USING VISUAL BASIC TO TEACH PROGRAMMING FOR GEOGRAPHERS

We describe a course in which the programming language Visual Basic wa s used to teach programming for geographers. Although the functionalit y present in commercial off-the-shelf applications has led to the demi se of computer programming instruction in geography, we feel there are several reasons why programming should be taught: 1) experience attai ned may be applied when using macro (scripting) languages in commercia l GIS packages and when manipulating sophisticated visualization softw are, 2) students develop a deeper understanding of general hardware an d software capabilities, 3) experience with programming makes students appreciative of the difficulty and time that good programming require s, and 4) resulting applications will function precisely as desired. F ortunately, modern programming languages, such as Visual Basic, ease t he burden of programming and still provide these advantages. Distinct advantages of Visual Basic include its low cost, ease of developing in terfaces, and links with standard Windows functions. A major disadvant age is the lack of graphic primitives and color manipulation capabilit ies appropriate for geographic work. To ease instructors' burden of us ing Visual Basic, we provide both source and executable code for seven projects developed in the course through the Microcomputer Specialty Group of the Association of American Geographers.