No comments about Sams Teach Yourself ASP.NET 3.5 in 24 Hours, Complete Starter Kit (Sams Teach Yourself -- Hours).

5 comments about Sams Teach Yourself SQL in 10 Minutes.

1. This is a true beginner's book. This is a book for people who know nothing about SQL. It is very helpful for starters.



2. SQL in 10 minutes?? ......I thought this guy was kidding. He wasn't. The main reason why I couldn't get a job was because I didn't know SQL, within one hour I read the book, tried all the examples, wrote SQL on my resume, applied for a job and got the job the next day requiring SQL experience :)
   
   This language is so easy to learn, it feels more like an application than a programming language. It seems as though the whole language is really just 3 words, select, from & where, although I'm still new and theres probably a tonne more but I didn't need to know that to get the job.
   
   Compare it to learning c,c++, Fortran and other languages for the first time where you learn to define variables, learn the functions, test cases, inputs, outputs, etc, etc. SQL you pretty much type in the inputs and you receive the outputs...its a really intuitive language, anyone can start learning within minutes. Highly recommend this book, its also probably the best quick reference out there if you need to solve a particular problem.



3. Good intro and you do learn the language and how to understand and write it by using this book



4. When I went for a job interview a few months ago all I knew about SQL was that it had something to do with databases. When I informed the interviewer I didn't know SQL, the look on his face let me know I was doomed. So as soon as I left that interview I got online and purchased this book determined to learn as much as I can, in an inexpensive way, and quickly. Wow! This book turned out to be all of those things. It is very easy to understand and made SQL seem like a breeze. I loved the examples and plan to purchase an intermediate-advanced SQL book very soon. Hope SAMS Teach Yourself can help me out with one of those too. With their help I think I can add 'knowlege of SQL' on my resume.



5. Ben Forta has a commendable honesty about him. He explains the intent of his books clearly in their Introductions and then proceeds to deliver just that. In this instance, Forta is clear that the book is for those new to SQL and who quickly want to learn how to get the most out of SQL. He is equally clear that the book does not cover every last aspect of SQL.
   
   The book is becoming a bit long in tooth since it has not been updted since 2004. DBMSs covered are IBM DB2, Microsoft Access, Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL (Version 4), Oracle, PostgreSQL, Sybase Adaptive Server. Some of the information is now outdated and MySQL v5 has added new capabilities. On the whole, though, everything Forta presents here is still usable.
   
   In 22 chapters, Forta teaches the reader the basics of SQL, more than enough to deal with perhaps 80% or more of common SQL requirements. Beyond that and you're in the realm of system architects and administrators who are simply not the audience for this book.
   
   Be sure to download the sample databases and errata from the author's website.
   
   On the whole, one of the best introductions to SQL available.
   
   Jerry

5 comments about Core Python Programming (2nd Edition) (Core Series).

1. Fellow Programmers,
   I am new to Python and found this book to be a comprehensive source of information. I started off with Java a few years ago in my spare time, however; Core Python is an excellent book for an understanding concepts in OOP for both languages. I thoroughly enjoy the book and the Python Language itself. My only criticism is that most of the programs are short, but from cover to cover; the reader will walk away with a rock solid foundation in python programming.
   
   L.R. Young



2. This book has small snippets of insight, unfortunately they are scattered across over 1000 pages. The book seems to take a general format of: 1) "Here is an idea or concept - not sure why I introduced it now;" 2) "The concept just seems to have a logical grouping with these other concepts;" 3) "But we will not go into the concept or the other concepts now;" 5) "We will save them for another section that will then refer you back to this section as a reference for those concepts;" 6) "By the way, did you know that C, C++, Java, Java Script have this vague similarity of implementation but use this code" 7) "Don't bother that this aside has no value for understanding python (if you are literate in other languages, you will get the similarities and differences - if you are not, then why bother introducing irrelevant material)."
   
   In essence, the book seems to say - I have 1000+ pages to write in, therefore organization and relevancy are secondary to filling them up. Also, there tends to be numerous mistakes in the prose as well as in the code. A trip to the book's website shows that, apparently, it took the author three tries (plus a .diff file) to get the MakeTextFile script correct. There are better books out there (along with the python online documentation).



