5 comments about Practical .NET for Financial Markets (Expert's Voice in .Net).

1. This text is excellent in what it sets out to do and five other reviewers have said so with 5 star ratings. I agree very much with the reviews of Ted Hrudz and Gulli Ellee, in particular - they are well said and spot on. I think I must make a few comments of my own, however. I have managed financial software projects in the last seven years and have experience in developing and implementing capital and money market securities software, and prior experience in implementing equity software, so I have some background and interest in this area.
   
   First the positives: This books succeeds enormously at providing a very good introduction to equity markets and front and back office software development from a .NET development lead, architect or developer perspective. In less than 500 pages the authors manage to provide a very good and reasonably comprehensive/broad tutorial in several aspects of financials as well as .NET and the book makes reasonably easy reading for such technical subjects. Most of the relevant and interesting topics are covered or touched on. The reviewers I mention above itemize most of the .NET and financials topics covered so I will spare you the repetition.
   
   The authors are obviously very knowledgeable in both the securities domain and the .NET architecture and development technologies and issues and convey their knowledge expertly. This book makes an excellent introduction (but ironically advanced/intermediate in several respects) to the domain concepts and requisite architectural/developmental .NET features. Having said that let me add that you will need more than this book if you seriously plan to undertake financial software development with .NET. You may need to supplement your knowledge in both areas with some of these books, depending what you already know or have been involved in:
   
   Securities/Electronic Payments Domain: 1. Securities Operations: A Guide to Trade and Position Management by Michael Simmons; 2. Corporate Actions by Michael Simmons; 3. After the trade is made by David M. Weiss, Revised 2006 Edition; 4. How the US Securities Market Works by Hal McIntyre (2nd Edition); 5. Gobal Securities Operations by Jeremiah O'Connor; 6. Trading and Exchanges: Market Microstructure for Practitioners by Larry Harris; 7. An Introduction to Financial Technology by Roy S. Freedman. 8. You may also need to understand Secure Electronic Payment Systems (see texts by Weidong Kou, Mostafa Hashem Sherif)
   
   Technology (.NET Framework, Visual Studio & SQL mainly) : Books by some of the best authors such as 1. Juval Lowy and Alex Ferrara (.NET 3.5, SOA/WCF, Web Services, Remoting, Messaging, Application Logging, Threading, Component-based/Distributed Architectures, Application Security Design, etc.); 2. Chris Sells (Windows Forms in VS 2005); 3. David Sceppa, Brian Noyes, Fabrice Marguerie or David Ratz(ADO.NET 2.0/3.5/Data Binding or LINQ); 4. Stephen Walther, Alessandro Gallo, Cristian Darie, Marco Bellinaso (ASP.NET 2.0/3.5 and AJAX); 4. Nick Rozanski (Software Systems Architecture); 6. Itzik Ben Gan (MS SQL 2005-8); 7. Secure Coding against hacker attacks using books by Gary McGraw/Billy Hoffman/Michael Howard such as 'The 19 Deadly Sins Of Software Security'; to explore such topics in greater detail.
   
   I think the author could have added the equivalent VB.NET code for VB developers and architects. That is the main beef I have (and the book is a bit too expensive, buy it online for a rebate. It should have been paper back to reduce the price for readers) but I still thinks it deserves a 5-star ranking . Bravo to Samir Jayaswal and Yogesh Shetty, the authors!



2. The authors' experience building a .NET application for a trading house shows. As a result I learned a little about the domain & saw several well written "how to" .NET examples based on it.
   
   Two negatives might be worth considering before spending a fair amount of money. First, not much (anything?) about building high performance applications. Lots of talk about needing performance in the securities market, little in the way of delivery. Second, the book is based on .NET 1.X "best practices". The chapter on 2.0 reads like a last minute techno-tour.



3. 'Practical .NET for Financial Markets' by Samir Jayaswal is a very specialized book for all financial developers. Laid out over 9 chapters with 500+ pages of detail this is a wonderfully written reference for this niche market.
   
   If you are a .NET developer in the financial industry you owe it to yourself to pick up this great resource!
   
   ***** RECOMMENDED



4. For me, just beginning in this field, this book is a gem.
   It has great explanations of the lingo/structure of the financial markets as well as useful code examples.



5. I have purchased several markets development books and this one beats them all. It has a fantastic overview of the markets, the language is awesome & the detailed instructions on how you can build your system ground up is fabulous. I'd recommend it to everyone from Beginner to a Pro - "A must buy !!"

