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ASP NET 3 5 For Dummies For Dummies Computer Tech

Did you volunteer to create a Web site for the softball team? Is it time to take your small business to the next level and let your customers shop online? Well, you can relax! ASP.NET 3.5 makes creating a dynamic site faster and cleaner than ever before, and ASP.NET 3.5 For Dummies makes it easier.

First, you’ll get an introduction to all the tools and terminology you need to understand ASP.NET. If you’ve used earlier versions of ASP.NET and Visual Web Developer, you can probably skip that part and jump right into what’s new in 3.5. You’ll make friends with LINQ and SQL, create sites in Visual Web Developer 2008 Express, and much more. Before you know it, you’ll discover how to:

• Integrate data, track shopping cart contents, and whisk away bugs
• Create user interfaces with easy navigation
• Use the ListView control for sophisticated formatting
• Write LINQ queries
• Add a table to a database
• Create an event handler
• Take advantage of the drag ‘n’ drop feature that lets you write less code
• Put all the features to work to develop dynamic Web applications

The softball team is going to love that Web site, and your customers might enjoy shopping on your site so much that you’ll have to expand your business to fill all the orders! We can’t promise that, of course, but we’re pretty sure that ASP.NET 3.5 For Dummies will make creating Web sites easier and a lot more fun.

User Ratings and Reviews

2 Stars VB ONLY
This book uses VB only. The web site reference is non existant. The overview should stipulate the strict usage of VB not C#. If you want to use C# do not but this book.

5 Stars A great enjoyable read
I am an experienced developer so I only expected to skim over the book to get familiar with any of the new asp.net 3.5 features. I found myself reading every word of every page because the book was actually “entertaining”. The writing is very smooth and easy to understand. You feel as if a really good teacher who knows how to relate to people is talking to you.

I was also surprised how deep the book was able to go into each subject. For example Linq is a very complicated subject yet the book does contain enough examples for you to use it in the real world.

5 Stars The Right Author, the right approach
I almost didn’t by the ASP.NET 3.5 for Dummies. Then I noticed that it was a different author than ASP.NET 2.0 for Dummies and I thought I would give it a look. Bill Hatfield wrote the ‘Dummies’ book on the previous version and while I found him to be very knowledgeable, I got frustrated because I was trying to learn how to use Visual Studio with ASP.NET and his book didn’t provide much help. Ken Cox however “gets it”. He wrote the book for use with Visual Studio and by the end of Chapter 4 you’re already using AJAX with no difficulty! By chapter 7 you’re delving into LINQ! Ken’s approach is intelligent and his style works both for the beginner as well as those more seasoned in ASP.NET. Excellent book!

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Programming Microsoft ASP NET 2 0 Applications Advanced Topics

In-depth guidance to help professional developers achieve mastery of advanced ASP.NET capabilities. Get the expert insights and pragmatic code examples you need to master the advanced features and capabilities for developing sophisticated Web applications with ASP.NET 2.0.

User Ratings and Reviews

5 Stars ASP.NET 3.5 Applications: Advanced Topics
So whilst you are waiting for the 3.5 version you can get this one second hand.

It covers loads of usefull day-to-day tasks that most web devs have to search google for. Not sure that “Advanced” is the correct choice here, but its tasks that all my senior devs are capable of.

This said, it’s a must have for any web developers desk. All of the 2.0 stuff still applies to 3.5 cant wait till the new version that would be more complete.

However, just using his examples expressed in Listview/Datapager controls using LINQ will yeild plenty till his new book comes out.

I can understand why the 3.5 version is delayed (seeing 4.0 is due in December), there is plenty of ‘advanced’ issues in using MVC to content with, then add microsofts version of Spring/NHibernate to the mix (not stable yet where as the open source Spring/NHibernate is) then you can see why there is a delay.

“ASP.NET 3.5 Applications: Advanced Topics” is a moving target and will be for 6 months(conjecture) or more(features in consenus use a >12months away?).

So why get “ASP.NET 2.0 Applications: Advanced Topics”?

