Murach's ASP.NET Web Programming with VB.NET

I recently got hold of a copy of this book (full title: "Murach's ASP.Net Web Programming with VB.Net") and it is terrific. In particular, it includes the best walkthrough and problem solver of using IIS I've yet seen - and I know from the Forums that this very early step causes a lot of people a heap of problems. (Me included at one time! ) The book uses a technique of having the main narrative on the left hand page, backed up by important summaries and/or diagrams on the right hand page. This can be quite useful for reinforcing those particularly tricky areas and is handy for flipping back to when you need to recheck something. Overall, I think it works great.

Simply said: One of the best books I have ever bought! I needed to dive into ASP.NET pretty fast because I had a project running to its deadline. I was a programmer who knew Visual Basic and Delphi pretty well. I did know the theory of ASP.NET but had no practical experience. This book teached me in a record time how to build and get my first web application up and running. The best starter's book you can imagine. The second book I bought on the subject was ASP.NET Unleashed, which is a marvellous book if you have some ASP.NET experience. For a beginner Murach's book is simply a dream, and although I have written a couple of web applications now, I still use it as a quick reference. WORTH EVERY PENNY IN GOLD.

As a teacher of ASP.NET, I have tried several textbooks. I always like a textbook that supplements my teaching rather than dictates it. Murach's ASP.NET does just that and is an excellent book for teaching web programming because of its format. The left-hand page explains a particular concept while the right-hand page illustrates the concept with code snippets that are easy to understand. My students get frustrated trying to sift through long sample programs to find the few lines of code that illustrate a given point. With Murach's code snippets, the code is easy to understand. The authors also use code-behind instead of embedding code via the ASP.OLD style. Not many books do that, thus giving this book a rich, more modern approach to the way ASP.NET programming should be done. The more I read this book, the better it gets.

Murach's ASP.NET web programming with VB.NET by Doug Lowe and Anne Prince is a in depth training and reference book for ASP.NET programming using VB.NET. The book builds upon Murach's previous books Murach's beginning visual basic .NET and Murach's VB.NET database programming and covers more advanced concepts for programming ASP.NET pages. The book covers the use of session states, cookies, database classes, object classes, user validation controls, application state, developing user controls, the crystal reports viewer and security. As with the previous books in the series the book is very complete. The only fault I can find is the failure to include instructions on how to use Access databases and XML files as data sources. While that topic was covered very well in the database book it would have been nice to have a brief overview of the subject specifically for ASP.NET applications.The book is written in the same style as the previous two books I have reviewed which makes it easy to learn and useful after as a reference. All the code is well documented with syntax explained in full prior to the code being used. In each segment of the book the complete code for the application you are working on is included even if it was originally introduced several chapters earlier. There are errors in the book and the website has an addendum for those. I did manage to find an error that was not already noted though on page.This book enabled me to write custom websites for two customers which is exactly what I wanted it to help me with. The sections that assisted the process the most for me where the ones on web application security and database classes. No previous book did such an excellent job of demonstrating how to do those two things.Overall I give this book a 9 out of 10 with one point being deducted for not including some examples on how to use XML files or Access databases as data sources for web pages.

With 12 years in software development, and just completing an ADO .NET course I can truthfully say this book will get you up to speed fast and creating a fully functioning ASP .NET web site using SQL Server and ADO .NET. I have purchased and sold some of the "Learn ASP .NET in 24 hours, 24 days", ect... That just could not teach this topic.The publisher's web site has downloads for all the code from this book, and two free chapters. They layout of this book is excellent.The book covers..· ADO.NET· Disconnected Data Access, Datasets, data tables· Managing State (5 ways)· User Controls· Cookies· Data Grids· Authentication/SecurityGreat choice for someone who wants to get up and running fast, or to use as a reference.You will need more information on ADO.NET that this book does not cover in enough detail such as updating databases, and custom grid paging. Buy Microsoft's ADO.NET Core Reference ISBN: 0-7356-1423-7 (no doubt the best book on ADO.NET)