2 comments about C# Programming Interview Questions, Answers, and Explanations: Programming C# Certification Review.

1. Indeed, this book is not for everyone. If you have all of the time in the world, you should probably search the internet. Here are some reasons
   why this book is for you.
   
   1. This book has information you can use right now.
   It has code snippets and detailed information.
   This book is an answer to your need for instant information.
   
   2. This book was written and edited by an IT practitioner
   and expert author who has 15 years of varied and vast experiences
   in the world of information technology.
   
   3. Rather than being a textbook-sized or voluminous
   reference guide, C# Interview Questions includes only
   the information that can be used immediately by the reader
   in their job search or IT career. In this regard, this
   book is relatively short. Rather than providing more information,
   this book focuses on providing the right information.
   
   
   4. C# Interview Questions can also be thought of as a
   "cook book" in the traditional sense in that it provides
   the reader information in a very concise and useable manner,
   not unlike a recipe. In this way it should serve you
   by saving you time - by helping you understand what
   is important, and what you can safely ignore.
   
   
   5. For instance, you might find this book particularly useful
   for gaining knowledge and understanding of a completely
   unfamiliar area of programming - C#.
   
   6. By skimming the table of contents and index, you may quickly understand the most important aspects of a particular area, and
   also have access to the accumulated knowledge of the author. It is the unique "Question and Answer"
   nature of this book that makes it so valuable.
   
   7. It can be said that, "If you can't find the right answers,
   maybe you're not asking the right questions..." This book not only helps the reader understand the answers, by providing explanations
   where applicable but also provides the right questions. This book
   also includes code listings and command references which sets it
   apart - and keeps it close at hand at work rather than collecting
   dust on the shelf.
   
   
   8. Finally, this book is published with several goals in mind which
   I believe sets it apart from other sources of information. Its
   mission is to provide the reader with timely, useful information
   that will increase your technical literacy, increase the
   awareness of careers in information technology, and challenge
   readers to question the status quo.
   
   
   I know that this book offers a great deal of value to our readers - I hope you find it as useful as I do.



2. I expected to receive a book in interview question format. The format was like "I did this" then it would give some code or the questions sounded more like a test question and the explanations were lacking. It might be better for people needing certification, but I was looking to get some insight into actual interview questions. If that is what you are wanting, please don't bother wasting your time and money on this item. In addition, the book is really NOT worth the money. There are a lot of books out there that are high quality, with much more information and costs slightly less. I was very disappointed.

5 comments about MCAD/MCSD Visual Basic(r) .NET(tm) Windows(r) Applications Study Guide (Exam 70-306).

1. It's obvious why this book was the first VB.NET book available. The book was obviously rushed, has many typos, pieces of code that doesn't work, and questions with wrong answers. The content of this title isn't anywhere near the quality of the study guide by Gunderloy. This book is a decent start for beginners, but if you really want to learn and pass the test, look elsewhere.



2. This is an excellent book to be used for your certification. It comes loaded with examples, exercises, exams, and plenty of explanations on the answers to the Self-tests on why they are correct AND why they were incorrect!

   One bad thing: You will need to watch the syntax on some of the exam watches and self-test question and answers. I highly recommend downloading the errata for this book before you start from [a website]. I have found a handful of important editing errors but they were pretty obvious.

   Other than the printing errors, which are very few IMO, this is a better cert book than [certain other] books!




3. This book is alright, but it does not take into consideration all OS's on which the code might be running (xp users beware on the globalization chapter) and some of the end of chapter questions don't even seem to be based on data discussed in the chapter. That all being said, there aren't many other options exam prep books for 70-306 and this one is at least easy to follow along with although I don't think it is in depth enough for the exam.



4. This book is chalk full of errors. I am not at all convinced that anyone went back through and actually tried to reproduce the examples and assignments found in this book. If you like a challenge and enjoy debugging someone else's code, this is the book for you. If, however, you feel that your time is better spent actually studying for the exam I would skip this book.



5. If you are new to Visual Basic.Net then this book is great for getting a basic understanding of the language. If you are using it to introduce yourself to the language then I would highly recommend it. However, this book miserably fails its' title in preparing for the 70-306 exam.