It will make your life easier and get projects out the door faster.

All that you learn in this book can be applied to your 3.5 projects (we just use VS2008 and VS2003 for legacy - VS2005 has no further use).

Likewise if your are a commerical C# developer you would use the VSTS version of 2008 due to the productivity gains unless you work in a sweat shop where labour is cheap.

Related:

Using ReSharper4 Power Programming with ReSharper: Optimize .NET Development with the ReSharper Add-In to Visual Studio 2008 (Wrox Briefs) offer substantial benefits for C# 3.5 users this too will have you get quality code out the door faster.

Programming Microsoft ASP.NET 3.5 is a welcome addition as Dino really knows his stuff (ASP.NET/AJAX/UI)

2 Stars Not the best for custom controls
I bought this book specifically for the 100+ pages on creating custom web controls. That is the only portion of the book that I have used.

The book does not come with a CD for the source code examples, and I have been unable to find them online.

That means I have to type in the examples. I normally don’t mind, as it helps me learn. But his sample control, SimpleGaugeBar, has code scattered across two chapters (#13 and 14), all in bits and pieces. The code is intermingled with alternate code examples that (I think) he isn’t using in the class, plus code from other classes apparently unrelated to SimpleGaugeBar.

The sample control is also buggy. Of course, it’s my guess as to the code that is supposed to be contained in the control, because there is no single definitive listing of the code in the book. I suspect the sample code is simply buggy because the event sequencing the control responds to does not match the way the control was coded.

He separated the creation of the internal list of control objects and the styling code into two routines. That’s probably a good idea. But, and this is a killer, if you programmatically change the properties of the control, the internal list of control objects is created *before* the new property value is set, and applies styling after the property is set. This will cause the control to fail, because the styling code will refer to objects that were not created based upon the prior property settings.

The styling code also refers to objects in the internal list of controls by array index number instead of by their id. That’s bad form and very prone to error.

I’m not a happy customer.

That said, there is a lot of material on custom controls, and I learned a lot going through it. There are not a lot of resources out there that cover this topic in any depth, and this is one of the few. So, muddled, buggy and disorganized as it is on this topic, I would recommend it (until I found something better).

5 Stars Excellent material
This book rocks! I cant find anymore words to say this

I keep this book by my computer all the time. Dino has once again provided us with some great information.

4 Stars Broad and deep coverage
The two books of this series (Core Reference & Advanced Topics) offer broad and deep coverage of ASP.NET.

All the important topics of ASP.NET web sites are covered in a mostly tutorial with a little reference fashion. The books are well researched. The coverage of what really happens during compilation, request processing, and expression evaluation is excellent. The books avoid being an MSDN rehash. By carefully pointing out which ASP.NET versions support which features, the books will be useful for working with any ASP.NET version. No matter what you’re working on you’ll find something useful in these books. Note that web services are not covered.

The terms “core reference” and “advanced topics” (which MS press is using on all the non beginner books) make no sense at all with these books. If you’re serious, you need both books. Think of them as volumes 1 and 2 of a single book.

I do have some issues with these books. The biggest mistake was recommending the use of GDI+ (through the System.Drawing namespace). This is not supported. The System.Drawing namespace page in MSDN states “Classes within the System.Drawing namespace are not supported for use within a Windows or ASP.NET service. Attempting to use these classes from within one of these application types may produce unexpected problems, such as diminished service performance and run-time exceptions.”

I didn’t enjoy Dino’s writing style. It’s verbose (at times), he uses odd words to describe things, and was boring even by tech book standards.

The chapter on configuration was difficult. It would have better to cover configuration throughout the book, in the context of what was being configured, instead of a single all configuration and only configuration chapter.

The section of asynchronous pages was confusing and didn’t really explain why asynchronous pages improve scalability.

Despite my reservations, there is much that’s good about these books. Anybody who’s serious about ASP.NET should consider getting both of them.

