Product Description

Beginning ASP.NET 2.0 in C#: From Novice to Professional steers you through the maze of ASP.NET web programming concepts. You will learn language and theory simultaneously, mastering the core techniques necessary to develop good coding practices and enhance your skill set.

This book provides thorough coverage of ASP.NET, guiding you from beginning to advanced techniques, such as querying databases from within a web page and performance-tuning your site. You'll find tips for best practices and comprehensive discussions of key database and XML principles.

Customer Reviews (14)

Good resource for those using Visual Studio
This information in this book is first rate and well written. My only concern is that its written assuming you are using VS.

Great book to begin with C#
My employer asked me to jump into a project to create a web portal for one of our products.The chosen platform was ASP.NET and C#.The only problem is that I had never used C# and had no Visual Studio experience.Thanks to this book I learned the ins and outs of C# and was able to create the necessary screens.This product has turned out to be a success and I owe much of the success to the clear instruction provided in this book.

Very good book for learning ASP.NET and C#
This is a very good book for learning the fundamentals of both ASP.NET and C#.

The book first provides an overview of the C# elements that any programmer will need.Then, it moves on to cover all the important aspects of ASP.NET.

It does have several mistakes, including errors in the example code.But, this is typical of computer programming books and all the errors I've seen are pretty easily identified. If the book had received better technical reviewing and eliminated these errors I would have given it 5 stars.

The book is written for programmers having experience with other languages. It dives right in to the substance of C# and ASP.NET. Previous coding, especially in object-oriented languages, will certainly benefit.

Someone with no programming experience should first 1) learn about object-oriented programming and 2) read a more basic book on this topic.

This is not to say you need to be a guru. Those with any reasonable programming experience can benefit from this book. For experienced programmers who want to learn ASP.NET and C# this is for you.

Theory !
I bought this book a while ago and have been reading it. I lost interest in the way the author deals with the topics. It is all theory and text. Developers need the real deal. Not just flab stuff. The novices will only confused with the way the info has been presented. I got the Wrox professional series and it is lot beter. Save money.

A very good book for anyone who wants to learn ASP .NET
I bought this book after someone had recommended it on a discussion forum. And that person was right. This book is perfect for the person who wants to learn ASP .NET using C# language. It covers almost every aspect of ASP .NET and C#. It's straight to the point with good examples. It requires some basic knowledge of programming, so if you are a begginer programmer and want to learn ASP .NET and the C# language buy this book. ... Read more

Product Description
ASP.NET Website Programming shows you how to build an interactive website from design to deployment.

Packed with solutions to website programming problems, this book will have you building well-engineered, extendable ASP.NET websites quickly and easily.

What you need to know

This book is for developers who:

• Use ASP.NET and Visual Basic .NET
• Use Visual Studio(r) .NET Professional or above, or Visual Basic(r) .NET Standard

What you will learn from this book

With ASP.NET Website Programming you will learn to:

• Establish a solid, scalable website foundation
• Provide flexible user accounts by integrating with ASP.NET's built-in security
• Create fully featured discussion forums
• Generate revenue from advertising
• Build a web interface for managing the files on your site
• Add opinion polls, e-mail newsletters, and news management
• Deploy the finished site on a live server
• Build websites using good, n-tier coding techniques

"I was very impressed with this work. This is a great book that the intermediate-to-advanced .NET developer should get their hands on. It's very well thought-out and the lessons are plainly stated, and easy to follow." —Jason Salas MBA MCP - Web Development Manager, KUAM.COM ... Read more

Customer Reviews (42)

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

If you build web sites with ASP.NET as a novice or hobbyist and want to get to the next level, this book is for you!I own both the VB.NET and C#.NET versions and I highly recommend either one.

Outstanding ASP.NET Case Study
ASP.NET Website Programming: Problem - Design - Solution, C# Edition by Marco Bellinaso & Kevin Hoffman is one of the most USABLE books I have seen.I stress the word USABLE because most books are either reference manuals or just teaching tools.Either one need is hit upon or the other, whereas with this book you get to have your cake and eat it too!

The whole design of this book revolves around designing a web site from the ground up, all using ASP.NET with C# as the programming language of choice.The authors assume that you begin with nothing and you need to have all the parts of your web site hit upon to get this up and running for corporate or personal use.Since .NET is still a very new tool, this book is a very helpful resource to have for any and all web developers.

The Authors break the book up into the following parts:

Design of the overall layout, database, look and feel
Setting up basic foundations like CSS, navigation, etc
Editing and viewing all files that make up the site hierarchy
A look at managing news (information displayed to the user)
How advertising can be set up to bring in revenue
Creating and displaying polls on your site
Working with Mailing Lists
Managing a Forum
Deploying the site to the world
A discussion of different data stores that can be used

The writing in this book is very clear-cut and easy to follow.Using the code supplied in this book, the user can modify as they see fit and get their own site up and running in no time.

As an ASP.NET case study, this is the best book that I have seen to follow a site from birth to adulthood.This is a fantastic book for all C#, ASP.NET, web developers and it's a great addition to your current staple of related programming books.

***** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

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

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

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

Product Description
ASP.NET allows web sites to display unique pages for each visitor rather than show the same static HTML pages. The release of ASP.NET 2.0 is a revolutionary leap forward in the area of web application development. It brings with it a wealth of new and exciting built-in functions that reduce the amount of code you'll need to write for even the most common applications.

With more than 50 new server controls, the number of classes inside ASP.NET 2.0 has more than doubled, and in many cases, the changes in this new version are dramatic. This book will alert you to every new feature and capability that ASP.NET 2.0 provides so that you'll be prepared to put these new technologies into action. Greatly expanded from the original best-selling Professional ASP.NET 2.0, this new special edition adds hundreds of pages of new coverage of advanced and new techniques relating to data and data sources, the provider model, personalization, membership, role management, localization, configuration, migration, and Altas.

Bonus CD-ROM and DVD
* The bonus DVD includes a 180-day trial of Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Professional
* The accompanying CD-ROM features a valuable library of chapters from other key Wrox books. It contains more than 1,000 pages from more than 15 Wrox ASP.NET 2.0, C# 2005, VB 2005, .NET 2.0, and SQL Server 2005 books.

What you will learn from this book
* The idea of the server control and its pivotal role in ASP.NET development
* How to create templated ASP.NET pages using the new master page feature
* Techniques for debugging and handling errors
* How to work with data from enterprise databases including SQL Server 2005 and Oracle(r)
* Ways to package and deploy ASP.NET applications
* How to retrieve, update, and delete data quickly and logically
* How to implement the cultures and regions features to localize your web site into multiple languages for different visitors
* How to use the new "Altas" add-in for ASP.NET 2.0 to add Ajax-style capabilities to your ASP.NET applications
* An understanding of how to use and extend the new pro?vider model for accessing data stores, processes, and more
* How to keep track of your application's performance and health with new monitoring tools
* When and how to migrate your ASP.NET 1.x applications to 2.0

Who this book is for

This book is for experienced programmers and developers who are looking to make the transition to ASP.NET 2.0.