   The best thing the book does is to provide you an outline of what to study for the exam but you will need to do further research on the topics with MSDN. Plus, as other reviewers have stated, there are a few errors throughout the book most notably on the practice tests. But, for an intro study I would not let the errors turn you away from it.

   The bottom line is the book is not detailed enough for the exam but a good introduction, especially, for college students taking a VB.Net course.

5 comments about Sams Teach Yourself C# Web Programming in 21 Days (Sams Teach Yourself).

1. :-) This book actually took me nearly forty (40) whole days to read! O.K. Poor humour aside, I'd recommend this book for several reasons...

   Firstly - and this is the most important one - when you invest the time to read ~600 pages of book you need to be sure that the time is being well spent. I purchased this book to get a heads-up on the constructs of the C# language having come from a VB background. I wasn't disappointed -
   

   THIS BOOK WILL TEACH YOU C#!

   I learnt quite a lot of stuff about *languages* that I simply did not think that I had the time to learn just by reading this book. For example, the author takes the time to teach you about polymorphism and inheritance and also the simple things such as reuse and how to lay out your code modules.

   The author - Bradley L. Jones - obviously has a very strong command of languages and that comes through by reading this book. He shows you those little language *tricks* that you only get from someone who knows, and obviously enjoys, programming.

   IN SHORT
   --------

   This book is obviously aimed at someone either new to programming or somebody looking for an introduction to the C# language and I would heartily recommend it for that purpose. If you're serious about .NET, and you enjoy programming, take the time to read this book - I couldn't do it in 21 days, but, I'm glad I did it :-)




2. This book will not teach you C#, there are better books for that. However it is probably the quickest intro to ASP.NET with C# as the programming language on the market today. However it will not teach you everything you need to know to make real world applications, but it will get you started (at least it got me started). True the Visual Studio 7.0 is quite complex and I would have liked to know more about the user interface, but there is enough in the book to get you going. PS the code is available for download (some reviews say its not).
   Only negative point is that the application examples are kind of boring :-(



3. The review titled "Heavy on ASP, light on Visual Studio" is misleading. I almost returned this book after reading the review. It is misleading and incorrect. Early in this book the authors discuss Visual Studio.NET and the "code behind" feature integrated within the IDE. This book is actually pretty good and discusses setup and how to get started in the world of .NET Web programming. It does not cover many details of the C# language, but if you're an experienced programmer, you shouldn't have any trouble picking up the syntax. Keep in mind that Visual Studio.NET offers comprehensive help with detailed and hierarchical views with it's integrated help. You can view the explorer on the right side, or hit F1 to view the help. It's similar to the MSDN of old with Visual Studio. Do not concern yourself with the fact that this book is a little older, as Microsoft has not updated the Visual Studio.NET IDE, except for one service pack to date. This book was written using the 2nd beta of the IDE, and so only a few things have changed in the IDE. Not a huge concern.



4. The authors has not spend enough time to write the book in a manner so that the readers can get the feel of the subject. It absolutly not going for new "code behind" technology. If you want to study ASP it is a so so book but if you are planning to take advantage of ASP.net and C# look else where. Authors could have made project examples in visual studio.net and gave us instead of single file format. In short it doesn't teach you C# or .Net or ASP.net.



5. Just to let you know that Electronic (not electric) source code is available for this book.
   
   Look at:
   
   http://www.samspublishing.com/title/0672322358#
   
   Which gives the link to:
   http://www.pgacon.com/csip21/
   
   Enjoy!

5 comments about C# for Web Programming (Microsoft Technologies Series).

1. If this book is suppose to be an introductory book on C$# fundamentals - they guys got it right.

   I was hoping for some windows programming but I just learned they have another C# book for that.

   I found it to be useful, accurate and to the point. A good book.




2. I didn't give this book 5 stars because nothing is perfect. However, these authors have done a pretty impressive job on their book.

   Let me tell you what I liked: I liked the introduction where they gave you all of the important C# syntax BEFORE launching into the WEB material. Then they showed me how to get started with simple WEB projects. This included the use of important controls, properties and more.