5 comments about Beginning Regular Expressions (Programmer to Programmer).

1. Regular expressions are one of those useful concepts that programmers have reimplemented in each new, aspiring language or software package. There has always been an abiding need for a compact notation that lets skilled users (and programmers) denote what they are looking for, in a set of textual data.
   
   Watt brings a lot of this work together, so that you can concisely find what you might need. Also, the book shows that much of the notation is common across the many implementations. Plus, once you've mastered a few of these, learning another is easy. Your experience transfers well.
   
   Chapter 2 has a good summary of the rest of the book. It points to a comprehensive list of packages and languages that have regexp, and which are covered later in the book. The packages include the open source StarOffice, and Microsoft Word and Excel. While the languages include JavaScript, JScript, VBScript, VB.NET, C#, Java, PHP and Perl.
   
   The heft of the book lies in supporting these examples. But the basic ideas are very simple.



2. I picked this book up because I had no idea just what a Regular Expression was. Turns out that regular expressions are nothing more than the "wildcards" from a lot of applications like Microsoft Word that have been generalized to fit a lot of applications in text processing.
   
   For instance you may want to examine an incoming field from an internet form. If the data is going to a social security column in a database, you want to be sure that the data doesn't say something like Fred-34-1234. It's the right format, but alpha isn't a good thing to have there. If this isn't checked form, it may wait until the SQL Insert statement blows up.
   
   The generalized form of expressions like this can be used to check things like SSN formats, the proper formation of an e-mail address and a lot of other things commonly needed in text processing.
   
   Many languages both programming and scripting have provisions built into them to handle this kind of text processing. This book provides the generalized background to use regular expressions in ways that that you haven't considered but which you'll find very useful.



3. As an introduction to regular expressions, this book does an excellent job of covering the many different ways in which regular expressions are used. Included are explanations of how to put regular expressions to use in client-side Javascript, Microsoft Word, Open Office, C#, PHP, Perl, ASP, etc (Just a few that I could think of off the top of my head). I especially like that the author didn't focus on only Microsoft products, or only on open source products. He gives an excellent introduction to how regular expressions fit in in both the world of programming, and simply using your computer from day to day. This is a huge book, and Mr. Watt does a fantastic job of covering both syntax (nuts and bolts) and real-world application. This is an excellent starting point for anyone wanting to more about Regular Expressions.



4. A good introduction, but I was disappointed with all the typos in the text and regex examples, as well as Figures being mismatched with the text (in one case a nonexistent Figure was referred to, and a totally irrelevant Figure was in its place). No coverage of modifier spans. But on the whole, adequate for rank beginners.



5. For years I have wanted to learn how to use Regular Expressions. But the short tutorials that I came across left me double cross eyed perplexed! I finally came across Beginning Regular Expressions. Now the whole process is a piece of cake. The author takes a very cryptic subject and makes it totally clear. Within two hours of reading this book while laying on the couch, I was able to hop up and write cryptic looking formulas as if it was my second nature. Regular expressions are so powerful and so helpful. I'm so glad I finally came across this book. Thanks to the author who painstakingly broke it down to the most basic levels and made everything crystal clear! If you have an interest in POWERFUL search and replace across a lot of files, this book is your ticket to search and replace paradise!

5 comments about Beginning Ruby on Rails (Wrox Beginning Guides).

1. I am not a fan of Wrox books. It has nothing to do with their content, but the layout of their books is irritating to me, so I find their books hard to read. Having said that, I think this is one of the best books written for the beginning Rails user.
   
   Most books (and online tutorials) try to teach Rails by going through a big monolithic project one step at a time. Those books have good information too, and are great if the books project happens to be what you want to create; however, this one actually tells you how Rails works, which I find infinitely easier to grasp and use.
   
   I was not a beginner with Ruby or Rails prior to reading this book. I had already read several others and used Rails on a couple of small projects. Nonetheless, I found that this book filled in some of the holes in my mind regarding Rails, so I would recommend it to both the beginner and intermediate user.
   
   The only thing I found lacking in this book is a thorough explanation of migrations and how to use them. Migrations are easier to understand for beginners, I think, than manually creating your data tables; as is done in this book. The Apress book on creating E-Commerce sites with Rails contains a good explanation of migrations, I think.