Wrox Professional guides are planned and written by working programmers to meet the real-world needs of programmers, developers, and IT professionals. Focused and relevant, they address the issues technology professionals face every day. They provide examples, practical solutions, and expert education in new technologies, all designed to help programmers do a better job.

This book is also available as part of the 5-book ASP.NET 2.0 Wrox Box (ISBN: 0-470-11757-5). This 5-book set includes:

• Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Special Edition (ISBN: 0-470-04178-1)
• ASP.NET 2.0 Website Programming: Problem - Design - Solution (ISBN: 0764584642 )
• Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Security, Membership, and Role Management (ISBN: 0764596985)
• Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Server Control and Component Development (ISBN: 0471793507)
• ASP.NET 2.0 MVP Hacks and Tips (ISBN: 0764597663)
• CD-ROM with more than 1000 pages of bonus chapters from 15 other .NET 2.0 and SQL Server(TM) 2005 Wrox books
• DVD with 180-day trial version of Microsoft(r) Visual Studio(r) 2005 Professional Edition

Customer Reviews (7)

exactly found with the same quality as was committed by the seller
I am happy and impressed by the fast delivery and also the quality of the item delivered to me.

Thank you amazon and thank you the seller.

Good book, no e-book
This is a good book to learn version 2.0. Well written, real world examples. Title says professional but beginners would like it as well. One disappointment for me was the accompanying CD only has marketing for other books, no e-book.

Good Book
Like the direct tack.Has what you want, where you would expect it.Easy to use as a reference.

Comprehensive but not in depth
This is a nice book for people who have the basic idea of ASP.NET.This Book covers almost all topics for .Net2.0 . It is a very good reference book for newbie.
Unfortunately, this book isn't in-depth for lots of topics, basically it just introduces most common cases, and you probably can't find what you want for some topics. (Eg implement Sorting and Pagation for ObjectDataSource, Crystal Report, memory management, ADO.NET in depth, .Net Virtual Machine etc). The source code is another down side for this book. Most of the code doesn't run, also the connection string wasn't right at the first place, I have to spend hours and hours to get it right.
In conclusion, it worth to buy, if you just want learn asp.net in a fast way. It will give you the solution for most tasks. Pretty good reference book.

Great ASP.NET 2.0 Reference
This is a great ASP.NET 2.0 reference book.It is absolutely packed with information covering all areas of the product.The book is also somewhat unique in that all code snippets are provided in both VB and C#, making it useful to all developers.

The authors are fantastic technical experts and speakers on .NET and ASP.NET.I think you can learn a lot from this book. ... Read more

Product Description

A unique resource that combines all aspects of Web testing and makes it completely specific to ASP.NET

As Microsoft's key Web technology for creating dynamic, data-driven Web sites and Web applications, ASP.NET is incredibly popular. This is the first book to combine several testing topics and make them specific to ASP.NET. The author duo of Microsoft MVPs covers both the test-driven development approach and the specifics of automated user interface testing; performance, load, and stress testing; accessibility testing; and security testing.

This definitive guide walks you through the many testing pitfalls you might experience when developing ASP.NET applications. The authors explain the fundamental concepts of testing and demystify all the correct actions you need to consider and the tools that are available so that you may successfully text your application.

• Author duo of Microsoft MVPs offer a unique resource: a combination of several testing topics and making them specific to ASP.NET, Microsoft's key Web technology for creating dynamic, data-driven Web sites and applications
• Guides you through the many testing pitfalls you may experience when developing ASP.NET applications
• Reviews the fundamental concepts of testing and walks you through the various tools and techniques available and for successfully testing an application
• Discusses several different types of testing: acceptance, stress, accessibility, and security
• Examines various testing tools, such as nUnit, VS test suite, WCAT, Selenium, Fiddler, Firebug, and more

This one-of-a-kind resource will help you become proficient in successfull application testing. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Good "Central Repository" of Information
I got a copy of "Testing ASP.NET Web Applications" a while ago but it's taken me some time to get through it because I wanted to dedicate the time and attention to it that it needed. There really aren't many decent books that discuss testing all different aspects of web applications (though there are several dedicated specifically to security testing). The content in this book is something I've been trying to find for a long time in a format aggregated all together in one place and, despite a few rough edges, I'll be recommending it to my QA friends this year.

I'll run down the content chapter by chapter so you can see what's inside and decide for yourself.

CHAPTER 1: PRELIMINARY CONCERNS

The first chapter gives a nice, concise history of testing tools starting from sUnit (Smalltalk unit testing) and bringing us through today, so you can see where we've been. It also provides a really nice terminology list. I may have to blow the terminology list up and attach it to my wall so I can point to it and make sure in discussions that everyone's on the same page, talking about the same thing. Finally, there's a good test-related "mythbusters" section you can use to get testing moving forward in your organization.

CHAPTER 2: DESIGN AND TESTABILITY

This chapter starts off with a summary overview of what makes a good unit test. I agreed with some points and disagreed with others, but the qualities that "make a good unit test" are sort of a religious debate that people can't agree on - for example, naming conventions. That said, they revisit what makes a good unit test at the end with a checklist of sorts that is really good. They talk about the design of your code and how it affects testability, discussing the SOLID design principles, and test smells (fragile tests, slow tests, etc.) you might encounter. They do touch lightly on pair programming and test driven development in this chapter (saving the details for the next chapter) but they don't discuss it in a dogmatic way, which is a nice change from most articles you'll read on the subject.

There is a section on refactoring in chapter 2 that felt somewhat out of place, like they wanted to relate the refactoring examples to how easy refactoring can be if you design your code well, but it really felt bolted on and distracting.

CHAPTER 3: UNIT TESTING AND TEST DRIVEN DEVELOPMENT

The chapter on unit testing and TDD should have been one of the best chapters, but it wasn't as helpful as I'd hoped it would be. Since this is an ASP.NET specific book, the aim of the chapter should have been to explain how to get testing running in ASP.NET - web forms and MVC. Of the 50 pages in the chapter, about two talk about web forms and the model-view-presenter way of separating concerns and getting web forms testable. The rest of the time is spent on ASP.NET MVC and setting up an example application that gets used through the rest of the book. While I agree with the authors that MVC is a far more testable framework, that doesn't help the people who have legacy applications or who are otherwise stuck on web forms. There is a tiny bit at the end that basically says, "It's not worth much to try retrofitting unit tests to web forms" (without saying those exact words). I feel like there was a huge opportunity missed.