   Then they even did some work on GDI graphics (and I couldn't find this material in ANY other book on the WEB that I looked at in the book store). The book ends with a couple of good WEB service examples, but I haven't gotten to writing them yet.

   Well, the book is about 500 pages... Pretty good deal for what I got out of it.




3. I enjoyed the early part of the book. The examples worked beautifully every time. I felt I was learning about C# and ASP.NET at the same time.

   As I progressed through the book I wondered when they were going to get to databases. They never did. What about Cookies? They are not mentioned either! OK, no book can cover everything, and who'd want it to. But this one simply doesn't go far enough even for a c#/.net novice like me.

   In summary, a good starting point but you'll soon need other books beside this one.




4. How can you do web programming without database programming? I mean thats the main reason we learn C#, or for that matter Java. For web programming a database is a MUST. I could use PERL or PHP or even Javascript to do scripting stuff.

   This book leaves out ADO.NET which is crucial to Web Programming. I advise to skip this book and to try something else.




5. Well, lets start?
   
   Chapter 1. The journej to C#.
   Well, we are talking about Web Programming, right? Why do authors write about Algol, B, C, C++ then? Ok, 16 pages is not too much, but they are useless. Moreover, they say that C# was derived from C++ while it is obvious that it was patterned over Java. But Java is completely forgotten. Umm... You will encounter some very useful stuff like
   "Hypertext - An online document that has words or graphics containing links to other documents. Usually, selecting the link area onscreen (with a mouse or keyboard command) activates these links". Cool!!!
   
   Chapter 2. C# essentials.
   From page 16 till page 70 you will find a lot of information, such as why C# is great. "Essentials" are not essential though. Say, classes and structures occupy just one page. Even for such a newbie in .NET as I am, this chapter was completely useless.
   
   Chapter 3. C# and VS.NET
   "Finally I will learn ASP" - that was my thoght when i finished boring chapters 1 and 2. But I was wrong. Basically, this chapter teaches you how to resize web forms. All the stuff from this chapter you can learn by yourself by just playing with VS.NET in 10 minutes. Do you know how to select a control? "Place the mouse pointer over any control and click once. Move the mouse pointer to the form..." Yeah.
   And you also notice that authors use a LOT of screenshots. All screenshots are half-page sized. Say, picture with textbox, and below the same pic but textbox is resized.
   
   Chapter 4 -5. Static control properties / Dynamic control properties.
   Here authors teach you how to change properties (ya know, in that properties window). Be prepared for long tables of properties with explanations which you can find in VS.NET on status bar. Serious coding starts from chapter 5, you learn how to use events and how to add 1-2 lines of code.
   All examples totally suck, I mean you will learn how to change properties of almost all controls and nothing else. In the end you will write a calculator which will multiply 2 numbers. 4 lines of code. Coooooool!
   
   Chapter 6. Events. From 193 till 221 pp you will find events and their short descriptions, obviously borrowed from VS.NET help. You will not find any example; just empty event handlers and VERY USEFUL comment to EACH of them : "The return type of method is void". Thanks guys! What would i do without you!
   
   Chapter 7. Processing web form input. 48 pages will teach you how, clicking on something, to change something. Be sure, that if your program will change image depending on selected radio button (3 buttons) you will find 3 screenshots which will differ from each other by picture and button selected. This is very useful.
   Authors also will include all code, even that one generated by VS, also it is almost always identical. Be sure, the event handler code will be repeated on the same page.
   
   Chapter 8. Procesing form output. The same stuff as in 7, but here you will show something somewhere... PP. 294 -295 are the best illustration:
   they ontain autogenerated code, screenshot wwith browser, showing microsoft.com and empty event handler method. COOOL!
   Well, this chapter also deals with DataGrid, DataList, Repeater and Table, with 1 example for each control... Just type the code; forget about any explanations or description of properties. Enough.
   
   Chapter 9. GDI Graphics Fundamentals. Chapter 10. Presentation graphics.
   70 useless pages which list classes in Drawing namespace, methods in Graphics and using WINDOWS Forms. Huh?????
   
