5 comments about Visual Basic .NET Black Book.

1. If you deduct from this book everything that you can find in the Help files and a whole lot of unecessary code it would number a few hundred pages instead of the massive 1144 pages that it is.
   I am an experienced developer and want something more than a (very good) manual. Perhaps it would suit a beginner better.
   An example of code-bloat was a section on adding a data adapter to a form. The author describes a simple drag-and-drop approach but then proceeds to list the code generated behind the scenes - all 10 pages of it. You can see this for yourself on the screen if you have followed the example, and it is not even accompanied by any explanations.
   Depsite it's size it wasn't always thorough. I wanted to find out what were acceptable values for the DataSource property of a ListBox but the property was not even shown in the list of 'noteworthy public properties' of the object, nor in the index.
   It does however contain a great deal of information on all aspects of VB.NET which makes it useful for a reference book.



2. The book is good for both experienced programmers and beginners. What I was looking well into was the ADO.Net chapters and they are very good.
   I have more than 6 years of Delphi experience and this book was good for me to begin with and as reference.



3. Being a programmer with 3 years experience and developing in VB6.0. I found this book to be a great reference book for me while I began learning VB.NET. I would ask myself while developing.. 'I can develop feature 'x' in VB6.0, so how does VB.NET handle 'x'.. and look it up'

   The Black Book doesn't dive into the philosophies of VB.NET, but rather delivers straight forward code examples of how to do it. For grunt programming and experienced VB6.0 developers, I feel this book is a must on every developers book shelf.




4. This book is a OK book. I would buy "Programming visual basic.net (Core References) by Francesco Balena instead of this book. It fails in alot of areas to explain anything! Hey, I have heard good things in the past about the black book series, but don't waste your money on this one!



5. This book is excellent. One of the best I've seen. Loads of examples, good explanations, far more detail than I've seen other places. Answers nearly all of my questions. I recommend it to anyone!

1 comments about Microsoft Visual Basic .NET Programming: From Problem Analysis to Program Design.

1. Throughout the years, I made several purchases from different sellers on Amazon. I never had a problem. However, I had a bad experience with LIKENEW. I received the wrong textbook, which I returned to the seller (FRAPALU) on 10/8/08 via Federal Express to the Florida address on the package I received 9/12/08.
   
   A full 5 days after my purchase on 9/7/08 of a textbook titled, Microsoft Visual Basic.NET Programming: From Problem Analysis to Program Design, I received a package from FedEx containing a textbook I never ordered about Microsoft Office XP.
   Although I contacted LIKENEW (FRAPALU) via e-mail and telephone on the day I received the package (Saturday, 9/13/08) stating I received the wrong textbook, I never received any resolution.
   
   The seller never accepted the responsibility for any wrongdoings and decided to keep the money I paid for the Microsoft Visual Basic.NET Programming: From Problem Analysis to Program Design textbook. I made several attempts requesting the seller to review his/her inventory and forward me the correct textbook. I never received any response to my many requests. Because of this incidence, I lost precious study time for my class and I received a lower grade marking on the first two assignments. I had to purchase the correct textbook from another seller on a different site using borrowed funds. :^(
   
   As referenced in my above statements, this seller had too many negative issues. First, the textbook order arrived 5 days later than anticipated. Secondly, the wrong textbook arrived. Third, but not least, the seller refused to acknowledge any wrongdoings. He/she took no responsibility to ensure I received the correct textbook. Nor did he/she try to contact me with any favorable resolution to the issue. I am looking forward to receiving a credit on my account from this purchase. I would not recommend this seller to anyone especially a classmate.

5 comments about Learning Visual Basic.NET Through Applications (Programming Series).

1. Learning Visual Basic.NET Through Applicationsby Clayton E. Crooks II (a partner in Advanced Information Systems, a consulting company specializing in custom hardware and software solutions) is a straightforward companion reference and instructive guide to learning how to program in Visual Basic.NET while developing applications such as MP3 players, encryption programs, DirectX 8.1, word processors and much more. Easy-to-follow chapters cover an introduction to the VB.NET language, math and random functions, strings, error handling, and progress to more complex topics like Windows form applications drawing with VB.NET, and Microsoft Agent. Screenshots, sample code, and step-by-step instructions make Learning Visual Basic.NET Through Applications a superb supplement to any course in VB.NET, or even an excellent self-taught course. An accompanying CD-ROM offers numerous tools, figures, and source code for every project in the book - almost everything except for VB.NET itself is on it. Learning Visual Basic.NET Through Applications is very highly recommended to anyone needing to quickly and efficiently learn or deepen their understanding and utilization of VB.NET.



