5 comments about Beginning VB 2008: From Novice to Professional (Beginning from Novice to Professional).

1. It's an ok, but not for an absolute beginner. I would say it's for the advanced beginner to intermediate. I've been learning VB.NET for about a year and this book really helped me grasp the concepts associated with creating classes and structured code.
   
   For the absolute beginner, read Visual Basic 2008 Step by Step before reading this book.



2. I opend the book with the hope that it would lay down a solid foundation for a novice VB programer like me.
   Guess what? If you don't have any previous knowledge on OOP or VB, to say the least, you're out of luck.
   The author might be a seasoned programer himself, but not a good writer from my stand point. The way he extends his ideas and thoughts into black and white is quite 'un-logic' to follow.
   This book is definitely not for novices. The title of the book should change: Finalizing VB 2008: exclusively not for novices!



3. Flipping through this book in the store, it seemed like a good choice because it appeared to try to use coherent projects to teach rather than going the way of most horrible programming books that just isolate topics on one or two pages and never explain how it all works together ("Chapter 44: How to place a radio button. Click the tools tab, then select radio button. Place on form. Chapter 45: How to place a text box..." etc).
   
   The other main reason I bought this book was because it actually has exercises at the end of the chapters, and promises that solutions are available on the publisher's website. This is another feature most programming books sadly lack. For anyone wanting to learn outside of a classroom, there is usually no way to test or check your own progress.
   
   Well, this book sourly disappointed on both these supposed advantages. While it does try to implement the concepts within whole projects, it does this at the expense of teaching you Visual Basic. The details are sorely lacking. After three chapters, very little has actually been explained. I've learned a bit about how to make text appear in a text box by clicking a button, about variable types and a few functions for manipulating numbers and strings. But very little about how to actually make things work together.
   
   Chapter three has you making a "translator" program that will take simple greetings and translate them from one language to another. For example, English "hello" to German "hallo." The first half of the chapter simply covers how to write a command prompt program to get "hello" to go to "hallo" reliably, while the rest talks a lot about language and culture settings in .NET and how to manipulate them. Where are this author's priorities? Is that really relevant yet? You would think he'd wait to cover that later and instead teach you how to use a radio button or something. Then, after giving nothing more than bare bones to work with, at the end of the chapter the exercise is to "finish" the translator, adding in the ability to translate both ways and to select different languages to translate to or from. This is all without having given you ANY idea how to implement any controls on a window or form (aside from making "hello world" appear in a text box by clicking a button). Umm... so how are you supposed to do this? To select a language, for example, you would need a control in the window to do that, but so far he has not given even the slightest idea of how that would work.
   
   It seems to me the author was simply extremely lazy and figured you should just read the Microsoft documentation for the petty details. Also, I think he really doesn't understand the perspective that a novice would have. The things he chooses to explain seem pointless for a beginner to know, while the things he glosses over are more relevant. He is more concerned with getting philosophical about whether it is the user's responsibility to make sure there are no extra spaces in the word he types, or the programmer's responsibility to anticipate that there might be extra spaces. Seriously, he spends a whole page on that. What a joke. In addition, the code that he DOES explain is really never explained in full. For example, I've typed "Public Shared Function" many times now and don't recall ever seeing the "public" or "shared" parts explained. Some functions in the book are only "public" and I don't know the difference. A few words on that kind of thing might help. The author really spends very little time at all trying to explain the basic structure of the language, it's logic and flow. He just has you typing out lines of code right away, telling you what it does as a whole but rarely explaining the parts.
   
   As far as the exercises and solutions go, well, there are no answers on the website. I downloaded what was available there, and guess what? It's just the examples from the book typed out for you. There isn't a shred of anything that can't already be found in the book. So if you're baffled about how to complete that translator application, you're out of luck. I'm used to learning things on my own and usually do very well at it, but a decent book is a necessity. This book is terrible. Avoid.



4. Beginning VB 2008? Hmm Beginning... Hmm!
   
   I'm going to keep this short and to the point.
   You would stand a better chance of learning VB 2008 by reading
   Walden by Henry David Thoreau!
   