   Chapter 11. Numeric Applications and Conversions.
   Very useful programs on how to calculate prime numbers, build trygonometric table or use bubble sort.
   
   Chapter 12. Web services. LOTS LOTS LOTS of screenshots. Nothing else.
   
   Well, im bored. These guys just wanted to earn some money, and they did that. The good news is that tthey did not place any screenshots on how to move mouse or close VS. Good idea!
   authors just wanted to fill the pages with something, screenshots and autogenerated code was a solution.
   This book says nothing on
   1. HTML controls. They are just mentioned.
   2. Web application life cycle events. Why there is on_load event handler? Whats that? Who knows.
   3. Whats about session tracking? Cookies?
   4. DataGrid et. al.
   5. ADO.NET is not even mentioned.
   6. Forget about security, etc.
   All eamples are so lame, I cant find words. There are NO real wold examples, even simple login page is not written.
   This book is junk.

5 comments about ASP.NET Website Programming: Problem - Design - Solution, C# Edition.

1. This is definitely one of my favorite books. I've read it cover to cover and I'm constantly going back to use the examples as patterns for building web sites and modules. This is an excellent book for intermediate programmers. I read Beginning Visual C# first, and then skipped around through several ASP.NET books. I really can't say enough good things about this book. It's the best programming book I've ever read. If you want to learn how to build solid ASP.NET websites using C#, this is the book you need.



2. This book is supposed to be used by intermediate-to-experienced .NET programmers. If you have known almost everything about .NET and had some experience developing real-life web application, you see this book worth reading.
   It covers a lot of matters in developing a typical ASP.NET web site. The book goes from module to module, and in each module the approach is problem-design-solution. I dont think I saw much use of design patterns, which is something I desparately want to know how to apply, but the design is generally good and specific to ASP.NET. In other words, it takes advantage of ASP.NET in terms of event models, code behind, custom controls, configuration settings, and ADO.NET of course... About using ADO.NET, it is not just simply and directly binding database to DataGrid, DataList. Instead, the authors did a good job in deciding where to use ADO.NET features and where to use object-oriented features.
   The book also covers data modeling to the level of stored procedure, triggers, relationships, transactions... This makes the development process look more professional and integrated.
   Though there existed some bugs in the code and the book itself takes time and hard to read, i strongly recommend this book to any one who pursues a real good career in .NET.



3. I did not like the layout of the matiral, a bit clombsy but as a refernce book for finding out how to develop a commercial web site it sure does the work.



4. ASP.NET Website Programming: Problem - Design - Solution, C# Edition by Marco Bellinaso & Kevin Hoffman is one of the most USABLE books I have seen. I stress the word USABLE because most books are either reference manuals or just teaching tools. Either one need is hit upon or the other, whereas with this book you get to have your cake and eat it too!
   
   The whole design of this book revolves around designing a web site from the ground up, all using ASP.NET with C# as the programming language of choice. The authors assume that you begin with nothing and you need to have all the parts of your web site hit upon to get this up and running for corporate or personal use. Since .NET is still a very new tool, this book is a very helpful resource to have for any and all web developers.
   
   The Authors break the book up into the following parts:
   
   Design of the overall layout, database, look and feel
   Setting up basic foundations like CSS, navigation, etc
   Editing and viewing all files that make up the site hierarchy
   A look at managing news (information displayed to the user)
   How advertising can be set up to bring in revenue
   Creating and displaying polls on your site
   Working with Mailing Lists
   Managing a Forum
   Deploying the site to the world
   A discussion of different data stores that can be used
   
   The writing in this book is very clear-cut and easy to follow. Using the code supplied in this book, the user can modify as they see fit and get their own site up and running in no time.
   
   As an ASP.NET case study, this is the best book that I have seen to follow a site from birth to adulthood. This is a fantastic book for all C#, ASP.NET, web developers and it's a great addition to your current staple of related programming books.
   
