. Before you know it, everyone is in sync.

SCE technology supports code synchronization

When you import and SCE file into Total Visual SourceBook, the program scans the contents and compares it against the code already in your database. To handle conflicts with existing code, you can choose to overwrite, skip, or create new for each module or class.

SCE Files are compact and self-documenting

SCE files use XML and compression technology to remain as small as possible for distribution over the web or with email. Additionally, when you create an SCE file, you can specify author name and contact information, notes, and copyright information.

General Information

System Requirements
Total Visual SourceBook has the following system requirements:

• Pentium 200 MHz processor, or better.
• 32 MB RAM, 64 MB or more recommended.
• 17 MB free disk space

Total Visual SourceBook does not require Microsoft Office or Visual Basic to be installed in order to run.

Product Packaging and Technical Support

Total Visual SourceBook ships on CD, and includes a printed user’s manual, extensive online help, and an automated installation program. Technical support is provided free of charge and is available by phone, fax, e-mail, and through our newsgroups (news.fmsinc.com).

Licensing and Pricing

Conclusion

Total Visual SourceBook represents the state of the art in integrated code solutions. With its extensive built-in code, and powerful repository features, it offers VB developers a total code solution.

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