3. I'm relatively new to Python, having programmed in 'C' and Pascal for many years, and have found this book to be a very good first book to read. As a programmer relatively new to Python I've found that it provides me with very good coverage of the language and its most popular modules. It is not a reference book like "Python In A Nutshell", which I would also recommend. It won't be sufficient if you plan on writing complex GUI applications using wxPython, but there's another good book available for that. Thanks to this book and a couple of others I've been able to produce several useful Python applications. If you're a programmer new to Python, I would recommend this book as one of the first you read.



4. I recently changed my job. My new company uses Python as the main technology. Before starting this job, I didn't know Python at all. The project I worked on was on a tight schedule. Fortunately I got this book and I can immediately starting writing code in Python on the first day. The book is written in a very easy to read and understandable way. It covers almost everything you need to know about Python. The "Core Tip", "Core Note" and "Core Style" sections are especially useful and helpful. They are not just for the Python beginner to develop good coding skills and habits. They are also very valuable advice for the people who already know Python. If you want to learn Python quickly or if you want to expand your Python knowledge, this is a book for you.



5. I got this book because of its many positive reviews, but I'm not happy with it.
   
   I'm a professional programmer. C++ is my main language, but I know C, Java, Perl, Smalltalk. I have used Python a fair amount in the past; I wanted to go through a Python book because I'm starting a new project in Python and the language has changed since I last used it.
   
   My main criticism of this book (2nd edition, 3rd printing) is its sloppy production. It is loaded with typos, broken code, and other errors. I'm surprised that most other reviewers didn't comment on this fact. The author knows about many of these errors and has corrections posted on the web, where he airily excuses the book's errors as being "due to lack of time or priority during the highly-compressed editing phase." If he or the publisher really cared, many of these errors would have been corrected by the third printing. (Many would not require resetting even a full line of type.)
   
   As other reviewers have said, Chun's writing is rather disorganized and conversational. That's not to my taste, but evidently it suits lots of people. For the length of the book, the depth is not great.
   
   Some reviewers say that this is the best book they have seen for beginning programmers. Maybe they are not familiar with Kernighan and Ritchie's classic, _The C Programming Language_. That book, in my opinion, is the standard of excellence.
   
   Overall I prefer Beazley's _Python Essential Reference_ 3rd edition to Chun's book. The Reference is terse and maybe not suitable for a novice, but it is thorough, accurate, well organized, and carefully produced. Chun does provide exercises after each chapter; that is the book's main positive feature, in my opinion.

1 comments about VBA and Macros for Microsoft Office Excel 2007 (Business Solutions).

1. This book was very helpful for some projects that I needed to accomplish with Excel & VBA. Some of the chapters were extremely enlightening in seeing the big picture of using VBA with Excel and other MS Office applications. Other chapters are excellent resources that I will refer to many times in the future. I would recommend this book for both the beginner (in using VBA) as well as the experienced VBA user.

5 comments about sed & awk (2nd Edition).

1. I have looked in this book again and again in an attempt to find out "how do I do xxx with awk or sed?" I just need a quick and dirty script to do something. The way the book is written prevents getting such answers. It is TERRIBLE as a resource for solutions to real problems. Presumably you can "learn sed and awk" from it, but what I want are answers, and this book gets in the way of that. It has literally never helped me solve a problem -- I always end up finding what I want with google somehow. Example: my latest experience was trying to write a script to simply go through a long shell script, and for each line, if it started with "if", "case" or "done", I wanted to prepend "echo line#" (echo the line number) to the line, so it would echo the line number when the script ran. If it had a certain other string in it, I wanted to replace that string with another, and if none, then just preserve the line. Should be pretty simple as a programmer, but I could not get the answer out of this book. It does not mention the FNS variable which allows you to echo the line number, for one thing. Sigh, I could go on... I'm in the minority, but I've made my point. I'm still looking for a good sed/awk reference.