2. The only reason I'm giving this book 3 stars is the good introduction to Ruby at the beginning. Its coverage of Rails is simplistic. The author asks you to re-run the command to create a new rails project for each example he takes you through. After awhile, this becomes very annoying. How often is a web developer creating new projects? It is better to go through one or two extended examples.
   
   If you do some programming for a living, this book is not for you. Get the real thing:
   Agile Web Development with Rails



3. Of the many RoR books I've read, this is probably the easiest to follow. If you don't have a lot of time and want to satisfy your RoR curiosity, this is your book. The author doesn't go into great details which can be a great thing if you're a new programmer and just want to get your feet wet. For experienced programmers, I'd go with "Agile Dev. with Rails" for a more thorough reading.



4. 'Beginning Ruby on Rails' by extreme (lots of publications) author Steven Holzner is an absolute must-buy for anyone looking to start learning Ruby on Rails!!
   
   With over 350+ pages of content spread over 11 chapters, subject matter is broken up logically:
   
   01. Ruby Overview
   02. Conditionals, Loops, Methods, Blocks
   03. Classes and Objects
   04. Rails Overview
   05. Building Simple Rails Applications
   06. Connecting to Databases
   07. Working with Databases
   08. Validating and Testing
   09. Action Controller
   10. Views
   11. Ajax and Rails
   
   This books is well written, sticks to the basics of teaching you how to become juuust a tad dangerous with Rails and and not going much further.
   
   Some reviewers have noted that this book is light but I 100% disagree. For the subject matter of learning this technology and getting up to speed this does exactly what is advertised. Wrox puts out lots of good books and this one easily gets my stamp of approval!
   
   ***** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED



5. I am tired of books that present a giant, extended tutorial, revealing bits and pieces while continually dragging you deeper into a dense forest of detail, leaving you, machete in hand, to try and find your way to enlightenment.
   
   Unlike those, this book actually teaches -- it provides small examples that clearly illustrate isolated concepts, and builds from there. I gather that Dr. Holzner has written > 100 programming books, and this work clearly shows why he is in such demand.

4 comments about Professional Microsoft Smartphone Programming.

1. If you need to develop smartphone applications, this book is a comprehensive guide that you must have. The book first gives introduction to Microsoft smartphone and .NET architecture, and then presents a lot of hands-on examples and projects on IDE, UI design, data storage and File I/O, networking, graphics, and so on. The book also has chapters specially devoted to debugging, security, and performance. Overall, the authors will guide you from beginning of smartphone programming to professional development in the book. I highly recommend this book.



2. If you would like to start programming with your smart phone, this is the book to acheive that goal. Step by step, you will learn through practical examples, and you won't regret to have it.



3. This book covers all the bases! From UI best practices to device security to performance, Yang, Zheng, and Ni leave no stone unturned. I'll be recommending this book to all developers in the Windows Mobile space.



4. I honestly don't understand why these other reviewers think this book is worth a five star rating. My first inclination was to rate it only one star but to be fair it's a good collection of information which you otherwise have to Google to together yourself. That's why I ultimately gave it 2 stars.
   
   The authors (or editor) took the "say what you are going to say, say it, and than say what you just said" principle to new extremes. Every chapter, section and some paragraphs apply this principle so often that it got me completely aggravated.
   
   Did I mention the ubiquitous usage of Visual Studio screenshots? Even to the point where there are full page screenshots to show the reader how to change a property? Contentwise this book should have been a third of its current size.
   
   Talking about a content, this book resembles a collection of unrelated research papers, course material and some of the wall writing thrown together to get a book out the door. I know these are often the source of good books, but for the reader's sake, the editor and Wrox could have done a better job of at least making this look like a coherent write up.
   
   I was really looking forward when this book got announced. I expect more from Wrox, that's why I am highly disappointed...

4 comments about Professional Web 2.0 Programming (Wrox Professional Guides).

1. As per the other reviewer, this book uses one chapter for each topic: eg. HTML/CSS, Javascript, Design Principles, and sometimes not even a whole chapter eg, Chapter 5 includes SVG, XSLT, XPATH, XFORMS, and the discussion about HTML 5 and XHTML 2.0.
   
   Each section only really makes sense if you are already familiar with the topic. If you are familiar with the topic, then the relevant section will only bore you. The areas where you are not so familiar will confuse you.
   
   It seems this book is an attempt to explain Web 2.0 technologies in a really short sharp fashion, from the beginning. Unfortunately, each topic is worthy of its own book. Shrinking 10+ books down to one doesn't work very well.
   