   Glad I kept my receipt!



5. Aside from the fact that it doesn't look like a book for beginners, the author doesn't explain what you need to know instead he fills the book with lame analogies that in the end will make you more confused.

4 comments about Beginning VB.NET Databases.

1. I am a novice Visual Basic programmer. I learned VB6 several years ago while I was still in college, but during the last six years working as a consultant, I haven't done any coding. Then a project came along where I was going to have to begin coding again. So, I looked into the latest version of Visual Basic, which is Visual Basic.Net 2003 or 1.1. What I didn't realize is that VB6 and Visual Basic.Net are not very similar at all. The biggest difference that I found was that VB.Net is truly object oriented while VB6 is not. Anyway, I needed to learn VB.NET quickly in order to develop an application that generated reports for my client. As a result, I also needed to learn ADO.NET in order to work with the database, which stored all of the data.
   
   I bought a ton of books on both VB.NET and ADO.NET and most of them were terrible. The other books that I purchased provided either no coverage on VB.NET and ADO.NET or it contained code examples didn't work correctly when I created them. The biggest reason that most of the code samples didn't work correctly was because a lot of the books on these subjects, especially ADO.NET were written using the first release of this development tool, which was Visual Studio.NET 2002 or 1.0. Therefore, I found that I kept buying books trying to find something that would provide me with an introduction to VB.NET with a significant emphasis on ADO.NET.
   
   Finally, I came across this book. While I am only about half way through it, I can honestly say that it's the best book I've found so far. Now, as I said initially, I would consider myself a novice VB.NET programmer, so I did need a book that would allow me to refresh my programming skills as well as introduce me to database programming with ADO.NET, since I had no experience with ADO, DAO, etc. This book is great because while it is geared toward newbies, it's not overly simple. The examples are all real world scenarios that you would use if you were in my current predicament. If you have no VB experience whatsoever, then you may want to choose a simpler book that focuses solely on VB. But, if you have some experience with VB6 and need to learn VB.NET and ADO.NET, this is an excellent starting point. The best part about this book is that it was written in 2004, which made me believe that the author used this in conjunction with VB.NET and ADO.NET 1.1 and so far, everything has worked perfectly. So, if you're in a similar situation, then please take my advice and buy this book first rather than spend hundreds of dollars on other books that won't help you at all.



2. Very good book for beginners but the drawback of this book can be summarized in 2 points:
   
   1) ASP.NET 2.0 beta release had been announced and it fly with coding to the next level where you can get rid of 70% your code lines (according to Microsoft !, and this includes database classes and objects which changed dramatically in ASP.NET 2.0 . So, why to learn an old version ;).
   
   2) I rated this book "4" stars, because some of the examples in this book are very long where you get bored before you see your result.



3. This book is exceptional. I have been programming for quite a while, so some of these are old hat, but the presentation is well thought out, easy to follow, quick to learn. Just an exceptional book for this topic.
   
   Not only do you get to use ADO.NET on Access, but SQL Server and/or Oracle, as well as ASP.NET and Web Services. All without breaking into a sweat.
   
   I had a question about one thing and I posted on the Wrox forum for the book. The author himself responded very quickly and we got it straightened out (it was on my end, not the book). I printed out the errata, but there are few errors in the book. Just an all around excellent book.
   
   p.s., oh, yeah, I bought two copies -- one for work and one for home.



4. If you want info now, don't buy this book. To get anything useful you have to read the whole the whole thing and do all the exercises. I prefer books that have many good clear examples that you can work through and learn from. I don't have time to use this type of book.

5 comments about Visual Basic .NET Reflection Handbook.

1. I've considered reflection one of the neatest features of .Net, but have scarcely seen it covered in the books I've read so far. This book exactly hit the spot. In 242 pages it succintly explains reflection in a very readable manner. It describes the 'why to do things' and not just the 'how to do things'. It even points out where using reflection would be overkill. I'm very pleased.



2. One of a growing series of books, this is the second that I'd picked up and even better than the first one (which was the Remoting). This book covers reflection in all its glory - giving all the details that we need to use reflection to the full. Where the book stands out from others is that it not only gives the technical details but also puts all the examples into a real world situation giving an insight into why we're using reflection in the first place. Definitely worth the [money] ...