As for MVC, the authors suggest a different "default project structure" than the one provided by ASP.NET MVC out of the box, and I only partially agree with the proposal. The idea is sound, but it would be nice to see things in a stock fashion since a new project structure really only applies to Greenfield work.

The walkthrough of creating the demo application is very valuable and shows the red/green/refactor process of test driven development well. If you're unfamiliar with this process, it's good to see it. Of course, they also introduce a lot of patterns and concepts very quickly with little ceremony (e.g., the repository pattern, NHibernate usage, etc.) and that's a lot to take in, so be patient.

CHAPTER 4: INTEGRATION TESTING

This chapter is a pretty short chapter and talks about the differences between unit testing and integration testing, then runs through adding some integration tests to the sample application so you can get a feel for doing that.

CHAPTER 5: AUTOMATED USER INTERFACE TESTING

This chapter breaks down the different types of functional testing and talks about the benefits, drawbacks, and challenges of automating the UI. The discussion of challenges is really good, listing different ways your UI automation tests can fail. It definitely gives you something to think about as you head down this road.

They break down different tools and approaches to UI testing with a primary focus on WatiN, Visual Studio Web Tests, and Selenium usage. They then show how to apply these tools to automating the sample application so you can see them in action. (There is also a section on qUnit - unit testing for JavaScript - at the end of the chapter, but it's really thin and feels like an afterthought.)

During the automation of the sample app, there is a little bit of distraction as the authors get a little lost in the weeds introducing test data generators with fluent interfaces right in the middle. For automated UI testing you do need some test data to populate the system with, but it's really confusing and distracting plopped right in the middle of everything.

CHAPTER 6: ACCEPTANCE TESTING

The chapter on acceptance testing starts off with some good terminology, but then dives into Scrum project management methodology. It feels like they're taking you on a ride, but if you have a little faith, you'll see how they bring you back around to testing. It's a worthwhile detour, even if it feels a little abrupt.

They focus on FitNesse and Cucumber as the two acceptance testing frameworks and show you how to get each running. I read the FitNesse section twice and still didn't really get it. There were lots of wiki screen shots and tiny code snippets, but nothing that was complete enough. It took skipping forward to the example section and once I got it, I started questioning if the work involved was really worth it. On the other hand, Cucumber seemed reasonably straightforward (though it, too, didn't come clear until seeing a real example rather than just reading about it in hypothetical terms).

I'm not sure the acceptance testing chapter accomplished for me what it set out to. After seeing all of the work and "glue code" required to get the business users the ability to write tests, I wondered if it might be time better spent getting them to write use case documents and having the developers write WatiN tests to associate with those documents. (Of course, in thinking that, maybe I missed the point.)

CHAPTER 7: MANUAL TESTING

This chapter talks about the things to look for in manual testing - usability, documentation, error messages - as well as scenarios you might look for - session timeouts, disconnected/down services, network issues, etc. It provides a few tools that can help you in manual testing and explains how to document manual test cases. It's not a long chapter, but it's nice to formalize some of this stuff, or at least give teams a place to start discussing. "Manual testing" isn't just "jump in and start clicking buttons."

CHAPTER 8: PERFORMANCE TESTING

Of all the chapters in the book, this one was my favorite. It starts off by giving a high-level description of what performance testing is and then it dives right in. There is some great guidance on establishing baselines and expectations as well as capturing requirements. It gives you a lot to think about and discuss with your customers around performance and gives a good set of questions to ask about it.

They provide a great list of tools you can use to measure performance and shows a sample run of each one. I was really happy with this bit because it was like having someone evaluate all of these tools for you, show you the outputs, and help you decide which one you like best. Really helpful.

They outline the components of a performance test environment and explain some of the relevant performance counters you should watch when running tests and what they mean.

Finally, they correlate performance testing with capacity planning so you can take the numbers you record and start figuring out what kind of resources you'll need to address your site's target audience.

CHAPTER 9: ACCESSIBILITY TESTING

Right after the chapter on performance testing, this was my next favorite chapter. There's a nice "accessibility mythbusters" section to disprove common misconceptions about accessibility and the web and a good discussion about the benefits of making your site accessible.

One of the nice bits about this chapter is that they take the time to discuss a few of the disabilities that people visiting your site might have and then provide simulated screen shots showing what users with these disabilities might be seeing. (Granted, the book is printed in black and white so the screen shots showing "color blindness" are less than effective, but the rest are good.)

They talk about several things you might see in web sites - images, graphs, forms, lists - and how to make them accessible. They also talk about other things to look for like acronym usage and CAPTCHA and how those aren't accessible. While they touch briefly on audio/visual media, not much help is offered beyond descriptions of what you could possibly do (not how to do it). Same thing with JavaScript - they talk a bit about what to do and what not to do, but don't really show any examples.

There is a great list of links to different web accessibility standards, not just for the US but for countries around the world. There's also a good list of tools you can use to help you test your site's accessibility and they do a bit of a walkthrough using these tools to test their sample web site.

CHAPTER 10: SECURITY TESTING

This chapter starts out explaining some common security terminology and then dives into selling you the benefits of security testing. It's unfortunate that anyone should have to be convinced to test their app for security, but if you have to get some time allocated from management, this is a decent list of things you can discuss.

Just like in the accessibility testing chapter, there is a list of links to related standards for security and compliance here as well as a list of places to go (like OWASP) for some guidance.

The bulk of the chapter focuses on the OWASP Top 10 vulnerabilities and walks you through an example of testing for each. This is the most valuable part of the chapter and if you've ever heard of, say, "SQL injection" but you're not sure what it looks like, this is really good.

There is a section about how to assess and report vulnerabilities in your application which is really good for communicating risk and helping manage that for your project.

Finally, there's a list of security-related testing tools... but there isn't really a description of them or any example usage, just a list of URL links. This felt like a bit of missed opportunity here, or maybe a last-minute addition.

GENERAL THOUGHTS

There were a ton of spelling and grammar mistakes through the book, enough that it was a little distracting. I sort of wondered if the editor was asleep at the wheel. It didn't make the book unreadable, but it does feel like a bump in an otherwise reasonably smooth ride.

Also, while many of the topics were really good, there were things I felt that belonged but were jammed in the wrong spots. For example, the discussion about design patterns that gets stuck in the middle of the TDD chapter may have felt better in the chapter before it about design.

Finally, there were lots of good tool lists, good links to related sites... it'd have been nice to see those recapped in appendices at the end so you don't have to hunt them down later in the middle of the book.

IN THE END? RECOMMENDED.

Despite some of the rough edges, I haven't seen a book before that captures all of this information in one place. I know it's earned a place on my shelf. If you're looking for a book on testing ASP.NET web apps, this is one to consider.