   However, I do think an advanced book that assumes knowledge of these technologies and explains how to integrate them together would be cool.



2. 
   Here we go again, another book from Wrox press written by multiple authors from multiple disciplines. Professional Web 2.0 Programming is another deception for me in that it only provides high level details about web 2.0 and the book contains several chapters of subjects already mentioned over and over again in other books already. Let's start with Chapter 2. Here we have an overview of HTML, CSS, XHTML and DOM. I mean, why is this mentioned here? Is this a WEB 2.0 book or Web 1.0 book? Chapter 3 is about JavaScript and Ajax. What a waste, I already have a JavaScript book no need for half a chapter on JavaScript undefined objects. The other half is about high level design philosophies about Ajax. If this is what is referred to as a professional book on programming I'm really disappointed. Chapter 5 is a rehash of XSL with a mix of SVG. Chapter 6 is a waste of time about rich client applications providing little value to the reader. Chapter 7 is a rehash of the HTTP protocol URI. Chapter 8 is a rehash of XML. Chapter 9 talks about Syndication. Ha! Finally 15 pages worth of WEB 2.0 information via a high level definition of the RSS format. Chapter 11 is about web services, a rehash of other books on the subject.



3. Basically this book will hardly teach you anything you don't already know. They assume prior knowledge about almost every single topic they cover. They say in the preface that this book is not about java-script DOM, XML, AJAX or any specific technology for that matter. This book is more like some overview of all the technoligies that are used in Web 2.0 sites but none of them are explained in a way that someone without prior knowledge would understand. This book may only be useful for you if you are an experienced web developer with thorough knowledge in both backend and frontend technologies and just looking for some better practices and tips.
   Unfortunately there aren't so many people that fit that description.



4. The problem with this book is that it jumps around a lot and I mean a lot. All the topics are in there, but not in a logical progression. If I had not needed this as a required text for a class I would not have bought it.

5 comments about The .NET Developer's Guide to Windows Security (Microsoft .NET Development Series).

1. 
   Excerpt from C# Online.NET Review (wiki.CSharp-Online.NET):
   "I have read many Sgt. Joe Friday accounts of Windows security--"Just the facts, Ma'am"--; but, Windows security remained an occult subject to me. However, this book enables me to program security functions and to understand what I am doing. The book explains the user-based security of Windows operating systems based on Windows NT including Windows 2000, Windows XP Professsional, and Windows Server 2003."



2. I read the online book and then went out and purchased it here on Amazon. This is a awesome book. If you are new to security or your company is finally getting serious about security and you work in a .Net environment then this book is a must start resource. I cannot recall how many times I have recommended this book. I hope the author makes updates for .Net 2.0 as well as continues to extend the book online -- simply a great read!



3. As a degreed, professional software developer, I found the book very weak in presenting a good explanation of how a programmer might make better use of Windows security.
   
   The book is a series of 4-6 page chapters. The author constantly refers back and forth to the chapters: (item 24), (item 15) etc. There is no big picture, just page after page of alphabet soup.
   
   I also found it annoying that the author uses 'her' instead of 'he'.



4. This review refers to Brown's 2004 edition of "The .NET Developer's Guide to Windows Security".
   
   Don't let the title fool you. For its size, this book is an excellent primer on Windows OS and network security for anyone. It is well-written in an entertaining style by a well-known and authoritative author in the field. I highly recommend this as a first read for anyone interested in Windows security as a programmer or administrator.
   
   The book does provide valuable additional information to the .NET programmer, including useful examples in C#. I was able to use it to implement secure access to a database via a web service using Windows built-in security despite the fact that I was already in the middle of learning how to implement web services in the first place.
   
   Due to its age, the book does not cover anything new to Windows Vista or Windows Server 2008. I'd still recommend this book until something equivalent (perhaps a 2nd edition?) good comes out covering those topics at both the Vista AND 2008 level. Alernatively I could see one using this short book as a primer and existing books on Vista and/or future books on 2008 as those become available. I foresee this book being a primary reference for me for quite some time.



5. Doug B from Minneapolis "A disconnected mess" has a point. The book does jump back and forth making it difficult to put together the "big picture." As a programmer I did not get the answer to my questions but as an analyst this was a good starting point for an understanding of Windows security. Also, I wish the book were updated to cover Server 2008 and Vista. Still the book is recommended reading for all who wish to get a better understanding of Windows security.