3. The book comes with an 'excellent' set of real world examples, solutions and a lot of information you simply can't do without! If you're interested in 'really' unleashing .NET's true power, this book is just what you need! Once you're done with it, you'll wish the book never ended :) Yes, it's THAT good!



4. This book serves as a good introductory to .NET Reflection. The book doesn't cover the Reflection.Emit class which is primarily what I was looking to learn about. I am some what disappointed.



5. i tried out all the examples and they work
   this is a very good introduction to relection
   technology which has dogged me for 1.5 years
   I fully enjoyed the book and I am now more familiar with
   the technology. thank you

No comments about Programming in Visual Basic.NET 2005.

No comments about New Perspectives on Microsoft Office 2000 Visual Basic for Applications, Introductory (New Perspectives (Paperback Course Technology)).

5 comments about Visual Basic(r).NET: The Complete Reference.

1. Simply put, this book is amazing. In order to take fully advantage of the .NET Muscle, you need a full understanding of the .NET Framework. This book will take you there. The chapter that covers the differences between Value Types and Reference Types is hands down the best I've read. Mr. Shapiro has a gift for writing, so be sure to take advantage of it.

   - MKP




2. You have to read this book, before you spend thousands on a VB.NET course.

   I read Mr Shapiro's first VB.NET book in late 2001 and made up my mind that I needed to make the move from VB to VB.NET asap. I am a VB/ASP programmer still struggling with OO design concepts and patterns, and I find his insight into the software development and design process quite remarkable indeed.

   He writes with a wit and with metaphors I have not seen elsewhere, and made tackling the complex subjects much easier more me. You'll be chuckling at some of the stuff he says. I find it hard to learn from computer books and prefer classrooms, but reading even the first 30 percent of this book, has saved me a bundle in time and money.

   I am more concerned about code than classes and figured that the new OO in .NET would put me off. But I was especially pleased to see Mr Shapiro tackle stuff like merge sort and quicksort and then place them in context with various .NET "features" like delegates, and interfaces. Incidently, if understanding interfaces and delegates has you scratching your head, this is the only book I found, browsing at the bookstore, that devotes a whole chapter to each subject respectively. At first I thought his notes on why Sun hates delegates would not be much use to me but they go a long way to understanding why .NET has delegates and interfaces and Java only has interfaces.

   There is also a very comprehensive linked-list example in this book that shows you exactly how to implement interfaces, like IEnumerator, and IList, stuff which very few seem to understand and which are very alien to a VB programmer.

   No book is perfect. There are a few typos in the text which are clearly last minute changes the publisher forgot to correct. The source code examples compile without issue. I will be looking for his next book for sure.




3. the first code example doesen't even work!
   He must have tested it in the beta version because his examples are sloppy, and poorly organized. I would have liked to have seen more code. In some spots his explinations are overly simple. In some spots it seems like he doesn't know what he is even talking about so he just fills in with techno-jargon. Mostly the code is just plain disappointing, what does work, needs to be re-worked so that it is not so buggy, for example, he uses implicit class declarations to demonstrate inheritance, then talks about the importance of strong type declarations. It goes on and on like that. His code on the web is not any better.

   Don't waste your money, I think that I will get a Wrox book next.




4. I'm still trying to catch up with the "rest of the gang" so this review is later than the others.

   It is a very good book in applying computer science knowledge like data structures to .NET. I have seen better explanations of interfaces in other books: for example, Deborah Kurata's "Doing Objects in Visual Basic 6", Jesse Liberty's "Programming C#", and the classic on C#, Grant Palmer's "C# Programmer's Reference".

   Regarding the downloaded code, I found it to be much better than most. I corrected 5 problems: 1. A "Shuttles" dll had to be created so "ShuttlesInjectorUI" would work (make sure the reference for this is set correctly, also). 2. "Math" didn't have a module, which I created from the book (though the two formulas for area mystify me: correct formula, area = pi * radius **2). 3. The reference to "vb7cr" in "Nodals" had to be corrected in the project properties. 4. The "BaseTree" module was in the appropriate directory, but had to be added to the "Nodals" project. 5. The "protected" access modifier for "StopInjector" in "Shuttles" had to be changed to "public".