Not Just for Testers
This book is a great introduction to testing ASP.NET web applications, from unit testing through acceptance testing.It's not just for the QA department, though.It includes a great introduction to the SOLID programming principles and demonstrates how they help create code that is not just testable, but flexible and extensible, too.I recommend it to anyone getting using ASP.NET, especially those getting started with ASP.NET MVC.It will likely introduce you to tools and testing methods you didn't even know existed.

The only reason I didn't give it five stars is that it contains a few too many typos and odd sentences.A couple of times a chapter, I'd run across a sentence that just didn't make sense.Fortunately, it never took away from the rest of the content, but it was a bit of a sticking point.

Also, the code was written against an early version of ASP.NET MVC.It may be a bit hard for MVC newbies to get it working.One of the authors has updated the code and posted it at [...], so check that out if you're having trouble.

Worst Wrox book I've ever purchased
Shame on me for buying this book! Over the years, I have become accustomed to reaching for the large red-covered Wrox books. To me, it had always meant quality. I don't like making mistakes. This one cost me $40. ... Read more

Product Description
Ajax has the power to revolutionize the way web-based applications are designed. This book provides you with a thorough working knowledge of what Ajax has to offer and how to take full advantage of it in your application development.


Following an exploration of how Ajax works with .NET, you'll get acquainted with DHTML, the role of JavaScript and the Document Object Model, and the XMLHttpRequest Object, which is the foundation of Ajax. Then you will examine the Ajax-type features built into ASP.NET and explore the Ajax.NET Professional Library in detail. Finally, you will explore client scripting as well as building and using controls with Microsoft's Atlas. With an entire chapter devoted to debugging, you will have all you need to use this cutting-edge technology.

What you will learn from this book
* What you can do with the open source Ajax.NET Professional Library
* How to use the corresponding functionality, Asynchronous Client Script Callbacks, that comes with ASP.NET 2.0
* Techniques for using the XMLHttpRequest Object to communicate between the client web browser and the server
* An overview of XML, XSLT, and other ways to send data between client and server
* How to integrate Microsoft's Atlas with many of the services available in ASP.NET 2.0

Who this book is for

This book is for programmers who use ASP.NET and are just starting to use Ajax technologies to create more responsive, modern applications.

Wrox Beginning guides are crafted to make learning programming languages and technologies easier than you think, providing a structured, tutorial format that will guide you through all the techniques involved. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Good starter
This book did just what I needed it to. It got me caught up on Ajax and ASP.Net using C#. I typically develop backoffice code and have not kept up on a lot of web development. This brought me up to speed and gave me some further references to check out.

Get Under the Hood or Jump Right In
Wrox continues to produce pragmatic books.This book is very traditional in its approach.It starts with a history of Ajax and goes quickly into describing how Ajax works (under the hood).I am a HUGE proponent of knowing how things work, even if there is a framework around it.As such, I really like this book's approach.

Building on the foundation of the basics, the book describes the frameworks for implementing Ajax.It focuses (obviously) on the ASP.NET implementations called "Atlas" (now simply referred to as Asp.Net Ajax).The book does cover other frameworks as well.

I recommend this book for learning about Ajax under the hood.It will be beneficial whether or not you work in .NET.The book is not very big and if you are looking for an understanding of the inner workings of client-side XML and JavaScript then this book is for you.

This is a great AJAX starter book.
GREAT INTRODUCTION to implementing custom AJAX solutions.
Starts with a detailed review of some of the technologies used in AJAX; CSS and Javascript in particular. The intro alone is likely to increase your coding efficiency for these technologies.

The book then goes on to give the nuts and bolts for creating roll-your-own AJAX scripts that are not locked into a specific vendor tool. By understanding these basics you can realize what some of the vendors are providing in way of RAD tools. While the design tools offer a developer great productivity gains, old-school developers will appreciate knowing the under the hood mechanics.

AWESOME.

Best AJAX book, period!
Not only have I learned lots of AJAX but also many other aspects of ASP.NET programming. This is a readable book unlike many tech books. Very well done with very good language.

I say it is readable, but it has also served me well for reference back to various subjects around JavaScript and other ASP.NET aspects which I felt were well explained here.

What I also like are the "Try it now" sections where you can get some immediate instruction in an instant. The website behind the book is also a good resource... with the code they talk to.

The book is well structured and explains 200-300 level material in 100 level terms yet with a conciseness that eludes more authors. I mean to say that I see presentations constantly at local Users Groups that do the same - well done - but they go past the 2hr mark - where Wally can put the knowledge in your brain in a short short instead of a long wind.

I mean lots of stuff you may not get in the 10000 page reference books which only skim the surface. This book gets to the nitty gritty and in a very well laid out way, easy to "get".

"Get more Wally" is what I say!

Dan

Feels like it was thrown together
This book feels like it was thrown together quickly to cash in on the Ajax craze. The various chapters don't really flow together that well. It seems like they were written independently and then they threw in "For more information on see chapter ". Some of the chapters were pretty good for getting started, like the stuff about XMLHttpRequest. But others lacked enough information to be useful on their own (like the one on XPATH and XSLT). The book may be useful to get a survey of a bunch of the technologies behind Ajax and how to use Asp.net, but I don't think this book will stand the test of time. ... Read more

Product Description

• Eight minibooks cover ASP.NET basics, Web controls, using HTML and ASP, C#, Visual Basic, database programming, using the .NET Framework, and advanced ASP.NET 2 (including themes, custom server controls, and Web parts)
• The ideal resource for Web programming newcomers as well as the 1.5 million existing ASP developers who want a complete ready-reference that covers the new ASP.NET 2 updates
• More than double the size of ASP.NET 2 For Dummies (0-7645-7907-X), the latest edition of the bestselling ASP beginner book that boasts combined sales of more than 100,000 copies across all editions
• Written by veteran Dummies author Doug Lowe, who is renowned for his ability to explain complex topics in plain English

Customer Reviews (5)

I would avoid this book.Tries to cover every topic, but not enough details
They give you an introduction to just about every thing you can think of in ASP.NET.The big problem though is the chapters do not give nearly enough details.They give you an overview, maybe 1-2 very simple examples, and that's it!If you are creating a web app for business purposes you will surely encounter many ASP issues that are NOT addressed in this book. In the end, you will end up buying 2-3 more books to make up for the lack of details in this one, therefore I would advise to pass on this book.

Very Easy to Understand - Humoristic Writing
Very well organized book for starter.

Reason giving only 4 stars is while the first few chapters has both C# and VB source codes, when it gets to later advanced topics, only VB codes are available.

Pretty good All in one Reference
I have to say I'm rating this product without completly reading the whole thing, that said... I can say the book is a real useful tool to introduce you into the basics of dotNET programing.

I've programming in VBscript (ASP) pages for years, and I've been meaning to start with the dotNET stuff for quite a bit now. This book is writen in the same way as all for dummies books, very easy to follow, and very straight forward, however it's exactly about what the title says: a reference.

