Event Driven Programming Key Features

Event Driven Programs Typically used for most modern day software applications examples include: word processing, spreadsheets, drawing packages etc. Usually used for GUIs where many types of events are generated i.e. clicking on a button or another object

Key features Event Handlers Trigger Functions Events Event Loops Forms Flexibility Service oriented Suitability for GUIs Simplicity of programming Time Driven

Event Handlers VB.Net uses subroutines for event handling, with the name of the object followed by the name of the event – see below: Event Event Handler

Trigger functions These are used along with the object’s name to determine with event handler to run Every object has a range of trigger functions, one for each possible event that can happen to it. For example, txtText could have an event handler for the following triggers: GotFocus, TextChanged etc... Temporal triggers mean triggers set off by duration of time State triggers are when the current situation causes a certain set of procedures to run What is the trigger here??

Event Loops Event Driven Programs have event loops built into the environment. The loops keep testing the interface to detect whether anything has happened, such as clicking on a button or typing into a textbox etc. Event Loops are also known as event listeners

Flexibility Programmers have enormous control over where to place code and how to start it. Every object has a good choice of events that a program can respond to. These events give an excellent level of control over exactly what the program will respond to when the user does something

Service Oriented A lot of networked applications use service oriented techniques so that different applications can reuse code components. Service oriented applications separate the service implementation from the program interface that uses the service. An example is a request from a database. XML (Extensible Markup Language) is commonly used for interfacing with such service oriented architectures.

Time Driven Time driven programming is often used in real time, where code execution is controlled by the computer clock. A program is divided into a set of tasks that need to be regularly activated. The activation pattern us stored into a dispatch table, where rules are used to schedule the tasks.