2. This book could have been so much better. The premise is very promising - build real world applications while learning VB.NET at the same time. The execution, however, falls flat.

   There are several problems with this book. First, as in any technical book, there are errors, both typographical and omissions. One chapter deals with accessing system information and printing it to a window. It leaves out the key detail of adding a reference to the system library needed to accomplish this task. In the same chapter there are several typographical errors, some within the code. No one is perfect, and these things happen. However, overall, the book has more typos than I have ever seen in any other computer book. The publisher's website has no way, other than a generic info@ email, to notify them of typos or code errors. There are no errata listings on the site or any way to submit them, as with WROX or O'Reilly.

   The actual content of the book isn't bad, and the code works (for the most part); however there a much larger focus on just providing code than actually explaining step by step what you are doing. The provided CD contains all the code in the book; beyond the first chapters that deal with the basics of programming both in general and also specifically in VB.NET, the CD essentially contains the contents of the book. While those first few chapters are generally well-written, the explanations are not very deep and drop off sharply once you reach the application-building chapters.

   Overall, I would rate it 2 stars. A second edition, one that has been proofread, would knock it up to 4.




3. I read earlier reviews about some of the editing issues, but purchased the book anyway. I am glad I did. Mistakes are there, but if you are going to be a programmer, you can deal with them. I am a professional programmer studying .Net. Learning through the examples that are laid out within this book makes it extrordinairly easy. I have purchased many many books on programming and find that this is the best of the lot. It is not fancy, but it delivers the goods. To the author. Keep Writing.



4. While there are a few small errors, this is a great book. I bought this book, and liked it so much that I decided to buy the authors REALbasic book. It was great as well. Keep up the good work.



5. I've bought about 20 books on Visual Studio .NET, and many of them are on Visual Basic. This is one of the best tutorials I've come across. Since I was familiar with a lot of the true beginner's stuff I skipped over most everything at the beginning and went immediately to chapter 13.

   The chapters are short, the code is minimal, but you get applications that are really useful and you get to build those projects that always stump you, like how to I get to print something, or how do I program an OpenDialog box to display files? (Many of the current Help examples in Visual Studio 2003 don't work and are useless.)

   There is also fun stuff: The chapters on Agents are worth the price of the book alone. This opened a whole new world to me and my 16 year old son.

   The book is already in need of an update since I am now using VS2003, and a couple of the chapters don't quite work with the old code, and there are a number of IDE differences as well. But most all of the applications work and you can get to modify them to suit your own applications.

   I would suggest an updated book with all the first 12 chapters removed, and with examples for Mobile devices added. Hint, hint, Mr. Crooks.

   If you are a novice VB .NET programmer, this is one of the first books you should get. The other first books you should get have been rated in these reviews. Just find one with high marks and that explains how to use the IDE, and how to display "Hello, world".

   Unfortunately, there are hardly any books on the new Visual Studio 2003, so you'll have slim pickings for those or just stuggle with the old books.

5 comments about Building Applications and Components with Visual Basic .NET (Microsoft .NET Development Series).

1. I toyed with the idea of writing a really long and detailed review about the content of this book (like so many you see on Amazon), but in a nutshell, this book is a masterpiece, it's what all technical books should aspire to be, comprehensive, thorough, mercifully free of unnecessary flab, and deeply intelligent in its choice of concise and ingenious examples.
   
   It left me with the feeling that I'd been hit by a truck with the word 'clarity' emblazoned on the side.
   you won't be a .Net guru afterwards because .Net is Massive!
   
   but...
   
   it is in my view the best 'foundation' book of any kind I've ever had the pleasure to read, read it and then read Balena, Esposito et al, but I can't emphasize enough read this first, it is hearteningly and informatively brilliant. You WILL understand Visual Basic .net after reading it, after that go on to books that exploit specific namespaces like ADO.net, ASP.net, winforms, XML web services etc.. this book is not about any of that it's about the compiler, assemblies , types and the framework, the plumbing! this is anatomy class, surgery should come later, and as these things go, it's 'the business'!
   It just goes to show that there are still people in this world who really do care about what they put their name to.
   
   '****New Addition (10 months on, I've read it again)
   Upon re-reading the book I was struck but how it was even more useful 2nd time round, but also particularly by how economical and highly informative the comments inside the code are. They are magnificent. I've found it very useful when the author is illustrating a particular point, to show for example, the return value of a method call as a comment to the right. When the main point of the example is 'watch out, this does something you don't expect' the code becomes complete, you can understand it without having to run it. I do think however that you understand code much better if you do run it. The point I'm making is that writing great and very succint comments is an art, and one I think the authors have completely mastered. You can read the book in transit and still make sense of all the examples.
   