   ***** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED



5. I've read through many of the reviews on this site, both positive and negative. The main point is that if you are a beginner to ASP.NET, C#, or both then this book is NOT for you. However, if you have some experience with ASP.NET and C#.NET and would like to learn more about an N-Tier approach (essentially programming in .NET the RIGHT way) then this book is a MUST. I can't understand why anyone would give this book less than a 5 star rating that meet the authors' intended audience criteria (which, by the way, is stated in the book). I have read the book cover to cover several times and constantly use it as a resource. The book is a series of examples leading up to one project, but I don't think the authors' main intentions were for us to try and build ThePhile.com. From this book I took away the understanding of how to build a scalable, portable, professional Web site having 100% control over it.
   
   If you build web sites with ASP.NET as a novice or hobbyist and want to get to the next level, this book is for you! I own both the VB.NET and C#.NET versions and I highly recommend either one.

3 comments about Pro .NET 1.1 Remoting, Reflection, and Threading.

1. I've bought it for several weeks, it's a good book, but there is no source code for downloading ....
   And I've contacted with APRESS customer service personel, but he said that it is due to the author not upload their source code to APRESS web site, I believe that "a good book must provid not only the content, but also the good using environment (ex: source code for downloading, or CD )"
   I wish that APRESS or the authors can see the comment, and provid source code as soon as possible, not just provide "Table of Content", its too poor ...



2. The author seems to know a lot about remoting(the only part I have read so far) and the theory sounds great, but when you type in the code, a lot of time it doesn't work (especially on multiple machines). Apress has a lot of books like that. This book itself is not bad; however, if there's no code that's runnable, you tend to think: Does he really preach what he practiced? I would really like to see publisher go this extra miles to provide workable code for this type of books.



3. this is actually a well-written book that explains difficult concepts quite well, and despite being authored by many different people, the book reads cohesively. the lack of downloadable source code was not a big problem for me because the code samples are short and straight to the point. some readers, however, may not like the fact that all code samples are in visual basic only.

5 comments about C# in a Nutshell.

1. In my opinion O'reilly continually puts out the best technical books and "C# in a Nutshell" further supports their excellent reputation. As usual with O'reilly's other offerings in their "in a Nutshell" series they leave out the fluff and provide just the facts. This approach makes "C# in a Nutshell" easy to recommend if you've already gotten your feet wet in C#. On the other hand if you're still green you're better off with books that offer a traditional tutorial approach and then come back when you're ready to get into some advanced topics or need a reference to the namespaces and C# implementation.

   Understanding this book is not a tutorial for the beginner will help acclimate yourself to what to expect. Even though the subtitle reads "A Desktop Reference" ample content exists to introduce beginning topics that lay the ground work for its reference sections.

   The first nineteen chapters, approximately two hundred and nineteen pages, cover beginning topics such as .NET Framework and C# basics to advanced subjects including reflection, XML serialization, and threading. The remaining chapters are devoted to a quick reference to classes in the namespaces. Several topics that I'm interested in, including GDI+ were mentioned only briefly and then referred to related namespaces. I'm hoping that GDI+ and other UI related material are covered in more depth in O'reilly's ".NET Windows Forms in a Nutshell" offering or the next edition of "C# in a Nutshell".
   
   Code examples in the book were sufficient to reinforce my understanding of each topic and the `animal tracks' notes were a nice touch and more than mere filler. Other niceties include UML diagrams detailing the namespace structures, DLL / namespace associations, and the C# API Quick Reference encapsulated in a Visual Studio.NET plug-in supplied on the included CD.

   "C# in a Nutshell" has already helped me in a VB to C# conversion project. I'm already looking forward to the next edition that may address some of the missing namespaces, otherwise it's a very important tool that supports my day to day efforts.




2. This book is not a "teach yourself C#"; it is only a reference text. If you are experienced in another programming language, however, you can use this reference to easily find the syntax required by C#. The book is a quick reference useful for programmers who like to have a paper copy reference on their desktops. By the publisher's own admission, it is not an exhausted reference.

   I like having a hard copy reference when I'm programming, so this book suits me fine. There are numerous example code snippets throughout the book to help you learn C#. In addition, the second edition also adds a CD that allows you to incorporate the book's Quick Reference directly into the help files of Visual Studio .NET. This gives you, the programmer, more options when you need help. It is also handy when you have left the book at home.

