An Introduction to VBScript

If you are creating a web site for the first time, then you probably have some knowledge of the HTML programming language. HTML is a fairly simple language to learn, and most beginning web designers are usually self-taught when it comes to using HTML to create a simple web page. HTML provides the style, structure, and formatting for a web site.

However, HTML does not actually do anything. It is a static programming language. It does not process anything or make your site interactive, it just sits there and tells the browser how the site should look. So, other programming languages have been created to improve site design and make sites more interactive for the user.

One such language that has become extremely important and widely used is VBScript. VBScript is a scripting language. Scripting languages are used to connect diverse pre-existing parts to accomplish a new related task without compiling. Also, scripting languages are interpreted, and are executed faster than a compiling language. VBScript is very versatile and can communicate with other languages effectively. VBScript is a variation of Visual Basic, an event driven programming language invented by Alan Cooper, and later bought and expanded by Microsoft.

VBScript is like Javascript in that they are both scripting languages, but at the same time these two languages are indeed different from one another, and most of the syntax is not similar. To use VBScript, you need to put any and all VBScript code in between script tags, with the attribute for the opening script tag being the VBScript text type. This tells the web browser that that code contained within the script tag is VBScript and not ordinary HTML.

You can place VBScript programming code in either the head section or the body section of your webpage. VBScript functions are to be placed in the head section so that the functions are loaded before called upon in the body section of the page. VBScript code that is involved in displaying certain elements of the web page immediately upon the loading of the page would go in the body section of the page.

As with Javascript, you can define values for certain variables that you plan to use in your VBScript procedures and functions. These would be placed in the head section of the web page. You can also define variables as an array using VBScript. An array would be a variable that has more than one value. When defining each value of a single variable with an array, the name of the variable stays the same, but each value is defined with an index number that is placed in parentheses. Here would be an example of an array for a variable called Random having 3 different values:

Random(1) = 12
Random(2) = 72
Random(3) = 45

VBScript has two different types of basic procedures. There are sub procedures and function procedures. Sub procedures can process data and perform an action, but they do not return a value. Function procedures process data and do return a value. There are four different types of conditional statements that VBScript uses. These include if/then, if/else, if/elseif, and select case statements. There are 3 basic looping statements that are utilized by VBScript, including for/next, for each/next, and do/loop. All of these statements are easy to learn and create. Conditional and looping statements are the logic, or the brain behind VBScript.

So, if you are new to web design and have become proficient in developing artistically sound, static web pages, you should now move on to creating more complex, interactive web sites with VBScript. You need to create sites that not only display information but react to input received by the user. You can begin to learn VBScript fairly easily through online tutorials, but it might be a good idea to enroll in some courses at a local college or computer programming institute, or perhaps buy a VBScript textbook from a local bookstore. However you learn it, using VBScript effectively is essential for every web designer.

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