No comments about Creating Visual Experiences with Flex 3.0 (Developer's Library).

2 comments about Visual Studio Team System: Better Software Development for Agile Teams (Microsoft .Net Development).

1. From the first chapter, you want to be with the book in a hand and VSTS in the another making all of the taught examples.



2. This book covers a wide range of cool things in VSTS wrapped up in a solid introduction to and roadmap through agile practices. Read the book and you'll get great guidance to working with agile planning, test driven development, refactoring, agile modeling, and a number of other topics.
   
   I have two small gripes with the book. First is that it includes the seemingly mandatory, maddening "meet the development team and walk through each day in the project with them" storyline. This book does no better than any of the other weak attempts at the novelization of a working team. Leave that stuff off for novellas and focus on the technical aspects instead. My second gripe is the book's organization. Planning is way back in section 8, modelling's in 6, etc. It seems a bit disjointed.
   
   Those gripes aside, the content in the book is just great. The walk-through of test driven development is solid, and the emphasis on having an environment and code base that can rapidly change to requirements is very nice.
   
   The technical side relating to Team Systems is also solid. The guidance on using source control is well-written, and the section on working with team build is as good as it can be (I'm NOT a fan of team build). The section on using and working with the process frameworks are solid, although I wished they'd covered the process editor add on.
   
   I'm also very happy to see that the Framework for Integrated Testing (FIT) was included -- I've been a long-time proponent of FIT and love seeing it in more books.
   
   Overall this is a very solid book. I like their approach to discussing agile, and I like their tie-ins to VSTS/TFS. They gloss over some of the things I don't like about VSTS/TFS, but hey, those are more my issues, not theirs.
   
   This book is a good addition to your bookshelf if you're looking to do agile in the VSTS/TFS world.

5 comments about Advanced CORBA(R) Programming with C++ (Addison-Wesley Professional Computing Series).

1. Don't wish to wade through book after book? This book would be the one to buy! The concepts are clearly defined and the code examples are fairly easy to follow. (The thermostat example grows too complicated at the end of the book to even comprehend all pieces - authors could use other smaller constructs to show the concepts.)

   The authors are well-versed in the topic and it shows in every chapter. There is no hand-waving on topics, as I have seen in other treatments of this subject.

   I've been a Corba programmer for the last 3 years and this has been my bible...

   Can't wait to see a second edition of this book from the authors!




2. Good book. Worth the money. There is a a lot of material here and it is pretty well organized. Some of the examples assume to much - they would be better if they showed complete code segements. If you needed to get one book on C++ and CORBA, this would be the one.



3. As the title states this is a book for advanced programmers. Not the kind of book I would recommend to someone looking to pick up a book and the learn from it. Might serve as an excellent reference source.



4. For my money, this book is worth every cent and more. The authors are knowledgable and articulate. If you know of a
   better book on CORBA, please let me know.....



5. This has to be one of the best CORBA books that I have read. It has helped me debug code and fix some really knotty problems. I found the exposition clear and easy to follow, and the index a useful tool. I don't think the authors intended it to be read cover-to-cover.
   
   If I am working on a CORBA project I alway like to have this book to hand.

5 comments about Beginning XML with DOM and Ajax: From Novice to Professional (Beginning: From Novice to Professional).

1. This book tries to do too much and falls down on many accounts. The two chapters on XSLT left me wondering what in the world was going on. Jacobs provides examples of how to use XSLT, but fails to explain how the code really works.
   
   The examples are very contrived. For instance, Jacobs shows how to use PHP to retrieve a result set from a MySQL database. Then, we see convoluted steps to convert the data into XML. Then we have to write XSLT to manipulate the XML. It would be much more efficient and practical to use PHP's object-oriented MySQL capabilities to spit the results into XHTML, or use PHP's own DOM capabilities to manipulate the XML.
   
   This book simply fails because it tries to cover too much information in its short length, and also due to the many weak, impractical examples throughout. To sum it up, it's all examples and no substance.



2. This book is excellent as an introduction to XML as used in web development. Whether you've been using XML for data storage but would like to take it to the next level, or haven't ever used XML, this book is a must-read. It doesn't tell you everything you need to know, but it gets you started and tells you how you can find out the rest on the Web. Its countless examples are all well explained.
   
   I use Professional Ajax by Zakas, McPeak, and Fawcett along with it. If one book may leave a question the other has the answers.