To actually learn dotNET programming from zero, you have to learn a hell of a lot of stuff! Thats why this book is so good. If you have never programmed before and want to jump in to the dotNET world, this book provides you with the basics of almost everything you need. BUT this is the thing: You will be a bit confused if you don't know any programming at all and you start reading from the beggining, for its been perfect so far, but for newbies I guess it would be confussing soyou will findyour self skipping to later chapters to get some introduction into HTML or Visual basic.net or C#. The book will save you a lot of time and money if you have some basic knowledge of HTML and server side programming, but if you none at all I would start with the Visual Basic or C# part, or even HTML if you need it.

So the conclusion is It's a very useful compilation of 8 books that you would normally buy separatly if you had NOOO IDEA at all of developping websites with programming languajes. If you have some basic knowledge you will probably not read all of it, but hey! its a reference book for dummies! So as I said, pretty good buy and very complete. Of course you will need to get other docummentation in order to get a higher knowledge of decent dotNET programming.

One thing i noticed is that the main code examples are in both languajes C# and VB.net but sometimes it only mentions the C# cases, so it seems its more focused to this languaje.

Very Impressed
My company throws different projects in my lap and I have to scramble to learn new technology in order to meet the deadline.
I was very impressed on how this book helped set up things I needed in Asp.net.
Easy to find things and very easy to follow with plain explanations.
ANd, with C++ and VB reference, I was very pleased.
It might not have ALL the answers, but no book ever does.
As a beginner, I was very pleased.

good compilation
Saved me some money combining several books.Easy to read and understand. ... Read more

Product Description
Excel 2007 VBA Programming with XML and ASP offers a hands-on approach for those looking to extend and customize Excel functionality. From recording a simple macro and writing VBA code to working with XML documents and using ASP to access and display data, this book takes you on a programming journey that will change the way you work with Excel!Learn how to: Automate spreadsheet tasks with macros. Write VBA code to program PivotTables, generate charts, build dialog boxes, and customize the Ribbon. Handle errors and debug programs. Create hyperlinks and publish HTML files. Retrieve data from the web directly into Excel. Develop and manipulate smart tags using XML. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Excellent Resource for VBA programming involving XML
This book is an excellect resource for those people trying to expand their capability in programming in Excel VBA when it involves manipulating XML. ... Read more

Product Description

Pro ASP.NET 2.0 E-Commerce in C# 2005 takes you through the e-commerce web application development cycle, from conception to coding to deployment and maintenance. It will also help you maximize your potential profits, learn what risks are involved, and take the necessary steps to minimize those risks. The book begins by introducing e-commerce systems and lays out the toolset. To help you learn about meeting and overcoming real-world challenges, the book features a case study of a fictional company, Little Italy Vineyards.

Customer Reviews (11)

create pro quality ecommerce site with ASP.NET 2.0
I agree with the editor that using this book you wil be able to create
professional quality e-commerce sites with ASP.NET 2.0 Webforms from start to finish

Excellent C# E-Commerce Book
The author did a wonderful job of showing how to build a fully-functional, e-commerce website in C#.I would recommend this to anyone who wants to learn how to build an e-commerce site from scratch.When I have my computer on, [...]
I wish Paul Sarknas well for taking the time to write a book like this.
[...]

Practical.
The content is well-presented in a logical fashion, it's examples are useful and re-usable. The author doesn't makes use of a few things that are beyond the scope of in-depth discussion within the book (such as MS DB Helper) but he gives sufficient information to use and understand these elements.
The code is occasionally illogical (to me) in its layout. For example the declaration of public class variables being left to the end of a file may lead a total novice to wonder why intelisense is having difficulty with their code. I suspect this is a quite likely occurence as the book comes across as a learn-as-you-go affair.

Some development steps are occasionally overlooked, such as instructing the reader to add certain references to their class libraries (done at some points but not others), and the book has some fairly serious coding typos. I shan't hold these points against it too heavily as it makes the reader think more carefully about what they're doing rather than letting them copy verbatim and switch off.

I especially like the "How it works" paragraphs on pretty much every bit of code. Most of it's pretty obvious, but as with any coding project (especially 3-tier architecture) there are times when it becomes complicated enough to overwhelm the reader, I found these sections really hold the book together and keep me on track with what's going on and why.

Also worth a mention is the use of the Paypal API. I haven't the cause to make use of it myself, but having read through it, I'd thoroughly recommend this book to anyone considering using Paypal services on any level.

Lastly, I'm also the the not-so-proud owner of "Beginning ASP.NET 2.0 in C# 2005: From Novice to Professional (Beginning: From Novice to Professional)" by Matthew MacDonald. If you have any intentions of making a working commerce website, and you're thinking, "which of these titles is best for me, I'm only a novice?": Go for Sarkansas. He will make you a professional. If you take the MacDonald option you will be a novice forever.

Good concept, but flawed in execution
Picked up this book and was rather excited to build a function, sample, website that I could use as a baseline e-commerce site for practical use and as a demonstration site.While Paul Sarknas's book demonstrates good design concepts, the document is fundamentally flawed in execution.The code in the book is buggy, and in fact does not match the code that can be downloaded (for free) from Apress. I've spent more time debugging the code that I have reading the book.To add to the problems getting this web site running the code in the book, evening including the downloaded code, is incomplete.One must write a couple of SQL stored procedures from scratch without any clear clue as to what they are supposed to do.

As a side note here, don't deploy this code in a production environment without some significant code hardening.There is virtually no input validation and as written is vulnerable to cross site scripting (XXS) attacks.

Overall I appreciate the attempt here, but recommend that you wait for version 1.1 (perhaps an update for VS 2008?) before buying this book.Simply stated this book is not for beginners and will not result in an operable web site in its current form.

Recommended
I wanted to get up to speed quickly on ASP web apps and e-commerce so I bought this book for it's tutorial value.

It's a very easy read; succinct and well organized.No goofy jokes or silly icon symbols.Treatments of requirements gathering and UML are so light they're nearly useless.However, the book is a case study and tutorial, not a treatise on a particular discipline.

I rate it 4, because it's BLOATED with HTML and C# code.But, no need to type it, since it's available on-line.OTOH, its inclusion is a quicker reference than digging around on disc.