2. I had to do some text processing and I wanted to learn sed & awk so I picked this book that is, to my knowledge, the only book completely dedicated to these tools. The chapter on 'advanced' sed programming is very scary because when using 'advanced' sed features, the syntax is cryptic. It is nice to know that these features are there but I want to stay away from them and perhaps use awk or perl for the tasks that would require those 'advanced' features. Still, when you stick with the 'basic' and 'intermediate' sed features, you can do cool things easily in shell scripts.
   
   Overall, the book was not thrilling to read but it does a good job to teach you these text processing tools.



3. In a nutshell, if you don't have this book, you are probably not a serious programmer or system administrator.
   
   Both sed and awk have been around for ages, and they are part of the fundamental toolkit of any Unix/Linux professional. Furthermore, there are versions available both for native Windows and for Linux-like environments under Windows (cygwin, MKS, mingw.)
   
   If you are a Perl hacker, you probably use Perl for a lot of the tasks that would otherwise be performed with one of these tools. Nevertheless, they are worth your time.



4. This book is a timeless classic, the information on sed is invaluable to anyone who regularly works with text files or streams (after all sed is short for stream editor). Not only is it very informative it's also a fun and easy read... You'll be seeing uses for sed almost every day once you learn how powerful it can be!
   
   
   The last 1/2 or so is on awk and although it's also very well written and informative it's not quite as useful if you're already experienced with a high level language with excellent text processing facilities like Python or Perl. However, it's work reading even if you keep thinking "I could do this in _____" because sometimes awk really is the right answer.



5. If you want understand all the sed advanced commands, this book is for you !
   
   I recommend using perl instead sed or awk

5 comments about Learning Website Development with Django (From Technologies to Solutions).

1. Learning Website Development with Django by Ayman Hourieh is a great introduction to application development with the Django web development framework.
   
   The author covers a wide range of topics, leading you through installation of the framework and its basic usage. The pace of the book is brisk but not too fast, though you might want to have at least some experience with Python beforehand. (Which is fair, since Django is a Python framework!)
   
   I really liked that the book has a running application that is being built as the chapters progress so you get an idea of how each concept presented fits into the overall structure of the application. It helps provide a context for why you are learning each chapter.
   
   This book is not a reference, nor does it seem to be designed to be. (And it doesn't need to be; Django's documentation is some of the best I've ever seen in an open-source project) If you are just staring to work with Django, buy this book and Jacob and Adrian's 'The Definitive Guide to Django', which is also excellent.
   
   If you already know or have worked with Django a little, you'll want to take a look at these sections that stood out above the rest:
   
   User Registration and Management
   
   Good coverage of the auth framework plus a very strong example of user registration; this topic comes up all the time in forums and blog comments. He shows how to do an "invite a friend" email registration system, complete with challenge verification.
   
   Enhancing the User Interface with Ajax
   
   The author presents the Ajax examples with jQuery and it's very approachable even if you haven't worked with that software. The chapter is meaty and thorough with examples of how to use jQuery's features such as event handling, DOM maninpulation, and accessing properties and attributes. He also provides examples of how to implement in-place editing, live search, and auto-complete.
   
   Commenting
   
   Good coverage of the comments framework; this is another area that isn't well-documented in the Django docs. (It's still evolving, so not a lot of time has been spent documenting it)
   
   Internationalization (i18n)
   
   Though not a long chapter, it's great to see coverage of the i18n system with a full example of how to set it up and deploy it.
   
   Unit Testing
   
   I enjoyed this section for two reasons: 1) The two examples provided were tests for the running app that is being built as the book progresses, so you understand the "why" behind the tests, and 2) It's great to see an author present unit testing as an important step for application development.
   
   It's good to see this information in one place; you'd have to scour a lot of blog posts and code snippets to find all this material.



2. Reviewing The Definitive Guide to Django: Web Development Done Right a few months ago I noted that the key place that book lacked was in examples. As befits the work of the creators of a framework, it did very well at explaining the underlying philosophies and working through all manner of implementation details, but it wasn't the book for those who just want to dive in and build something. If that's how you like to use technical books, then Learning Website Development With Django may be more what you're looking for.
   
   Following the iterative development of a delicious/digg hybrid social bookmarking application, Ayman Hourieh's book moves quickly through a range of Django features, from setting up your initial models, and using the built in user and admin sections, to supporting AJAX with jQuery, speeding up your app with caching and (briefly) writing automated tests. The pace is fairly measured and Ayman Hourieh does a good job of explaining what's going on at each step. An experienced web developer should find most of the information they need to get up and running with django, ready to get to work on their own apps.
   