   '*** end of New Addition



2. This book covers the truly essential concepts and techniques for developing applications in VB.Net. It does so with clear short sentences, great and relatively simple examples, appropriate diagrams, no skipping around while learning, and downloadable projects. Enjoy.



3. Relevant and interesting .Net book that emphasizes "why" rather than "how" while privileging concepts over code snippets.
   
   The material Pattison and Hummel cover is relevant to all dotnet developers because it revolves around the building of object oriented component-based applications without emphasis to any particular app framework (whether console, asp.net ∨ windows forms/"smart client" apps). The result is a book that's some what akin to a generic re-usable class (that's a good thing)
   
   Building Apps and Components W/ VB.Net covers the things other books either: ignore, assume you're familiar with, or provide code samples without explaining the context (this observation extends to the MS web application exam too)
   
   Things like:
   
   What a type is
   Shared class members VS Instance members
   Inheritance
   Writing abstract base classes
   Scoping considerations
   Polymorphism
   Interfaces
   Event-based programming
   Garbage Collection and Object life-time
   Values and Objects (Structures Vs Classes)
   etc
   
   I concur with the programmer who wrote the following in his review of the book " if you can't explain straight out to someone what boxing or polymorphism means now, you'll be a better programmer for reading this book."



4. The book is good but WORTHLESS without its code examples.
   The author tells you to get the book code examples from Barracuda.net web site. The site when accessed defaults to a HTTP 400 error message. I mailed the author asking for the code examples and received no response. DON'T BUY THIS BOOK if you intend to use the code examples, since it is worthless without the them.



5. This book helped me understand .NET better. This book is for someone who knows how to program VB6 or VBA and wants to learn about .NET. I liked it when the book compared VB6 to VB.NEt and VB.NET to C#.

4 comments about Visual Basic 6 In Record Time.

1. I and another instructor used this as a textbook for a visual basic desktop development course. We both thought it was excellent. We liked that the author covers 19 specific skills at the introductory level. It was not over taxing for the beginner, yet it gave an excellent overview of what could be done in a single-user environment.

   There is no discussion of using VB6 in the enterprise (nor should there be at this level). There are other excellent texts that deal in more detail with database programming, and those should definitely be the next step for someone interested in business applications, but this book will get the beginner actually writing complete desktop applications.

   What does it lack? In-depth discussion/application of object oriented programming. Database applications. In-depth examples on ActiveX and COM. Anything you might be looking for if you have already been programming in Visual Basic for more than a year.

   That is not to fault this book at what its purpose was -> get a newbie up to speed in VB6. We teach more advanced courses and use other books for those. This is an excellent introduction to VB6. Highly recommended for the beginner to intermediate programmer.




2. Well it is not bad , but i had so much difficulties in the start i guess cause the author don't explain some codes so i had to rely on MSDN help to help me understanding some codes , but i did understand good at the end of the book so i guess you need to read all book before you really can grasp visual basic , i liked Mastering Visual Basic 6 it was just great but Visual basic in record time was not a bad start you need at least to know a little on Visual basic if you want to read Mastering Visual basic



3. Although it is probably not the author's intent, this is the funniest programming book I have ever read. (Yes, even funnier than Mr. Bunny's Big Cup o' Java.) A co-worker and I have been laughing out loud after reading parts of it.

   My favourite part so far is the introduction to variables. The author describes memory as a sheet of graph paper, and points out that if one had enough graph paper to represent 16 megabytes, it would take up an area "approximately 85.33 feet wide and 85.33 feet high." (What is 'approximate' about taking a measurement to two decimal places? Why would it be measured in height and width instead of length and width? Am I supposed to imagine all those sheets of graph paper standing on end?) He goes on to point out that if each square of graph paper actually represented a bit instead of a byte, then 16 megabytes would actually cover three football fields. (In case people don't know what graph paper or a football field looks like, there are illustrations of each.)

   After instructing the reader to imagine three football fields covered in graph paper, comes the punchline: "Now that you have a general idea of what memory looks like, you can start to understand how the different variable types work." Priceless!

   Now that I'm thinking about it, maybe this guy was intentionally trying to be funny. He later mentions that a programmer "will invariably start using variables" and defines Constants this way: "Constants are nonvariable variables."

   In short, if you are already a programmer, pick this up for the laughs. Everyone else should leave it in the bargain bin.




4. I'm reading this book to learn visual basic 6.0. I agree that some parts are not clear, I hate the part about the status bar because it doesn't explain it well.