5. When you buy a book with "Complete Reference" in the title, you expect one of two things:
   
   1. A thorough reference book that you can use for, uh, reference.
   
   2. A book that will completely explain whatever is in the last half of the title - Visual Basic .NET in this case.
   
   This book fails dreadfully on both accounts.
   
   Let me start by saying that I absolutely love Visual Basic .NET. It is a terrific development environment, and once you start to get a feel for working with objects, you wonder how you ever finished a project before.
   
   This book was actually the first .NET book I bought, over two years ago. I found it utterly incomprehensible and had to go on to other books for help in learning to use Visual Basic .NET. Recently, I've been reading through it again - thinking the book might be useful as a reference now that I have a much better understanding of Visual Basic .NET.
   
   Wrong again. You are much better off with the online reference material that comes with Visual Studio. After realizing that I had wasted $30 and a lot of my precious time on this gigantic paperweight, I was stunned that this sucker got 4.5 stars!
   
   It turns out that one of the first reviews was written by none other than the book's author, Jeffrey Shapiro. (Needless to say, he gave himself five stars.) After reading some of the other five star reviews, I darkly suspect that they must be close, personal friends of the author.
   
   The fundamental problem with this book is that it is so abstract. A reference should, by definition, be detailed. This book spends hundreds and hundreds of pages talking about abstract concepts in object-oriented development in a very vague way. It uses lots of abstract object-oriented terms without really defining them. It doesn't really tell you "how to" do anything. You just come away with a vague impression that however you go about developing something in Visual Basic, it should be "object-oriented".
   
   The book was also poorly organized. (I don't believe that this is the fault of the author, though. It's the fault of the book's editors.) It is very hard to find anything in the book, which severely limits its effectiveness as a "reference". The index is terrible. Concepts which are mentioned in many places throughout the book will only have one or two entries in the index. This, too, severely limits the book's usefulness for its stated purpose.
   
   If you want to learn Visual Basic .NET (and you want to learn it from books) here are my recommendations:
   
   1. MURACH'S BEGINNING VISUAL BASIC .NET, by Anne Prince - This book is 700 pages of meticulous and thorough reference. This book tells you "how to" do almost any basic programming task in VB.NET, from creating user interfaces to accessing databases. The format is very easy to read and understand. Each section is very short, takes one topic at a time and covers it very thoroughly. The entire book is meticulously cross-referenced, making it very easy to find whatever you need. This should be the first book you buy.
   
   2. REFACTORING, by Martin Fowler - This book isn't specifically a Visual Basic .NET book. In fact, it isn't really language specific at all even though all of the references are in Java. However, you do not want to pass up this book. It is a classic in object-oriented development. It is very, very easy to read. (In fact, the very readable Java examples illustrate just how similar VB.NET is to Java.) REFACTORING is absolutely stuffed with simple, easy to follow advice on how to write better code (and how to fix the really lousy code you just wrote). I have had this book for nearly two years, and even now hardly a week goes by but I am picking up this book and leafing through it to glean more and more useful advice. One of the nicest things about REFACTORING is that the author, Martin Fowler, never talks down to you, the reader. He speaks to you as a colleague. The book also displays the author's very finely developed sense of humor. This makes the book easier and more enjoyable to read, but it never gets in the way of the material. I can't recommend REFACTORING enough.
   
   3. MURACH'S BEGINNING VB.NET tells you how to do all of the basic stuff that you're always asking about when you are first learning. REFACTORING tells you how to organize your code in such a way that it is easier understand and maintain. Once you've got these two books as a foundation, you can pick up any of the other excellent "how to" types of programming books for tips on specific topics.
   
   4. You certainly don't need it in order to be an effective developer, but if you want to study the abstract concepts of Object-Oriented Analysis and Design, go straight to the source and buy one of Grady Booch's books. Just be sure to bring your own oxygen: Booch tends to stay up in the stratosphere where the air is cold and thin.