   Perhaps appropriately, where this book is lacking is in explaining how the different parts of the framework fit together. There's plenty you can pick up by inference, but there are no detailed explanations of, say, the routing system that maps URLs to code. This book's weaknesses are the former volumes strengths, and while you'll find much repeated between them a combination of the two is likely to be a good way to get a fully rounded sense of what django is and how you can use it.
   
   Disclaimer: I was sent a copy of this book for review by the publisher.



3. This book is an excellent introduction to Django that goes far beyond any online tutorials. While its definitely a beginner's introduction, it covers complex enough topics that even an intermediate level Django user like myself still learns plenty.
   
   Its my first Django book, so its just nice to have a "best practices" reference when doing common tasks like handling ManyToMany relationships, voting, caching, etc.
   
   There are a fair number of typos/misprints which are just a pet peeve. I enjoy the author's succinct writing style, although at times he pulls the "And in the next paragraph I'm going to cover X." Just cover X! Luckily he's usually quite succinct, so its just me being picky. ;-)
   
   Full Disclosure: I got a review copy for free. The $40 list price on the back of the book seems a bit steep for such a thin tome, but it would probably be worth it for beginners who want to learn Django fast.



4. The book is aimed at web developers who are not looking to become experts in the framework, but just want to build a "2.0" web application quickly and painlessly. It is expected that they know some Python, but no great demands are placed on other previous knowledge.
   
   Like most titles from Packt, the book wastes little time on introductions and quickly dives into the subject matter. The reader is put to work from the very beginning, and by page 20 Django is installed and the first project created and launched. I like this practical approach. All the code is available at the book's web site, so it's also easy to follow along.
   
   The book is structured around the development of a social bookmarking application. Without going into too much detail, each chapter introduces the reader to some new Django concepts needed to build specific features into the application. For example, there are chapters focusing on user management, searching, Ajax and administration interfaces.
   
   By the end of the book, the reader has a working application for storing and sharing bookmarks, complete with tags, tag clouds, RSS, Ajax bells and whistles, voting, friend networks and an administrative interface. She also should end up with a good knowledge of what Django can do and how to use its features. A couple of final chapters on deployment and future directions complete the tour and give the reader some insight on what to do next with her newly gained Django proficiency.
   
   Overall, I think the author explains the concepts well enough and achieves his objective of teaching beginners how to build an application with Django. However, if you have a good knowledge of web development and Python, you may find that you need a deeper source of knowledge about Django as a framework.
   
   At just over 200 pages and at a price tag of US $40, I find the book somewhat expensive, but it covers the ground it promises, so if you just want to quickly get going with your "web 2.0" application, the book could be worth the price.



5. This is a great book for an intro to Django.
   If you need to get up and running in Djago in 1-2 weeks and know nothing about it, this book is THE way to go. Fast-paced and not too deep, this is just what I needed.
   The last chapter however leaves something to be desired. It is more like a fast-skip-along over all the things that are out there. Granted - helpful for general information, but it just does NOT work for me. After implementing my last chapter in the code - all of my application broke down. I feel that because the book skims over the topics so fast, it should not introduce advanced topics at all.
   
   Also be aware that there are some differences between the book's trunk version of djano and the current trunk. For example there is no more clean_data, instead we use cleaned_data.
   
   Overall, the book was just RIGHT for the me. Quick introduction to getting the web-framework up and running at the basic level. Must have first-book, for a once over read.
   
   PS: Why, you might ask, I needed to learn Djano in 1-2 weeks? Because django is fun! Or a more realistic answer: I got tired of playing configuration games with php frameworks...

5 comments about Programming Microsoft Visual Basic 2005: The Language (Pro Developer).

1. I based my purchase of this book on the reviews on it, and I must say that they were accurate. This book is an exceptionally good means for an experienced programmer to learn how to program in Visual Basic 2005. Assuming one already is familiar with typical program mechanisms and mindsets, this book allows you to immediately become effective without wasting time discussing elementary concepts.
   