Looks like a very good choice for following a complete project and learing the essentials of ASP.NET 2.0 E-commerce. ... Read more

Product Description
Discover how to use ASP.NET to build, deploy, and run 10 distributed Web applications that can target any browser on any device
ASP.NET provides developers with the functionality they need to create enterprise-level Web applications. This book clearly shows them how to use this framework to create the top ten enterprise applications that they will need for their organizations. To build these applications, Smith explains how to combine the functionality of ASP.NET with products and technologies such as VB.NET, C#, ADO.NET, SQL Server 2000, WAP, XML, HTML, JavaScript, and Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). The projects include an address book application, a contact manager application, advertising manager, online store, and a Web log analyzer
CD-ROM includes the complete source code for the ten projects, additional resource links, corrections, and FAQs.
Companion Web site features a working version of the ten projects built in the book.
Microsoft Technologies
.NET Platform: The next big overhaul to Microsoft's technologies that will bring enterprise distributed computing to the next level by fully integrating the Internet into the development platform. This will allow interaction between any machine, on any platform, and on any device.
Visual Basic.NET: The update to this popular visual programming language will offer greater Web functionality, more sophisticated object-oriented language features, links to Microsoft's new common runtime, and a new interface.
ASP.NET: A programming framework (formerly known as Active Server Pages) for building powerful Web-based enterprise applications; can be programmed using VB.NET or C#.
C#: Microsoft's new truly object-oriented programming language that builds on the strengths of C++ and the ease of Visual Basic; promises to give Sun's Java a run for its money. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (15)

Errors, expose to hackers
First of all, the book is full of errors. I can tell right from Project1.No need to read further.

Second of all, the code is poorly written.
For example, on Project1, if you move your mouse over Update and Delete hyperlinks on the page that displays all the contacts, you would see the actual IDs that you created in your database at the bottom along with the pages that willt ake you to if you click the links .This will allow the hackers to target easily to your webpage and database.The author should get more professional skills before he decides to write a book. Waste of my money and time.

update the website!
might be 4 stars if the proper code updates were placed on the website.

Real Projects & Solid Code
The projects are hosted on the internet at www.10ProjectsWithASP.net and they work well.
But you better make sure the book you buy has a CD in it because you cannot download the code online. That is extremely bogus in my case because I bought a used book at amazon marketplace and the seller said it was with a CD and that was a lie. smoky mtn books if you are curious who it was.
Otherwise the projects are really useful, real world projects.

very disappointed!!!
this book contains lots of errors. The author even don't care to upload the correct codes to his website.

Good in spite of the errors
I considered many books before choosing this one because it had an approach which fit the way that I learn.
I'll be reviewing some of the projects many times to understand the method behind the design of the projects.
Unfortunately, some of the projects were simply unfinished, or had problems that would prevent them from working correctly.
It's still worth it -- there's a lot here. ... Read more

Product Description
Learn to use Devexpress ASP.NET controls, and get $250 worth of controls included with the book

Devexpress is a leading supplier of ASP.NET controls - the addins used in ASP.NET sites. Not only does this book show you how to make the most of them with Silverlight and Ajax, reporting, calendars, editors, and charts, but you also get actual controls worth $250 on the CD-ROM included with the book.

Regardless of your level of ASP.NET expertise, this complete reference will show you how to implement many award-winning and useful controls into your ASP.NET applications. Controls save time and effort as well as adding functionality, and this book helps you take full advantage of what they offer.

• Devexpress is a leading vendor for ASP.NET controls that developers can use to add features, accomplish difficult tasks, and save development and testing time
• This book addresses the all-important use of controls for Silverlight and Ajax, as well as classic essentials like reporting, editors, calendars, and charts
• Covered controls include reports and charts, HTML editors, menus and treeviews, gridview, and many more
• Explains when and where to use controls and how to add functionality without additional development
• CD-ROM includes $250 worth of Devexpress controls ready for you to use right away

With Professional DevExpress ASP.NET Controls, you'll be a step ahead in developing powerful ASP.NET applications.

Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Not bad
One of my biggest complaints about DevExpress was their lack of good documentation for their products. In the last couple of years, they've come a long way towards improving that. The problem with this book is it is already outdated if you stay up to date with the latest DevExpress releases. It's not a bad book, but with the now acceptable online documentation, knowledge base and tutorials, it's almost not worth buying.

Decent book, but misleading
The book itself is decent.It includes some good examples on using DevExpress ASP.NET controls.However, only a portion of the book is useful unless you purchase the full control suite.For example there are chapters devoted to the ASPxDataGrid and the ASPxHTMLEditor.The CD only includes a trial of these controls.The controls that are included are freely available on the DevExpress site, so you really aren't getting "over $249 of controls". The amazon description also mentions the Silverlight Menu and Grid controls.This book does not even mention these controls anywhere that I could see.
Don't get me wrong, I really do think DevExpress has some GREAT software products and I have used several of them over the past few years.However the book and included CD are very misleading.

Great resource for new and experienced programmers
I've used DevExpress controls for almost two years for web application programming.This book has made it easy to explore some components and features I've not had time to research on my own.I find the examples to be clear and well-documented with text and screen shots and they come from a good cross-section of tools and capabilities.For example, during the initial skim I came across a code block that answered a report creation question I had intended to submit to tech support.

A programmer new to DevExpress should have no problems following along and the free controls on the included disk are a nice bonus, although there doesn't appear to be anything new on the disk for existing customers.

For me, one of the best and perhaps the most useful of the 14 programming books I've purchased in the last two years. ... Read more

Product Description
If you are familiar with creating HTML web pages but aren't familiar with creating dynamic, data driven web applications, you should consider learning ASP. And Sams Teach Yourself ASP.NET 2.0 in 24 Hours, Complete Starter Kit is the perfect learning tool. The Starter Kit provides the unbeatable combination of programmer/author Scott Mitchell and the step-by-step learning method of the best-selling Sams Teach Yourself series. The accompanying CD includes Visual Web Developer 2005 Express, a lightweight, easy-to-use and easy-to-learn web development tool, and all projects developed in the book's examples. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (25)

Very good "pre-intro" book on ASP.NET
I've read the book from cover to cover and I give the book 4.5/5, which is nearly perfect. The most valueable part about this book is the sample website at the end of the book. Unfortunately the later editions did away with a sample website. Having said that I have to admit most programming books nowadays do not come with a sample project, which is a shame. I read the book twice from cover to cover, and it surely got me started on ASP.NET, a server-side scripting language that has a lot of significance in web programming. ;-)

the book review from AskBargains.com
very nice book, easy to follow. include most basic concept of theASP.NET 2.0

Should be called "Teach Yourself Visual Web Developer"
I'm only about 1/3 of the way through this book (I just finished hour 8) and am already frustrated with it.It seems to be a book all about how to use Visual Web Developer, not about how to program for ASP.NET.It relies completely on the tool to generate all your code, and rarely shows you the resulting VB.NET code, only the HTML that gets generated once you execute it.If you want to learn how to program in the ASP.NET world, you're better off with a book on VB.NET or C#.NET, as this book doesn't cover it well.