4 Stars Written by somebody who knows what he is talking about
Basics of .net framework is presented in a clear and lucid style. This book is a joy to read and . by the way there is not much difference in content wise between applied .Net framework programming and this book. My only worry is the speed at which microsoft is pushing .net versions as if there is no tommorrow! [Subsequently the catch up I have to do on reading all this!]

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ASP NET 2 0 A Developers Notebook

When ASP.NET hit the street a couple of years ago, it was a real eye-opener. Microsoft’s tool for creating dynamic, server side web applications introduced Web Forms, a feature with the same rapid drag and drop convenience enjoyed by Visual Basic developers, along with a method for creating XML-based web services. ASP.NET was more than an upgrade of Active Server Pages it was a quantum leap ahead. Now Microsoft has a new version of ASP.NET as part of its upcoming next generation release of the Visual Studio .NET development platform. ASP.NET 2.0 is already available in beta release, and web developers are anxious to get a good look at it. That’s exactly what our new Developer’s Notebook allows you to do. More than just an introduction to ASP.NET 2.0, this practical guide acquaints you with all of the new features through nearly 50 hands-on projects. Each one places emphasis on changes in the new release that can increase productivity, simplify programming tasks, and help you add functionality to your applications. For example, ASP.NET 2.0 includes master pages, themes, and skins so you can build applications with a consistent page layout and design. Other changes allow for the automatic creation of web pages for use on mobile devices, while wizards and controls allow you to perform frequent tasks (like data access) without having to write a single line of code. ASP.NET 2.0: A Developer’s Notebook also includes suggestions for further experimentation, links to on-line documentation, and practical notes and warnings from the author regarding changes to the new version. The new Developer’s Notebooks series from O’Reilly offers an in-depth first look at important new tools for software developers. Emphasizing example over explanation and practice over theory, they focus on learning by doing you’ll get the goods straight from the masters, in an informal and code-intensive style. If you want to get up to speed on ASP.NET 2.0 before its official release, this all lab, no lecture book will get you there.

User Ratings and Reviews

5 Stars Very Useful For Beginners and Mid-level Developers
This is a well-written, easy-to-use book hitting the main points of ASP.NET 2.0. I’ve never read it cover-to-cover, but have gotten great use from it as a reference manual when I need to quickly figure out how to do something new in ASP.NET 2.0.

The book’s laid out in a clear fashion and has a solid index, so it’s easy to find the material you need to solve a problem. Each “lab” in the book is task-oriented, so you’ll find things like “Create a Master Page for Your Site” which details the steps necessary to accomplish the task. Sections are nicely done and full of tips and tricks, plus there are plenty of short sidebars noting smaller bits of interest such as content pages being limited to having only one master page.

I’ve found the breadth of coverage quite nice. The author hits everything from Master Pages/Site Navigation to Security to Profiles. There’s also a nice section on Performance which talks about site precompilation and caching. (I even nabbed one of the author’s labs for one of my talks on .NET — with attribution, of course.)

The book’s very nicely done. It’s concise and clear, and I like its style, both content and visual. Some folks might complain about the examples all being in Visual Basic 2005, but as Dr. Phil might say, “Build a bridge and get over it.” The labs give you more than enough detail to understand how you need to use the Framework to accomplish tasks, so the particular language used shouldn’t be such an issue.

Advanced ASP.NET developers probably won’t get a lot out of this unless they’re completely new to 2.0, but beginning and intermediate developers should find the book very helpful.

So far this book’s been very useful.

5 Stars Go Beyond the Basics
This is a great book for taking your ASP.NET 2.0 skills beyond the basics. Learn valuable skills for improving your web sites such as data caching, partial page caching and lowering the cost of server callbacks. Learn to let your site save user profiles and let users save site themes as a personalized profile; plus lots more.

Where other books just gloss the surface of controls and topics Wei-Meng Lee using a lab notebook approach drills down multiple layers on each topic and in just over 300 pages manages to cover more information than books with 3 times the number of pages; and on almost every page is a URL for additional information. IMHO, this book should be on the bookshelf of every serious ASP.NET developer.