   I should also add that the writing of the book is pleasant, the proofing very well done, and the overall appearance is quite nice. There aren't many books that get 5 stars but this is one.



2. Visual Basic appeared more than 15 years ago as a tool to define quick prototypes and develop GUI applications with ease. Its development environment, which the language was literally blended in, was remarkably easy to use. I remember those good old days when a fellow colleague of mine showed me how to draw VB forms and in less than an hour after I was already developing a new GUI application.
   
   Visual Basic has gone through a long way since then. The language is nowadays a powerful, complex, potent medium to develop sophisticated applications. In fact, Visual Basic.NET is virtually on par with C#.
   
   "Visual Basic 2005: The Language" by Francesco Balena tries to show - in a gentle yet dense manner - the long way that VB has pursued over the years and well as the current state of affairs. It succeeds on both counts.
   
   The book is divided in four bigs parts:
   1) The Basics - which introduces the reader to what Visual Basic.NET is all about, with explicit references to the differences between VB6 and VB.NET (very useful for VB6 programmers).
   2) Object Oriented Programming - which presents the OOP support in VB.NET. This section is important because VB.NET departs from the old OOP support and gets more in line with the .NET paradigm.
   3) Working with the .NET Framework - which may be seen as a natural continuation of the previous part in the context of the .NET framework.
   4) Advanced Topics - which tackles how advanced .NET elements (like attributes) get handled in VB.NET as well as what VB.NET is still better than, say, C# (namely the interop with COM and Automation).
   
   The book is truly monumental in form and dense in content. The style is slightly verbose but this adds value: you cannot skip pages without losing valuable information and in such conditions reading a book of this size is quite a task.
   
   As an added bonus, the author presents several mini-projects that are in fact mini how-to tutorials: how to build a plug-in for WinForms, how to develop a n-tier application. Without the generosity of Mr. Balena you'd have to buy an extra book for an introduction in such useful stuff.
   
   "Visual Basic 2005" has several minor drawbacks, though:
   1) The remarks showing the differences between VB6 and VB.NET are scattered throughout the text. For a VB6 programmer this is difficult to follow and for a non-VB6 programmer this is slightly annoying. Perhaps Mr. Balena should have dedicated a special chapter to those differences and then forget about them.
   2) The book does not say much about all the other .NET languages, as if VB.NET is the only .NET language under the sun. In fact, .NET diminishes the differences between languages without making them identical. This is not apparent from this book.
   3) The book does not say enough about what is specific to Visual Basic, besides syntax. Why would anyone want to program in Visual Basic.NET when you have C#? In my opinion, Visual Basic.NET is not going to go away any time soon especially because it retains those qualities of VB6 - a verbose and intuitive syntax, a loose typing system (perfect fit for Automation interop) as well as a slightly better exception catching mechanism. In my opinion, "Visual Basic 2005" does not elaborate enough on such necessary topics.
   
   Overall, the book is a must if you want to come up to speed with the Visual Basic language after years of programming in other languages. However, if you want to learn Visual Basic from scratch or if you want to use Visual Basic.NET for more "mundane" tasks - such as building WinForm applications - then this book is not for you.



3. The things I like about this book are that the topics it covers are very well done. It covers some of the trickier aspects like threading and regular expressions. Being an experienced programmer I like the fact that you can jump around in the book to just the aspects of the language that you are interested. I will warn the novice programmer that this is probably not a good starter book, but if you are ready for the material you will find that it has a good balance of code examples, and explanation.
   
   There are just a few spots in the code example where I can see a slightly better implementation, but if you are an experienced programmer this will not be difficult at all to see yourself.
   
   Last but not least, the appendix is one of the beefiest one's I have seen in ANY programming book. If there is anything I hate about tech books is a lousy appendix and this one is top notch.



4. I made an international request for this book and in the ship info they told me that the delivery of this item would be delayed... but it didn't. i got this book sooner than expected.
   
   it was a geat thing that i got this book before the estimated delivery date!!
   
   thanks
   amazon



5. I had a case dealing with Version Tolerant Serialization, after searching the web; they all came up short. I double checked the book later, and found the answer I needed. That 1 time more than paid for this book.