5 comments about Beginning .NET Game Programming in VB .NET.

1. This book may present some theoretical views for beginner level game programming, but do not expect to learn the correct syntax for VB.NET. Actually if you purchase the same authors book for programming in C# you'll find they have the same first chapter (that's as far as I looked). This book was obviously a lazy attempt for these people to make a quick buck. Unfortunately they wait until the end of the book to let you know:
   "Most of the example games leave much room for improvement. Even when we looked back on them after finishing each chapter, we would sometimes look at parts of the code and think, "We can't believe we wrote that." Even worse, some of the things we told you aren't always true." pg 348
   While I was trying to complete the exercises in this book I spent more time with my nose in other books so I could learn the correct way to do it. Do yourself a favor get a different book.



2. Although this book isn't a complete waste of money, don't be fooled. It's not very well written.
   There are countless errors in the code right from the beginning. They also just skip telling you some important pieces about what is going on in every chapter.
   However, you can still squeeze some use from this book. Go to the web site and download all the code from them. For the most part, the code works and can be your reference. You *can* learn from this book and d/l code, but you have to work at it and use a lot of trial and error.
   
   Thank you for reading.



3. My biggest complaint with VB.NET game programming books so far (and I've read a few) has been that they either: A) try to teach elementary VB.NET using game flavored examples (but nothing about actual game development) or B) try to take existing game programming material and shoe-horn it into a VB.NET book. Sadly this book falls squarely into the second category (so far).
   
   It's quite obvious that ALL of the sample code was originally written in C#. No big deal, it's easy enough to convert. However, if you aren't a VB.NET guy, don't you dare write a freaking book with VB.NET in the title. There are more differences between VB.NET and C# than just syntax!! For the love of god, 85% of the code samples (encountered so far) do NOT work as printed in the book. Some have glaring C# syntax still in them, but only in places... often sharing a line with VB.NET syntax. The tech editor should be drawn and quartered, on TV.
   
   To make matters worse, the main author seems somewhat condescending (arrogant?) for someone who's never actually published a game in his/her life, ever (and had to have TWO other people write the book with him... neither of whom have ever published a game either.) This is an actual quote, immediately after some collision detection code that DOES NOT work as printed... If you think this is too much math, this is probably the place where you should take this book back and take up something less mathematically demanding, like nuclear physics! Ok... seriously? That comment would be a lot more impressive if your code ACTUALLY WORKED!
   
   So far I have nothing positive to say about this book, so let me see... ok well, the girl on the back cover is kinda cute (allegedly one of the authors, although I have no idea which sections are written by whom... is that good or bad? You tell me.) Oh yeah, and the price I paid was 40% off, although sadly I still feel ripped off!
   
   FWIW, I did eventually get the collision detection code to work on paper, although NO explanation is made for why the algorithm handles things a certain way, and the reader is told to perform a simple Google search for more info (I kid you not!!). I'm guessing this is because they don't actually know why the code they "borrowed" (from the net?) did things that way either.
   
   At this point, I'm almost considering this book as a possible alternative energy source. I can't believe anyone at one of my favorite publishers actually read this book prior to printing it and selling it for $50 a copy. By the time you rip out the index, table of contents, foreward, introduction, recommended reading and 'about the author' section... it's barely 350 pages. Yes... I know it's not about page count, but when quality is already out the window, what other metric is there?
   
   I'm not going to tell you the name of this book or the publisher (yet), because even though I've managed to work up this much bile and stomach acid over it, I'm only on page 35. God help me, I hope it gets better quickly.
   
   It's funny, every truly good tech book I read makes me less inclined to try writing my own. This book, however, has convinced me that I still have a pretty good chance at getting published.



4. I would hate for people to get the wrong idea about the book from reading the other posts. This really isn't a bad book.
   I am completely new to game programming (although not new to VB), and following along with the examples I was able to get the Tetris, Caterpillar and other games to work.
   This gives a good introduction to game programming, covering both 2D and some 3D graphics.
   
   But the book isn't all about writing the code. It also tells the reader how to plan out a game before coding, and gives good tips on keeping the project on track.
   
