.Net and XML

A careful reader would have noticed the "using" keyword in the code sample, and realized that this is C#, not Java. I found this book a good supplement to the MSDN; its well-conceived examples got me off to a good start in this area.

Over the years, I've found it increasingly difficult to buy technology related books simply because of the speed in which they become obsolete. So now I look at each book as not only an instructional tome, but whether or not it will be useful 6 months down the road as a reference. This book (like many of O'Reilly's titles) has easily earned a place in my library. Mr. Bornstein's method of writing seems to fit very well with the way I learn, and his coverage of the subject matter makes this book a great resource when I'm trying to remember the exact syntax of a specific method call.

This book has probably all you need to know about reading, writing, formatting and sending XML over the wire with C#. Standout chapters for me were chapters seven, on XSLT, and nine, on web services. That being said all of the non-reference chapters were evenly written, easy reads and neither rat hole nor pander to the reader. The code samples are numerous but they are hilighted with bold to emphasizes the portions that a critical to the narrative.C# is the only imperative language covered in the book even though most .NET authors cover both C# and VB.NET. In the introduction the author calls C# the central language of .NET and says it's the best language for the job. I don't have big issues about that but other potential .NET readers may, especially considering the popularity of VB.NET. Personally I prefer when the author chooses one language and then leaves the other to the site or the CD. I think VB.NET example code fragments on the O'Reilly site probably would have been a safer bet.It's this one language approach in the dual language .NET environment that kicks the rating from five down to four.

Anyone who has spent even a little time with .NET knows that XML is at the core of many of the libraries. When performing a query with ADO.NET, it's as easy to return the results as a DataSet as it is to return it as XML. This book realizes the core use of XML to .NET and discusses many of the various options developers have in handling XML.The book covers a few main points: how to read XML, how to write XML, how to transform XML (via XSLT), and various data manipulations. Each of these points, in turn, opens up various different issues which are discussed at length (like constraining XML via an XSD or how to read a non-XML document into XML). Much of the discussion contained some of the best instruction related to XML and .NET that I have seen. The final section of the book contains various reference chapters related to the XML namespaces (think of the reference section in the Nutshell series and you'll have a pretty good idea of what to expect). All in all, this is a very well written and well thought out discussion on the uses of XML in .NET. Not only will this book further your understanding of how to use .NET and XML together, but it will also help you gain insight into perhaps new uses for XML in your applications. I would recommend looking through this book before you begin your next .NET application.

The advanced C# developer is the target audience for this book, although a Visual Basic.Net developer who is familar with C# will be able to follow the examples. All of the examples in this book are in C#. This book is sometimes very confusing especially starting in Chapter 5 - Manipulating XML with DOM. Some of the chapters must be read a couple of times in order to make sense and this book is somewhat difficult to read. In Chapter 1 - Introduction to .Net and XML, Chapter 2 - Reading XML, Chapter 3 - Writing XML, and Chapter 4 - Reading and Writing Non-XML Formats establish a basic foundation. The more advanced subjects start in Chapter 5. Here is a synopis of Chapters 5 through Chapter 11.Chapter 5 - Manipulating XML with DOMChapter 6 - Navigating XML with XPathChapter 7 - Transforming XML with XPathChapter 8 - Constraining XML with SchemasChapter 9 - SOAP and XML SerializationChapter 10 - XML and Web ServicesChapter 11 - XML and DatabasesThe author provides a quick reference in chapters 13 through chapter 20 but needs an entire chapter (Chapter 12) to explain how to use the quick references.Pros: The author covers just about every facet of XML in this book. The author provides 4 examples of using the memory stream for I-O. Other books that I have read just mention it briefly but did not provide examples. There are ample examples in this book.Cons: This book is sometimes hard to read and can be confusing at times. You may have to read the chapters several times to make sense of the material. On page 12, the author states that "the simplest thing you can do with an existing XML document is to read it into memory". Shouldn't it be "read from memory" and "write to memory"? I may be wrong but this line confuses me everytime I read it. Like all O'Reilly books, the font used is very small and makes reading difficult.Overall this is a good book for the intermediate to advanced C# developers who have a strong working knowledge of C# and .Net but for less experienced developers or Visual Basic developers with no knowledge of C#, this book may be confusing. This is definitely NOT a beginner book.