4 Stars Get your hands dirty with 2.0
I bought this book after reading a couple of chapters at a local bookstore. It’s very hands on, totally gets the job done. I was trying to implement a web application using the new asp.net framework, and it helped me out in all but details which I did not need till later on in the project.

What it will not do: Explain you the intricate differences, eg. at the level of the asp.net worker process in the difference in the way it compiles pages at runtime.

What it will do: Get you completely up and running with the new framework, esp. with a very good chapter about the GridView control.

2 Stars An expensive paperweight
I really have not gained anything from this book. I bought the book having extensive 1.1 experience with a bit of 2.0 experience.

The examples are way to simplistic. I can see this book being okay for an absolute beginner, but advanced developers aren’t going to gain much.

And all of the examples are in vb.net… *sigh*

3 Stars good introduction to ASP.NET 2.0
This is a pretty good introduction to ASP.NET 2.0 for folks who are already familiar with ASP.NET 1.1. All of the examples are in VB.NET, so if that bothers you, you might want to look elsewhere. I prefer C# myself, so I just rewrote the examples in C# as I went along. That gave me something mildly interesting to do as I worked my way through the book.

The examples in the book are pretty simple and generally just serve to illustrate basic concepts. There’s no really interesting code in the book. It’s really just a quick way to get through some of the new stuff in ASP.NET 2.0.

One problem with this book is that it was written during the beta phase, and doesn’t reflect a few things that changed in the final version of ASP.NET 2.0. There is an update document on O’Reilly’s site, and there may be a new printing with those corrections, but I’m not sure about that.

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Beginning ASP NET 3 5 in C 2008 From Novice to Professional Second Edition Beginning from Novice to Professional

The most up–to–date and comprehensive introductory ASP.NET book you’ll find on any shelf, Beginning ASP.NET 3.5 in C# 2008 guides you through Microsoft’s latest technology for building dynamic web sites. This book will enable you to build dynamic web pages on the fly, and it assumes only the most basic knowledge of C#.

The book provides exhaustive coverage of ASP.NET, guiding you from your first steps right up to the most advanced techniques, such as querying databases from within a web page and tuning your site for optimal performance. Within these pages, you’ll find tips for “best practices” and comprehensive discussions of key database and XML principles you need to know in order to be effective with ASP.NET. The book also emphasizes the invaluable coding techniques of object orientation and code behind, which will start you off on the track to building real–world web sites right from the beginning—rather than just faking it with simplified coding practices.

By the time you’ve finished the book, you will have mastered the core techniques and have all the knowledge you need to begin work as a professional ASP.NET developer.

User Ratings and Reviews

5 Stars Great Introduction to ASP.NET
I have purchased (what feels like) hundreds of computer related books from Amazon.com (including other ASP.NET books), and this is the first one that I have ever felt the need to comment on.

This is just a great book, in my opinion! I found the book to be very easy to read, and logical to follow - Matthew MacDonald’s writing style is very effective in communicating technical information in a way that made it easy for me to understand.

I’ve been developing Windows client applications (VB/C#) for close to 10 years, and have “played around” with ASP.NET 2.0. I knew how to make some basic web apps work, but didn’t really understand what was going on underneath the covers. I had a lot of questions that were answered and now have a lot more confidence going forward with creating ASP.NET apps.

As I mentioned, I had purchased ASP.NET books by different authors (for 1.1 and 2.0). Maybe I never gave those books a chance, but this is by far the best that I have come across.

4 Stars Disconnect from the first edition
First Edition of this book 1-59059-468-1 was a step by step tutorial of how to build sites. At the end, you get a decent working model of a balloon website. Thus, the title Novice to Professional. This book doesn’t do this. The book is more laid out like other books. Chapter by Chapter, it covers a big topic like State Management, Error Handling, and others. This book is just like other books out there. I am bit disappointed that the publisher thought that previous book was not in an optimal format. There is really nothing wrong with the content or the information. This just isn’t the Novice to Professional Book. It’s as if you were reading the Harry Potter. On first edition, you know how Harry Potter is like. On second edition, he is gone or he doesn’t do the magic tricks anymore. Instead, he cooks or sings. This book is like that. I can see Harry Potter Singing and Cooking. But that’s not the Harry Potter series. He does magics…

This book is good but it’s not in the original format.