   Stuff that rules:
   Great Introduction
   Great Coverage
   Book cover is nice
   If you misread the author's name you might think that "the crocodile hunter" has written it!
   No typos in codes and litterature

   Stuff that sucks:
   Sometimes Confusing
   Layout of the book is poor (it explains the toolbox and all the controls AFTER you have made your first program (!!!))

   overall get this book if you are desperite... Great intro... But then get "Doing Objects in visual basic"

No comments about Excel in VB.NET Programming Interview Questions: Advanced Excel Programming Interview Questions, Answers, and Explanations in VB.NET.

5 comments about Professional VB.NET 2003, 3rd Edition.

1. This book is not based on Visual Studio.Net Final Release!

   I have read the book front to back including introduction page. I just realized that the book was based on beta 2 of Visual Studio.Net, too late for a refund. Anyway, I went on to read it and found out that the book was not very much organised as tons of '...we'll discuss this on chapter xx ... ' appear no less than 5 times in a single chapter (on some chapters). Mispelled words also are catching enough to say that this book was in a hurry to be printed.

   If you're looking for a book that covers thorough details on window forms and web form control howtos, this wouldn't give you enough detail on those topics. Web Services is equally a mere introduction, with about two pages of discussion on UDDI as well as WSDL. Not much on ADO.Net and XML.

   I should have borrowed this book instead and skim through it or should have bought it for 20 bucks less. Besides, it's already outdated. I hope the same authors would come up with a second edition that has richer detail...and send me a free copy.




2. I'd say this is the best Professional VB.NET book so far. I like the the ADO.NET part and VB control part of this book. Better than O'really ASP and VB book.



3. First, this review DOES refer to the current edition:
   Professional VB.NET 2003, 3rd Edition
   
   I have purchased many, many books published by WROX. I have found them to, for the most part, to be GREAT books with a range of information. The books are in series, so you can choose either Beginner or Professional versions.
   
   BUT the one thing I can't understand is their total disinterest in creating a decent index. This book has the worst INDEX of all. Not only is the index very skimpy (as most of the WROX books are,) but THIS book's index is FULL of mistakes. It seems virtually every listing sends the user to the WRONG page. I just don't understand what the problem with Wrox is. This index issue of skimpiness/mistakes is found throughout their catalog of books.
   
   NOTE: As far as content, I would have given this book FIVE stars, but someone from WROX should start addressing the INDEX issues.
   
   If you wish to see well done indices just look at books from Microsoft Press.
   
   Again, please understand, the content of this book is excellent.



4. This book is the sequel to "Beginning VB.NET 2003". That book of necessity had to devote time to going over basic syntactical material of VB.NET. By contrast, this book is squarely aimed at object oriented material.
   
   It shows how to design a problem so as to have natural object classes. From these, the book moves into implementing these under VB. This of course leads immediately into topics like inheritance and interfaces. And how to make a hierarchy of classes. You get to imagine levels of abstraction, like virtual methods in a class, which act as placeholders for actual methods in derived classes. There is a good discussion of the various ways that polymorphism can arise.
   
   Other chapters go into the GUI aspects of the language. Secondary emphasis really. These chapters are straightforward. Nothing conceptually hard here.
   
   What is striking about the book is that in the OO chapters, if you remove the code examples, much of the text could apply to C++, Java and C#. What Microsoft has done is promote VB to the level of these languages.



5. I am an experienced VB6 programmer so I thought I could skip the "Beginning" edition from Wrox. I went onto this "Professional" edition. Boy was that a mistake. While I could follow the concepts in the book, they were presented in a very overly-complex manner. It seemed the authors (and there were a lot of authors) tried to present the most complex scenario they could think of for each topic. But then did not give any "real-world" cases where you would ever use all of the complexity and nuances discussed. They could have made the code examples much more direct and to the point without trying to confuse the reader. I think I could have gotten a basic skillset from the Beginning book and picked up anything else I needed through development. Also this book is absolutely filled with errors. Even the index is complete garbage, you have to download a corrected one from Wrox.com. I don't want to carry a bunch of loose pages around with the book as a side-bar.

5 comments about Designing Visual Basic .NET Applications.

1. I really dislike programming books that don't give me lots of good code samples but I can't recall one with as little code as this book. I am going to return it as a result.



2. A supurb introduction to .NET. Informative and enjoyable to read. Furthermore, in a tremendous burst of mental and physical agility, I was able to actually *open* the book in the store and observe that it doesn't have a lot of code examples (see previous "review"). It does however have a wealth of useful information, introducing the basics of both .NET, and Visual Basic .NET.