2 comments about Selling Online with Drupal e-Commerce (From Technologies to Solutions).

1. While strictly, this book says you need no prior experience with Drupal, it can also be considered a sequel to Building powerful and robust websites with Drupal 6. The latter concerned itself with general purpose websites, with some emphasis on handling user contributions, like blogging. But Peacock addresses the case where your website has commercial intent. You are selling something on it.
   
   There are numerous topics. Along with roles, which are primarily customer and staff in this situation. Logically, we start with making content. A catalog of items for sale. The museum example chosen in the text lends itself to easily making different sections of the catalog. Not just a flat list of items. In general, the book suggests that you do a careful top-down grouping of your items. In a manner that will seem logical to visitors to the website. It advises to keep the content "plain and simple". For most of you, that will be so. Exceptions might arise if what you are selling is specialised and where visitors might expect comprehensive data sheets, say, on the items. Think perhaps of fine chemicals, real estate or cars. Then again, these items tend to be individually expensive, so it may be economic to provide large content.
   
   Unsurprisingly, Drupal lets you easily add photos to the catalog. An important selling point, to grab a visitor's attention.
   
   It's not all about the webpages that a visitor sees. One strength of Drupal is that it has several payment gateways. Eight in the default installation, and modules for other gateways are also available on the web. The default support includes PayPal, Eurobill and Eway. To a general audience, PayPal is probably the best known. Some gateways are only available in certain countries. Depending on your location, you may choose to sign up for as many of these as make sense, for fitting your expected customer demographics.



2. I have read many books about using particular software applications. Almost always the instructions given are incomplete or don't work without some technical work on the part of the reader. Normally the author of the book hasn't paid enough attention to the state already stored on his or her computer and, when a reader follows the written instructions, all sorts of peculiar little problems arise: file not found, environment variable not set, etc.
   
   I worked through this book from cover to cover and, put simply, it was correct. Everything it said worked first time.
   
   I installed Drupal and eCommerce on Amazon's Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) and simply followed the instructions in this book. Within an hour I had an eCommerce website up and running.
   
   I strongly recommend this book (and the underlying Drupal and eCommerce packages) to anyone setting up an eCommerce web site for a small or medium business.

5 comments about JavaScript Demystified.

1. I recently attended a JavaScript course where the instruct have a difficult time explaining JavaScript in clear Englishing. I'm not a programmer, so I needed someone to explain this in simple English. This book make JavaScript clear enough so that I passed the course.



2. I you ever wondered how the professional web page developers dress up their web pages, then take a look at this book. Every trick that I've seen on commercial web pages are revealed in this book. I easily copied code from the book into my web pages and made mine work like a pro web page. Good book.



3. This is a great book to start with for those who want to learn JavaScript. It has excellent discussion of the basics of the language with plenty of examples to follow along with. Most of the example scripts are small and basic in nature. But, they can still make useful additions to any website that might need image rollovers, cookies or pop-up windows. In the later chapters there are a few larger and slightly more complicated scripts like an image slide show. The book also has thorough coverage of basic programming concepts like variables, arrays, loops and such. Therefore, any prior programming or scripting knowledge is not an absolute requirement. All the code in this book worked smoothly with errors found only in the HTML code. The minor, and somewhat strange, errors in the HTML code really didn't create any problems. The multiple choice final exam did provide a descent review of the material at the end of the book. However, I would have preferred answers with a little explanation rather than just the correct letter.
   
   The only issue I had with this book is the final chapters. I did expect a little more exposure to advanced scripts and concepts. There were only a few examples and most were scripts from dynamicdrive.com with little or no discussion of new concepts. Much of the final two chapters were just descriptions with URL's of sophisticated scripts that can be downloaded from Dynamic Drive. This was a bit disappointing since most designers/developers probably know how to find and install scripts from the many code libraries on the web.
   
   Overall, JavaScript Demystified is a great book for a true beginner with no prior experience with scripting or programming. This is not the best book for those who just want to copy scripts or who are expecting advanced topics. This is a book for those who want to actually learn JavaScript. I definitely would look forward to a new book by the same author in the same format that covers advanced JavaScript.