5 Stars Solid Material
I don’t read many 900 page books cover to cover.. It’s an accomplishment for both finishing this tome, and for the author of this great read.

The first sections gets you up to speed on C# quickly.. You should know some programming before diving in. Then each area of ASP.NET is covered at a healthy pace. Useful samples, and explanations and recommendations throughout. He first covers the manual ways of doing things, then goes into the slightly narrower scope of productivity shortcuts that turn days of development into hours. He’s given me a new respect for it.

There are so many books on each tech subject, it’s hard to know where to go. You find a few authors you like, and read their books. I’ll pick up another one of his books soon.

Great read, highly recommended.

5 Stars Good book
Usually technical books are very booring to read. I buy many books as I tend to easily get trapped with reviews about book. But this book is one of the best book on C#. Every chapter is in detail and all it needs to get concentrations is to start reading it. The examples and the flow of topics are well planned. This is the book one should have if you are in to C#.

This is my first review on any book although I have purchased many books from many website. I felt a book which is soo good needs to be acknowledged.

Mark my words…this book is worth buying …!!!!

5 Stars Awesome ASP.NET 3.5 Book!
ASP.NET 3.5 is the latest version of the .NET Framework from Microsoft. C# is the defacto standard programming language for Microsoft programmers. Although there are more VB.NET programmers out there, C# is considered the more “professional” language and hence forth there are more job opportunities for C# programmers.

This book is huge (800+ pages) and really covers everything you need to know about C# and ASP.NET 3.5. Of course there maybe a few database topics it did not go into detail as much, but for the money it can’t be beat. The author (Mathew MacDonald) really explained all the topics very well and assumed no prior knowledge of .NET knowledge. You really can be a `novice’ and learn a lot from this book.

The great thing about the .NET framework from Microsoft now, is that there are so many free programs to learn before you invest any money (apart from the book of course).

The author explains the C# language first (great choice and wish more authors did it that way), in the first few chapters before getting into web forms and ASP.NET objects. C# is a professional language and definitely should be learned first before getting into anything else.

Starting at chapter 5, the author starts to explain what a web form is and how ASP.NET works. Covering everything from how sever and web controls work, to the web.config customizations, WAT, web control classes, etc. The following chapter focuses in detail about web controls (what ASP.NET is really all about) and probably is the meatiest of all the chapters. The chapter 7 goes into state management which is a very important and goes hand-in-hand with how web controls work.

Error handling (chaper and deployment (chapter 9) is next on topics covered and then in the next sections of the book the author goes back into web controls with lots of examples of using the validation controls and master pages. Master Pages have grown a lot in this version and it is the core of how you will design you own ASP.NET 3.5 web site. There are 3 chapters dedicated to web site design and development and I have never seen a book with so much detail on the subject. Well done!

The rest of the book goes into database topics such as SQL, ADO.NET, Data Bindings, etc. I can’t describe how impressed I am with how many topics are covered in this book and how well they are covered. You really only need this book for 80-90% of you ASP.NET development work.

A great buy!!!

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Murachs ASP NET 3 5 Web Programming with VB 2008

This book is for Visual Basic developers who want to learn how to develop professional web applications with Microsoft’s ASP.NET 3.5. The first 4 chapters present a quick-start course that works both for beginners and for experienced web developers who are new to ASP.NET. Then, the next four sections present (1) the skills you need for any business application, (2) the skills you need for database applications, (3) the skills you need for e-commerce applications, and (4) the skills you need for developing code that can be reused in other web applications. Along the way, you’ll learn about .NET 3.5 enhancements that streamline web development, like the ListView and DataPager controls, LINQ, and AJAX.

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