3. Here is a novel concept for a book: let's teach someone how to program in a language without code. Can it be done?

   The answer, of course, is yes ... if you rely on the Visual Studio .NET IDE, which this book does. More than a book on coding, this book is a step by step on how to create code with the Visual Studio .NET IDE, without actually writing code.

   This is not all bad, of course, as you can write some decent applications using this technique. However, it would have been nicer, if this was their intention, to include some screen shots. This book does not.

   On the plus side, there is an awful lot of theory in this book. This alone may make this a useful addition to your library. If you want to really learn to code Visual Basic .NET, go elsewhere.




4. This book is about design and technique. There are lots of examples of how to do the right thing but the book doesn't deluge you with page after page of code samples. Instead they cut to the chase and show you just the portion of the code that makes a difference. This is a great book for anyone from beginner to moderately experienced VB program who is moving over to VB.Net and wants to learn how best to do it. I highly recommend this book.



5. I am a VB 6.0 developer for quite a few years now and when the .NET framework kicked off I was a bit confused about the new way of developing .NET applications. I have read a few tutorials about the new technology and the new programing architecture but was still confused.
   I found this book on the net and read the reviews, two positive two negative, still decided to buy it and I don't regreat it. It is worth the money.
   It is true that the book has the minimum code needed for a programming book, but remember the title doesn't say "CODING VISUAL BASIC.NET APPLICATIONS". The title on the cover of this book is "DESIGNING VISUAL BASIC.NET APPLICATIONS". If you are an experienced programmer on any of the other languages you will now that the first step to creating a succesfull application is the designing stage. Then you go to coding. If you are one of those people that want to do the coding before the design then this is the wrong book.
   If you are looking for a book that does both, designing and coding, then this book is not for you, then you have to look for a book that has at least 2500 pages, a CD-ROM included and of-course will cost like eight times this book.
   But if you are looking for enough information to desing .NET applications and start thinking on the new way of developing for .NET then this is the right book for you.Autor goes deep on explaining the theory behind the .NET architecture, the need for migrating to .NET and gives you more then enough information about the new beast out there called .NET.
   It helped me clear out a lot of things there were mixed on my head, being used to develop on VB 6.0.
   If you are a serious developer and you read and learn, to learn and know then this book is one of the books that need to be in you bookshelf. Othervise by one of the books that say ".... VB.NET COMPLETE" read about all the possibilities of the new language but never learn any of them.
   Offcourse this is not the book that will teach you everything. You need to buy some more books to learn the coding technologies. There is a lot of good books out there on coding like BIBLE series (Good for beginners), quite a few on the reusable objects and components, and at the very end you have the UNLEASHED series for the most serious developers. You will never find a book that references all the ends of programming. You have to buy a couple to get where you want and I think this is one of them.

   Coriolis and Dave Vitter, thanks for this this title. Great Job.

2 comments about More Visual Basic 5 for Windows for Dummies.

1. For a beginner such as myself, learning any type of programming language was about as much of a challenge as it was figuring out how to stop that blinking 12:00 on my VCR-next to impossible.Mr Wang detailed everything in such a well manner I felt like Capt. Picard venturing out on a new frontier. I almost forgot I was reading a book on programming. I learned alot and had a good time. I highly recommend this book!



2. The ...Dummies series of books was a great concept from the beginning. Never before have there been technical references which could just be read for their entertainment value alone. Beware of ...Dummies books not in the computer genre, they are mediocre at best. This one however proudly continues the heritages started by Dan Gookin in being informative, technical but not more than is neccessary, and allowing you to start from a point where "computer" is still a word to be looked up in your dusty Webster.

2 comments about Microsoft Visual Basic .NET: Introduction to Programming, Second Edition (South-Western Computer Education).

1. this book really helped me to understand visual basics programming. if it wasn't for this book, i might have failed my class!



2. This book is something I would definitely recommend for anyone interested in breaking into programming by starting with Visual Basic. Perhaps the fact that Michael Sprague (the author) has been teaching for many years contributes to the easy-to-understand, no-nonsense flow of this book; I found other books on the same subject a little too daunting after this one. His Step-by-Step approach is very helpful, although it can be a bit tedious at times.

   This is not a "cookbook" or reference book - it does not show you how to learn to program in VB overnight (it has over 75 hours of lessons, but a few "projects" that come at the end of each chapter will probably take you longer to go through the book, especially if you are just starting to program). But each lesson builds on the previous one so you are always practicing what you are learning in this book. If you are a slow folk like me, you feel tremendously rewarded when you figure out a simple task or complete a project, and it really gets you thinking about how powerful VB is and all the things you can do with it once you are proficient at it.