3. The book barely touches XML, and when it does, it keeps comparing it to XHTML. In fact, a lot of examples are about XHTML (and I thought this book was about XML). There aren't any real-world examples in how to use XML, just theoretical talk on ideas of use. I can understand that XHTML is the marriage of HTML and XML, but does the book have to use more examples of XHTML than explaining what XML is? Obviously I was still lost about the use of XML. The book also covers formatting XML with CSS, for presenting XML in certain formatting light. Um, isn't that what XHTML is for? Presentation? I know XML is for holding data, even configuration files, but this book doesn't even introduce you to such ideas, nor does it explore those type of concepts. Just more focus on presenting XML as a displayable document in the web browser (XHTML anyone?) I found myself skimming pages until I reached the end, and felt ripped-off. I was also lost on the whole idea of using namespaces for XML, which the book did a good job of not explaining the use of it in real-world scenarios. Do yourself a favor and stay away from this book.



4. I am a beginning web designer as i was assigned by the church i work at to pick up books and learn how to make a website. I bought this book after deciding to follow through a roadmap series, provided by apress publishers, that i found on the back of Beginning CSS Web Development, which by the way is a great book for those wanting to learn CSS and enjoy doing so. Simon Collison is very entertaining and knows how to properly instruct and teach you in the arts of CSS web development.
   
   Maybe i should have read Sas Jacobs Beginning XML with DOM and Ajax before reading Simon Collison because after reading Simon's book first i was very disappointed in Sas Jacobs way of teaching XML. This book is full of theory which isn't necesarily a bad thing, but it also shoots code out there and half the time there is no explanation as to where it came from. XML isn't applied very well to web development in this book so if you are looking for ways to tie XML into web design don't expect much out of this book.
   
   I guess what i'm trying to say is that this book isn't going to get you going asap into utilizing XML in your dreamweaver program or Flash CS3. I would like to compare this book as a very borring Junior level college lecture class. the kind of class that forces you to go out and learn stuff on your own.
   
   The book impliments different coding techniques and languages to impliment with XML such as CSS and XSLT and Javascript. There is a whole chapter on CSS which isn't bad but i had also already read a book on CSS so i was ready to go, but the XSLT chapters were quite dreadful. I had no clue what was going on or how to properly form an XSLT stylesheet. Its something that i'll have to look at on my own from other sources. The book showed examples of things you could do with XSLT rather than show you how to write XSLT.
   
   I really wish the book wouldn't waste so much time on code that isn't going to work on cross browsers. Jacobs repeatedly will show you an example that will work on IE 6 but wont work on Mozilla or Opera or Safari. Or it will work on Mozilla and not the others. Either way it just seems like she could give you the examples that work on all of them and then say if you do it this way it won't work on these browsers because... there never really is much of an explanation.
   
   The plus in the book is that Sas Jacobs does know what she is talking about. She gets too indepth for having the book labeled as "Beginning XML". So maybe they could have picked a better title for the book and it would be alright. The book is more intended for those wanting to expound on XML beings it is a Metalanguage and has a vast amount of capabilities. Its a book for those who are very intuitive when it comes to coding. People that are good problem solvers and already have a web portfolio started. Its a book for people that are not me, and thats someone that is looking how to build a dynamic website from scratch with no prior experience in web design and web development.
   
   So if you are a beginner looking to pick up on XML watch out for this book. Maybe try somewhere else. The book will give you a good lecture on XML and will help you understand XHTML better as well as a few other languages, but you won't be utilizing XML very well any time soon.
   
   Other books i own and have read and would recomend to beginnig web designers:
   
   "The essential Guide to Dreamweaver CS3 with CSS, Ajax, and PHP" -good book.
   "Beginning CSS Web Development from Novice to Professional" -great choice buy it.
   "Foundation Actionscript Animation" -great book.
   "Learning ActionScript 3.0" -good book.



5. The book do the right job for who want to learn the XML in the context of the browser , and i consider it XML in the Browser defenitive guide , beginning with the fundamentals of XML for writing well formed XML documents , then illustrate what you need to know about XSL , XPath , XPointer , xhtml , MathMl , SVG , WSDL , SOAP , RSS , VoiceXML , SMIL and Database output formats , then illustrate how to manipulate XML in the client-side using W3C DOM , XSLT and ADOBE flash XML class and AJAX then end up with server side XML manipulation using PHP and .NET .