UPDATE 7/23/08 - I'm now finished with the book, and my opinion hasn't changed. This book tells you what ASP.NET is capable of doing (and it's capable of a lot of nice things), but if you don't plan on using MS Visual Web Developer, this book will do you no good.It does not show the code that it generates, only the resulting HTML.Also, I tried using several of the programs the MSVWD created, and they were incompatible with our web server configuration.This code appears to be highly configuration dependent, so if you can't control the configuration of your web server (and I can't for the class I'm taking), this book will help you even less.

Perfect How To Book
This is as close as I ever hope to come to a perfect how to do it book.
If you know anything about programming with almost any GUI IDE, this book (alone)will teach you how to build complete, functional, real-life, non-trivial, database, web sites and applications.

It requires no extra purchase. It does have examples for Access mdb files, Microsoft SQL databases and MySQL. Except for Access, the other databases are no-cost free downloads.

It uses and includes the Microsoft Visual Web 2005 Developer IDE.

If you are not familiar with SQL it will get you off to a useful start but you will soon need some additional help there. I recommend Beginning ASP.NET 2.0 Databases by Damien Foggon.

It will not teach a non-programmer anything useful.
It is NOT a "You can" book that tells you what can be done but not how to do it.
It is NOT copied from the help files.
It will not teach you HTML, XML, or any other *ML. It will show them and explain what they are.

Unfortunately ( Its only failing in my opinion. ) it does not show you how to publish the web sites you create. The author would argue that that is a topic for another book and I can't really argue with that opinion.

It does start at the beginning with how to use the IDE. It provides examples of every step required to create complete web based sites/applications with database support. including how to use and customize all the commonly used windows controls. It also includes user access control.

It is especially good for a VB programmer who wants to move from client side applications to web based browser/dot.net applications.

Way to go, Scott!

Good starting point
I don't often review books but I felt I had to on this one. Coming from a classic ASP background I think this book really helped me get my feet wet in ASP.Net 2.0. It had easy to understand examples on using the IDE to accomplish a lot of the common things you would normally do while developing.

Granted, the book does not get deep into best development practices or higher level concepts such as Data Access Layers and different types of databases and methods for accessing them. What it does do, is give you a very good starting point if you've never done any .Net development.

After you absorb this book and understand what you can do, you can move onto a more full featured ASP.Net book that covers a lot more.

I actually emailed the author and asked what book he would recommend next and he pointed me in the right direction. Overall a good book to start with. ... Read more

Product Description
Designed for intermediate Web designers and developers with no previous experience with programming or server-side technology.  Adobe Dreamweaver CS3 with ASP, ColdFusion and PHP: Training from the Source has been fully-updated, not just for the latest version of Dreamweaver but for today's Web. It's now standards--compliant, with a site created using one of Dreamweaver's brand-new CSS templates, that includes Ajax elements in the dynamic site design. Users ready to take the next step and make their Web sites interactive will find the same easy-to-read, logical, well-constructed projects, but with a site based on the latest Web technology. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

Timely shipping...
I paid for the most basic shipping and it still got here in a timely manner. The product was in the condition described by the seller. I would definitely use this seller again.

Adobe Dreamweaver CS3 with ASP ColdFusion & PHP
If you know the difference between CS3 and 4, then this book is the best deal for you. Its cover says "Training from the Source". You cannot judge a book by the price, a buck plus a quarter, a nickel and 4 pennnies.

very weak
This book could have been way better. It never really discussed the database/PHP portion in much detail. It basically just had you blindly typing in code thru wizards and not explaining enough of what was really happening in the background. If there was anything good about this book, maybe... it is the fact that it introduced me to the great "front-end" dev tool dreamweaver. Other then that, you really need to get a book that teaches you how to hand code PHP/MySql, otherwise you will be totally lost ! Good luck

Just not very good...
Bought this book for a class that taught the subject matter and was sorely disappointed in it.The book was oft times long winded in its discussions and tried to mix too much beginner information into its subject matter to be clearly a book for such a rather advanced subject matter.In the end it felt like I was not given enough training in server side scripting and like I wasted time and money on the class and the book.

I hate to say this, but there are better books out there that can cover the subject matter, for instance I've already started work on David Powers' The Essential Guide to Dreamweaver CS3 with CSS, Ajax, and PHP and easily feel like I'm getting my money's worth.

Very Helpful Book Except......
Adobe Dreamweaver CS3 with ASP, ColdFusion, and PHP: Training from the Source

I've used other Jeff Bardzell books before and found them very good for beginning code.

The latest edition, covers Spry somewhat, which is helpful. And, as in the previous edition, Bardzell conducts tutorials to build an application in ASP, ColdFusion, and PHPfor the fictious company Newland Tours.

However, there are abundant code typos, which can be very difficult for beginners. The book should have an errata site/blog somewhere; this is a major disappointment in this new edition.

Guido T. Sarducci ... Read more

Product Description

As the Internet user experience (UX) progresses, more users are demanding and expecting their custom-built business applications to provide the same UX that they see on the Internet every day. ASP.NET 3.5 AJAX Unleashed empowers ASP.NET developers to easily provide this type of experience with minimal code. Author Rob Foster has built AJAX-enabled web applications for a number of major corporations and uses the experience he has gained there to explain concisely, clearly, and completely what ASP.NET developers need to learn to start taking advantage of the rich opportunities made possible by ASP.NET AJAX.

• Learn ASP.NET AJAX by working with real-world examples
• Use the ScriptManager and ScriptManagerProxy controls in your ASP.NET AJAX-enabled applications
• Leverage the ASP.NET AJAX client-side API to maximize the flexibility of ASP.NET AJAX
• Build applications that use the UpdatePanel and Timer controls
• Use the ASP.NET AJAX Control Toolkit to provide rich AJAX functionality to your web applications
• Build ASP.NET AJAX-enabled extender controls
• Integrate ASP.NET AJAX and .NET 3.5 with Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007
• Create ASP.NET AJAX-enabled Windows Vista Gadgets
• Learn advanced AJAX concepts such as JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) and WCF Web services

Introduction     1

Part I Introduction

Chapter 1 Introduction to AJAX Technologies     5

 AJAX and Web 2.0     6

 Why Use AJAX?      7

 AJAX Rationale     7

 AJAX: An Example     8

 The XMLHttpRequest Object     8

 A Simple AJAX Library     10

 Using the AJAX Library     14

 Summary     20

Chapter 2 Introduction to ASP.NET AJAX     21

 Introducing the Visual Studio Controls     22

 ScriptManager     22

 ScriptManagerProxy     23

 Timer     23

 UpdatePanel     23

 UpdateProgress     23

 Introducing the Visual Studio Projects and Web Site Items     24

 Projects     24

 Web Site Items     25

 Introducing the AJAX Control Toolkit     26

 Summary     27

Part II Working with ASP.NET 3.5 AJAX

Chapter 3 The ScriptManager and ScriptManagerProxy Controls     31

 About the ScriptManager Control.      31

 ScriptManager Properties, Methods, and Events     34

 JavaScript Proxy Classes for Web Services     37

 Partial-Page Rendering     43

 Summary     47

Chapter 4 The ASP.NET AJAX Client API     49

 The Namespaces     49

 Global     49

 Sys     52

 Sys.Net     53

 Sys.Serialization     54

 Sys.Services     62

 Sys.UI     66

 Sys.WebForms     68

 Summary     71

Chapter 5 The UpdatePanel and Timer Controls     73

 About the UpdatePanel Control     73

 Using the UpdatePanel Control     74

 Advanced Features of the UpdatePanel Control     78

 Triggers     78

 Multiple UpdatePanel Controls on a Single Page     81

 The Timer Control     89

 Using the Timer Control with Partial-Page Rendering     90

 Summary     92

Chapter 6 Advanced Techniques with the ASP.NET AJAX PageRequestManager Object     93