4. I felt that this book was very good for beginners as well as a good reference for those that have a strong background in html and JavaScript.



5. Clear and concise, done with not one wit of 'speaking down' to you, and the explanations are straightforward. The material is introduced a piece at a time, and with reasonable review questions that are surprisingly thorough.
   I would suggest it to anyone who wants a good reference to JavaScript as well. Buy it you won't be disappointed.

5 comments about Expert SQL Server 2005 Development (Expert).

1. The book presents real-life SQL Server problems and shows you how to solve them. It is written in a friendly and story-like fashion. The amount of detail presented is just right - detailed enough to understand the topics yet simple enough not to feel overwhelmed by the amount of information presented.
   
   In the first chapter, the author reviews coupling, cohesion, encapsulation and database role in the application development cycle.
   
   Chapter 2 is extremely useful for testing and tuning queries. It teaches you all you need to know about SQL Profiler. Other topics include unit and functional testing and performance counters. The chapter also introduces the SQLQueryStress Performance Tool which is a free query performance and load testing tool designed by the author.
   
   Chapter 3 covers the different types of errors and exceptions and also shows you how to write error handling code using new error-handling construct added in SQL Server 2005.
   
   The chapter on Dynamic SQL, chapter 7, is a must read for every database developer as it teaches you how and when to use dynamic SQL to make your application both efficient and secure.
   
   Other advanced topics covered in the book are encryption, SQLCLR security and designing systems for application concurrency.
   
   Recommended for SQL Server professionals of all levels.



2. Frankly, I was expecting a very SQL Server 2005 specific book. Instead, what we have is a good general RDBMS book that happens to be using SQL Server 2005. Encryption, access control, testing, basic software engineering and exception handling are never touched in SQL programming books -- including my own! The spatial chapters were new to me. The little asides were also worth looking up. Good clean style, great job.



3. This is really a great book. It covers specific topics really extensively and it is very easy to read. I was impressed because I was able to find great information about topics such as Encryption or Hierarchies that cannot be found very easily in other books. The examples are very descriptive but the most important thing is that the author will show you all possible solutions and will prove why the one he selected is the best. It is not a beginner's book but it is a fantastic book for advanced DBAs/Developers.



4. I have read (well, ok, read through or I would post more reviews) quite a few technical books about SQL Server. Where many books follow a very rigid path through a subject, quite often in a very feature driven manner (Here is this command, and you can do this. Next, this command) or process driven manner (First we do this, then we do this...).
   
   This book is very different from that. The title includes the word "Expert" for good reason. This is a book that doesn't assume you know nothing and start from scratch, nor does it try to teach you every knob and switch on all of the SQL commands. It it more about going to the next level and becoming the expert at programming with SQL Server by covering several deep dive subjects that every person needs to make the transition from "Pro" to "Expert".
   
   It has eleven chapters, each of them about a distinct facet of programming SQL Server, from the common stuff you need to do or use right (testing, errors, privilege, CLR, encryption, dynamic SQL and concurrency) to three chapters on really deep applied stuff (spatial data, temporal data, and graphs/trees). Each chapter has some very deep information, and a lot of code that could make you dizzy if you try to ingest it too fast. It is all explained nicely though, and if you take the time to understand the code you will be far better off for it.
   
   I would not suggest this as a book for the casual "I would like to know a bit more about SQL" reader. It is more for the reader who is already good and wants to become a solid professional/expert SQL programmer who know the right way to do things. For that reader it should be on your required reading list.



5. The author imparts a wealth of knowledge on the reader in a mere 445 pages. His style is direct, clear and doesn't waste any pages on trying to get you up to speed. He gives you just what you need and nothing else. I wish they were all like this.
   
   By providing actual performance testing Adam Machanic doesn't just make expert claims for his methods. In fact, my favorite quote from the book: "The hallmark of a truly great developer, and what allows these qualities to shine through, is a thorough understanding of the importance of testing."
   
   Having never worked with spatial data before, I found the coverage of the topic fascinating. Also, entire books have been written on tree's, hierarchies and graphs. Adam provides enough information in a single chapter for the developer to choose a strategy that works.
   
   5 stars - easy