   The book isn't perfect though. There are some errors in the code (but only one glaring instance of C# code in the VB code).
   But APress has followed up, and has posted some code corrections on the web-site, and gives the downloadable code which helps a great deal.
   
   I found the text of the book to be very easy to follow. The author has more of a conversational style than lecturing.
   
   I think the book succeeds in being a good introduction to game programming. Getting the Tetris game to work gives you the incentive to keep reading and learning. Plus, it is fun to play your own game!



5. I am halfway through this abomination and only a masochistic bent will force me to continue. I initially thought that I could easily pick up any beginning programming book and breeze through it but I am new to VB.net and have been away from programming for a couple years so the MASSIVE amount of Typo's, random variable names, extraneous nonsense, as well as items that are left as an exercise for the reader -- most of which are anything but trivial -- make this a medication consuming, frustration-fest. I was considering trying to sell it second-hand but I would foist this dead tree turd on my mother-in-law. Not to mention it's poor condition from heaving it out the window numerous times. Don't, I repeat, don't consider this purchase!!! Pitiful, just pitiful!

5 comments about Visual Basic 6 Weekend Crash Course.

1. I found this book very beneficial. I hadn't done any programming other than some basic scripts for about 15 years. I found this book brought me up to date with VB6 and made me productive quickly.
   I find myself returning to the book as a resource for syntax help quite frequently.
   It may take someone completely new to VB a little longer to go through, but it is well worth it.



2. To me, this book teaches Visual Basic 6 in a friendly manner, but it lacks explanation in some areas. Even though, it still is able to teach programming farely well.
   Watch out! This book does contain flaws in code. I encourage you to buy a little reference book so you are able to point out and debug the wrong code.
   This book isn't a newbies dream come true, but it is a decently good Visual Basic 6 book.



3. OK, so it took a effort approaching that of Hercules, and I'm an experienced programmer with quite a few other computer languages under my belt -- but at least we know it's possible!

   I finished the book in 14 hours, 15 minutes -- including all of the review questions (usually just a mental affirmation when I knew the answer), plus 10 minutes to set up the included version of VB on my computer.

   One of the greatest things about this book is its motivating format. It's a challenge -- learn the essentials of Visual Basic in a weekend!

   And it was that challenge, plus the generally very positive reviews at Amazon.com, that motivated me to pick *this* book instead of a different title. Simply put, I decided this past week (because of a couple of opportunities that came up) that I ought to learn VB -- preferably, by Monday!

   I finished the book 15 minutes ago, at 11:35 p.m. Sunday night.

   My advice: start earlier in the week, and try to get in a bit extra time as you go along. Other matters took some of my time on Saturday and Sunday, and if I hadn't gained an hour and a half on Thursday evening, and half an hour on Friday, I couldn't have finished tonight.

   The other great benefit is that Mansfield majors on the things you'll use a lot, and skips the things you'll use less, to produce a package that actually *can* be completed in a short (and hence motivating) time frame. He claims "the VB vocabulary has been carefully surveyed to determine which commands you need to know for nearly all programming." Obviously, I can't verify that from experience -- but throughout the book he seems to know what he's talking about.

   Compare my experience in learning VB via this book with, say, my Java expedition: I began an 1100-page Java text almost a year ago, and I'm still stuck on page 257.

   Negatives: yes, it could definitely use some better editing, including, in places, editing of the code supplied. For humor, my own favorite example of this was:

   --------------------------------------
   For I = 1 to Numberofcopies
   Printer.Print Text1.Text
   Next I

   Notice the convention of indenting the code inside a For...Next loop. This graphically illustrates the loop.
   --------------------------------------

   (Did you see the indentation? Me neither!)

   Far less amusing is that the author should've included on page 279 or so the code for cmdNew_Click() that's on page 302. Also, my main finished application didn't behave quite as expected -- and if I'm "keeping to schedule," I didn't have time to debug it (that's OK, I learned enough from it).

   Incidentally, though, another reviewer's complaint of illegal names -- as in "1stSearch" (a variable name can't begin with a digit) -- was INCORRECT. The previous reviewer misread the text, which reads, e.g., "LSTSEARCH" (as in LIST BOX) -- *not* "1STSEARCH".