   I'm an intermediate Java programmer who needed to make the conversion to C# for a particular project. "C# in a Nutshell" has assisted me in this aim, and as a result, I would recommend this book to anyone as a useful reference text.




3. I bought this book because, after using the JDK javadocs for Java for years, I found MSDN's .net online documentation unfriendly in comparison. For the past year, I've been using this book as my first reference, before checking anywhere else. I've found I can usually get what I am looking for the quickest in this reference.
   
   The one problem I have with it is that it doesn't list the exceptions thrown by methods.



4. This book not for beginners . tell me why ?
   because the authors think All people brains as their brains , it's very complex to difficult to understand .
   I advise you to buy the book : Learning C# 2005 from oreilly media .



5. I bought this book because my prior experience with other nutshell handbooks but this one must be the worst among them. A lot of information have been left out and I usually can't find what I am looking for.

3 comments about CodeNotes for C#.

1. This book was reccomended to me by my Senior colleagues and I felt very thankful to them when I started reading this book. It is really a good book if you want to start C#. Very good reading and the authour presents his ideas very straight forward.

   I like the extra pointers that you can explore it in their website if you are interested more about some particular areas.

   After a long time I really enjoyed reading this technical book. My thanks to the authour and the publisher in bringing out such a good book in a very low price.

   Regards
   Mani Subramanian




2. I bought this book to help update my VB/ASP skills to their .NET counterparts. It is layed out in a very smooth and informative manner that walks you through difficult topics with relative ease. My biggest issue is not with the authors portrayal of the subject matter as the obvious lack of editting in the code samples and the companion website.

   In the first 6 code blocks, 3 of them contain errors that prevent the blocks from compiling. An experienced programmer can debug these issues fairly simply, but a novice programmer would likely become very frustrated.

   My second issue is with the companion website. The book relegates many topics to it's website (http://www.codenotes.com/). While this serves to keep the book concise and on-topic, many of the topics are either mislabeled or missing from the website entirely. This was the source of much frustration.

   My final complaint is with the MS ebook format of this book. It cannot be used in a Remote Desktop or Terminal Services connection. You are also prevented from copy/pasting the code blocks, this means each example must be typed out manually even though the electronic format is right in front of you. That is painful at times.

   All said, on the merits of the authors ability to walk the reader through the subject matter, I'd recommend this book.




3. I purchased the book because I decided I wanted to learn C#. I liked it because it doesn't dally around much. It is written in a very straightforward style. The code samples are very direct and don't contain extra fluff just to fill out the book (like too many computer books today). I liked the order in which the concepts were presented, with a few exceptions where they brought up a concept way before it was "officially" introduced.

   This book is not for the novice programmer, it does not hold your hand. It does a fair job of not making too many assumptions about what kind of language you already use, however I don't believe that a programmer who has only ever used Visual Basic will be able to go through this book quickly. For example, the book has some sections on Object Oriented Programming (OOP) but most of their samples show bad OOP practices (probably intentionally to keep the samples simple and direct). This will almost certainly set a VB-only developer off on the wrong foot.

   While I previously applauded the authors for keeping the samples simple, I still fault them for showing bad programming practice when they could have easily shown good practices (for example, catching unnamed or general exceptions rather than specific ones). They clearly don't want to get into the "political" arguments surrounding some issues (such as the use of "goto") and I feel their pain, but they could have been more thoughtful to provide samples that encourage better programming than just the minimal sample that shows the feature. I have not yet seen any of the online samples so these may be better (more about that below).

   I would have given the book 5 stars except that it is missing some very important topics: Threads, methods with variable argument lists, most of the Collection classes, memory usage and limitations, distribution (or installation) issues of C# applications and assemblies, assembly versioning (it covers it somewhat but not how to control it), and the IO model (it assumes you get the concept of streams). Instead of covering these topics it often "punted" and sent me to www.codenotes.com to look up a sample, article, etc. The big problem with this is two-fold: One is that I tend to read the book in restaurants, in the park, in my hammock, etc. pretty much anywhere except for sitting in front a computer. Two, I have yet to find the code notes site active when I have gone in search of one of the notes (the web server on that site has been unresponsive the whole time I spent writing this review). This is not just a problem with this book, but with any book that assumes the code notes site will be highly available.

