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CBASIC Learning C# basics

Tags: C#, Csharp, C# fundamentals, C# basics

These lessons are designed to keep you engaged with the process of learning C# basics by presenting it through a series of lessons aimed at creating simple, browser-based, web applications using ASP.NET. Our main focus will be on learning C# basics, while the side focus will be on learning ASP.NET. Once you understand the C# basics, you will then be able to delve far deeper into ASP.NET, which will also be made easier having come to understand HTML, CSS, and other web related technologies.

Lesson 2 Development Environment for C#

C# is used for server side execution for different kind of application like web, window forms or console etc. In order to use C# with your .Net application, you need two things, the .NET Framework and an Integrated Development Environment (IDE).

What is Microsoft .Net Framework?

The .Net framework is a software development platform developed by Microsoft. The framework was meant to create applications, which would run on the Windows Platform. The .NET Framework is a platform where you can write different types of web and desktop based (windows) applications. You can use C#, Visual Basic, F# and Jscript to write these applications. If you have the Windows operating system, the .NET framework might already be installed in your PC.

The .Net framework applications are multi-platform applications. The framework has been designed in such a way that it can be used from any of the following languages: C#, C++, Visual Basic, Jscript, COBOL, etc. All these languages can access the framework as well as communicate with each other.

The .Net framework consists of an enormous library of codes used by the client languages such as C#. Following are some of the components of the .Net framework:

• Common Language Runtime (CLR)
• The .Net Framework Class Library
• Common Language Specification
• Common Type System
• Metadata and Assemblies
• Windows Forms
• ASP.Net and ASP.Net AJAX
• ADO.Net
• Windows Workflow Foundation (WF)
• Windows Presentation Foundation
• Windows Communication Foundation (WCF)
• LINQ

.Net Framework Version History

The first version of the .Net framework was released in the year 2002. The version was called .Net framework 1.0. The .Net framework has come a long way since then, and the current version is 4.7.1.

Below is the table of .Net framework versions, which have been released with their release dates. Every version has relevant changes to the framework.

For example, in framework 3.5 and onwards a key framework called the Entity framework was released. This framework is used to change the approach in which the applications are developed while working with databases.

What is  Integrated Development Environment (IDE)?

An IDE is a development tool that helps you write your programs. 

Microsoft provides the following development tools for C# programming:

• Visual Studio IDE 2017. Fully-featured IDE for Android, iOS, Windows, web, and cloud. There are three versions available Enterprise, Community and Professional. Community version is free, but you need to register with Microsoft. You can download them here.
• Visual Studio Express 2017 is available for Windows Desktop developers. This will be the final version of Visual Studio Express, and there will not be a UWP or Web offering of Visual Studio Express 2017. We encourage all users to look at the free development options offered by Microsoft such as Visual Studio Code and Visual Studio Community for future development needs. You can download it here.
• Visual Web Developer 2008 Express Edition is a free easy to use and easy to learn program that allows everyone, from the novice to the professional developer, to create ASP.NET web sites. You can download it here.
• Visual Studio Code. Visual Studio Code is a lightweight but powerful source code editor which runs on your desktop and is available for Windows, macOS and Linux. It comes with built-in support for JavaScript, TypeScript and Node.js and has a rich ecosystem of extensions for other languages (such as C++, C#, Java, Python, PHP, Go) and runtimes (such as .NET and Unity). You can download it here.

Using these tools, you can write all kinds of C# programs from simple command-line applications to more complex applications. You can also write C# source code files using a basic text editor, like Notepad, and compile the code into assemblies using the command-line compiler, which is again a part of the .NET Framework.

Note: You need an active internet connection for installing the IDE.

#develop (short for SharpDevelop) is a free open-source IDE for C#, VB.NET and Boo projects on Microsoft's .NET platform. You can download it here.

Note: Microsoft .NET Framework 4.5.1 must be installed on your  PC.

Writing C# Programs on Linux or Mac OS