   For most chapters, you'll need to use your computer to really follow and learn the material. Unfortunately, the version of VB on the CD-ROM won't allow you to walk through all the steps in some of the final chapters, but the author (obviously knowing this) has provided more screen shots, allowing you to follow along.

   A time-saving tip: don't type in the code! Simply cut and paste it from the CD-ROM. Then review it line for line, either from the book pages or on your screen.

   A perfect book? No. But all in all, this text got the job done for me. I'm by no means a VB expert after one weekend and 375 pages, but I sure as heck am on my way. I give Mansfield's book a quite solid 4 stars out of 5.




4. I agree with everyone else that the book has some value, but not worth more than $10. The Wiley site is unresponsive to the feed back and judging from the amount of time that has elapsed since it hit the shelf, the publisher dosen't care. There's no errata sheet to download. I'll certainly keep this publisher's name on a post it on the monitor to AVOID future purchases.



5. This book starts out with an interest and plausible concept: to teach the reader the fundamentals of VB6 in a weekend. And it would be able to accomplish this task in at least a "four-star" fashion if the author and/or publisher had attempted to review the code for errors and debug the code. From chapter 22 onward the code errors are so serious that one cannot run the sample program since one uncorrected error builds on another (and coding errors are simple repeated in the code on the included CD) the book becomes practically impossible to follow along by coding on your own computer after chapter 22. What's worse, the publisher does not publish an errata on their website for this book.

3 comments about Visual Basic .NET Database Programming for Dummies.

1. I am really please with this book :
   In this book you will find clear, efficient examples explained step by step.(you can download the examples from the WEB).
   You will have to read only what is necessary to do your job.
   You don't loose time and you don't have to read from the beginning of the book to understand. You can read directly only the chapter you need.

   You don't have to read useless comment or sentence which bring you no practical skill. This book explain really only what you need .
   And you can adapte the example of the book to your need.
   This book is more clear and efficient than "VB.NET" Professional of the Wrox Team.

   In conclusion, this book is made in a way that you can understand fast and well. This is good and practical book.

   Emmanuel Evrard




2. I'm a beginner and already have hit errors on page 47:
   Start>Programs>MS SQL server>Configure SQL XML support in IIS

   My computer yield the following:
   Start>Programs>MS SQL server>
   >Books online
   >Client network utility
   >Enterprise manager
   >Import and export data
   >Profiler
   >Query analyzer
   >Readme.txt
   >Server netowrk utility
   >Service manager
   >Uninstall SQL server 7.0

   There is no mention of Configure XML support in IIS!

   I'm tired of buying books with sloppy technical editing. Oh, to read just one book on VB .net that didn't have an error in the first 50 pages.




3. This is a total waste of paper. Save the forrest, do not print books like that!
   Most of the stuff from this book can be easily found on the net. And also the book does not cover most of the topics. There is not a single part of the book that describes well any of the .NET concepts

5 comments about Excel 2000 VBA Programmers Reference.

1. This book had potential, but it is so full of errors that it is practically useless. It needs a good editor with lots of patience and time to make the corrections.



2. I've owned this book since it has been published and I still keep it at my desk. This reference is a handy size and is packed full of information that applies even today. Amazing!



3. I think that John Green outdid himself on this book, the people who gave it a bad review oviously have no experence with Exel, the book is the best refrence that I have ever seen. All the codes are easy to get to function, really John, you couldn't have done a better Job!
   Great job Dad!!



4. I have been programming with VBA for approximately 6-7 years now. This book is probably not for the beginning programmer. It does a very good job at describing the object model (at least it did for me). I have found it to be a wonder resource book and have learned several new things as I have read through it. The only reason I have given the book 4 stars instead of 5 is because I don't feel the index does an adequate job. There are things I know I have seen in the book, but have difficulting locating it again. I have yet to find a VBA book that explains everything, so I would certainly recommend adding this book to your VBA library.



5. I it gives you the right information to start, for learning is great because you don't need a lot you just need the right basics and then you can construct from there.