   The book also has numerous errors, mainly in the sample code (errors that keep many of these from even compiling, let alone functioning as defined). Many of these errors are obvious cut-paste type errors. The publisher of the book allowed code samples to be broken up between non-facing pages (on facing pages that's not so bad, but when you have to flip the page back and forth to try to figure out a sample that is only 5 lines long it seems pretty silly). I found very few errors in the actual text of the book, however, so there were only a few times (maybe five) that I had to re-read the text to figure out why the sample code didn't match up with the description. Note that I am an expert in both C++ and Java so these mistakes may cause more learning problems for others (for example a programmer who is only expert in VB and has no OOP experience).

   Bottom line: If you are expert at C++ and/or Java you will get a lot out of this book. If you are an expert at VB but have studied some Object Oriented language you will also be able to get good use from this book (but it will be slower work). If your only language is VB then you might want to look for a book that doesn't make so many assumptions about your knowledge level. In fact I would suggest picking up a book on Object Oriented Design and Programming first, in C# if you can find one, in Java if not, and that will give you a big boost to prepare you for C# (you can use any Object Oriented Design book, but Java is the closest language in which you are likely to find an existing book).

1 comments about LINQ for Visual C# 2005.

1. If you are looking for a preview of the LINQ SDK help file, look no further. The code samples (for the most part) work with the Preview Release (May 2006).

5 comments about Professional C# (2nd Edition).

1. I have to agree with the previous reviewers who say this book is not up to Wrox standards. This book is "all over the place", meaning there's little cohesion between chapters. This is probably because of all of the authors involved. It makes reading it very confusing.

   Here's a specific example. When discussing struct's vs. classes, the book starts talking about how memory allocation is different for each, and they referred to an earlier discussion of memory. I didn't recall them discussing memory earlier in the book, so I looked it up in the index. They had given it a sentence or two - obviously written by another author, and not intended to provide the depth later assumed.

   Unfortunately, I have purchased 3 C# books, and they're all weak. This, though, is the weakest. I gave "C# Bible" 2 stars as well, but I actually think that's a better book.




2. The book is a great book for new comers to the C# language and to the .NET platform itself as well. It is kind of scattered about, not very much flow to it. Overall the I would highly recommend it to any one wanting to learn to language.



3. Hi,

   There's a lot of mixed reviews about this book . The table contents promises to give a lot of information which it does but not efficiently . I am C++ programmer ,the intial chapters are easy to understand since they are basic oops that I already know .. and the intial chapters on windows and asp was good I felt becoz I had worked on my own before I went thro this . After that it was tooo much of information not written well .In the sense you just keep reading without undestanding half of it becoz the author's expect you to know all the concepts and they confuse what you know by puttting it in words that are so confusing . The flow of thought if missing ...

   ralph.




4. This book is fine,, though I won't say its a great book..
   the really good C# book I found was Inside C#,
   some chapters stand out but in some places this bok just loses flow.
   The best book for C# is C#:Primer Plus.



5. This is the only technology book I've seen written well enough to keep me reading it. I'd have to guess that most of us, when presented a book like this, find ourselves in the index and TOC more than anywhere else, looking for specific concepts that we are interested in.
   
   This book works well in that model, but also has a flavor about it that let's you read a chapter of it at a time, as though it were a magazine article. Perhaps it's because different segments are by different authors (some are much more talented than others in regards to their ability to relate concepts to the reader), but overall the book does not suffer from the numerous voices it holds.
   
   When I teach C#, I recommend this book. It has something for everyone. The examples are often concise, but not at the expense of relaying the necessary information. There is far more in this book than any one person might want on C# at one time.
   
   That isn't to say it is a complete compendium. It does not often dive deeply into the why's of concepts, even if there are how's present. Some higher-end concepts are missing, or understated (encryption, for instance).