 Using the PageRequestManager Object     93

 A Practical Example of the PageRequestManager Object     95

 Summary     100

Chapter 7 Using the ASP.NET AJAX Control Toolkit     101

 ASP.NET AJAX Control Toolkit: The Controls     102

 Using Controls in the ASP.NET AJAX Control Toolkit     105

 Configuring Visual Studio to Use the Toolkit     105

 The Accordion and AccordionPane Controls     106

 The CalendarExtender Control     110

 The CollapsiblePanelExtender Control     112

 The ConfirmButtonExtender Control     118

 The DragPanelExtender Control     120

 The DropDownExtender Control     122

 The FilteredTextBoxExtender Control     125

 The HoverMenuExtender Control     127

 The TextBoxWatermarkExtender Control     130

 ASP.NET AJAX Control Toolkit: A Practical Example     134

 Using the ASP.NET AJAX Control Toolkit with Microsoft Expression Web     145

 Configuring Expression Web for the ASP.NET AJAX

 Control Toolkit     145

 Summary      150

Chapter 8 Building an ASP.NET AJAX Extender Control     151

 Add ASP.NET Controls     151

 How to Build an Extender Control     154

 Server-Side Code     156

 Client-Side Code     159

 Summary     163

Chapter 9 ASP.NET AJAX and SharePoint 2007     165

 SharePoint and AJAX     165

 Modifying Web.Config     166

 Developing an AJAX-Based SharePoint Web Part     171

 Summary     177

Chapter 10 Creating ASP.NET AJAX-Enabled Vista Sidebar Gadgets     179

 Vista Sidebar Gadgets     179

 Creating the Gadget     181

 Create the Web Service     181

 Generate the JavaScript Proxy     183

 Create the Vista Gadget     186

 Test the Gadget     187

 Summary     188

Part III Appendices

Appendix A Microsoft Expression Web 191

 An Introduction to the Expression Web Interface     191

 Creating Web Pages and Web Sites     191

 Customizable Interface     194

 Creating Standards-Based Web Sites      198... ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

Real good book
this book is what I was looking for, even though I have experience with Ajax toolkit, it is refreshing to see how things works

Not so useful for dotnet or web programmers
For my purposes as a dotnet (C# ASPX) programmer, this was very disappointing. Maybe useful for very advanced programmers but not useful for beginners or intermediate coders.The coverage of dotnet issues is absolutely minimal.He does not even bother to cover cascadingdropdowns, which are useful in many applications.Very little useful coverage of database hookups and almost nothing about SQL Server or dataobjects.And why is Sharepoint covered here? I think he ran out of steam.

As far as the other reviews, I find it difficult to believe any of them actually used this book as a coding reference, a tutorial, or a guide.Compare this book to Walther's ASP.NET 3.5 Unleased, which is absolutely crammed full of sample code and detailed hints, tips, and explanations. AJAX is vital stuff, so please, will someone write a complete guide to AJAX in the dotnet world?Please!

Great read but not that helpful
It gives what Ajax can do for me. However if I decide to open Visual studio and make use of some controls then I have a hard time to do so. I was interested in the topic to Ajaxify SharePoint however the codeplex project ajaxify sharepoint solved all my questions and hence I ended up skipping this chapter.

I found it to be a great Ajax review book but not useful from a developer point of view

Best concise guide to ASP.NET 3.5 Ajax out there
This book is not for people who have no experience with ASP.NET. Rather, if you are a seasoned pro at building Postback-style ASP.NET applications but you want to make your apps more interactive, more responsive, and overall bring them up to par with the rest of the web - this is the book for you.

This book provides clear, concise explanations for what Ajax is and how it is implemented and made available for developers within ASP.NET 3.5. When you're done reading this book you will be able to do more than just make some pieces of your page refresh without postback, you'll be able to fully consume JSON services, dynamically re-render pieces of your page on the fly, implement client-side paging, querying, updating - and much more.

The bottom line is if you build commercial-quality ASP.NET applications and you want them to be clean, crisp, highly responsive, and up-to-date, you need this book.

Good intro to AJAX for ASP.NET; examples were difficult to reproduce
I read this because the ASP.NET 3.5 MCTS Training Kit will not be released until April, and I want to take the test before then.

I found the examples to be rather difficult to repeat, as information was often left out that would be necessary to get them to work properly. ... Read more

Product Description
The ASP.NET 2.0 Framework introduced web developers to dozens of new server controls and components, and a greatly expanded and easier structure for writing their own server controls and components. Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Server Control and Component Development covers the breadth of server control functionality as well as the rest of the membership, role management, SchemaImporterExtension, and so on – the functionality referred to as components. Written for the experienced ASP.NET developer, Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Server Control and Component Development will show you how to write your first sever control or custom component.

The step-by-step coverage drills down to the details of the extensible part of the ASP.NET 2.0 Framework that you need to extend to write the specified type of custom control or component. Rather than present the extensible part as a black box, it presents a detailed step-by-step approach to implement functional replica of the extensible part, discusses the replica’s code in detail, and provides an in-depth coverage of the techniques, tools, and technologies used in the code. From there you get a detailed practical recipe for developing the specified type of custom control or component and book then uses the recipe to implement one or more real-world custom controls or components of the specified type that you can use in your own Web applications.

Some of the many types of controls and components you'll learn to build are:

• Ajax-enabled controls and components: four chapters on Ajax discuss and use Ajax patterns, ASP.NET 2.0 client callback mechanism, CSS, DOM, XML, and JavaScript to implement a number of Ajax-enabled controls and components.
• Web Parts: four chapters on Web Parts in ASP.NET 2.0 develop a number of custom WebPart, EditorPart, CatalogPart, WebPartZone, WebPartChrome, WebPartVerb, WebPartManager, and data-bound WebPart controls.
• 5 chapters on ASP.NET 2.0 security, membership, and role management components
• 5 chapters on ASP.NET 2.0 tabular and hierarchical data source controls and custom Parameter components
• 4 chapters on ASP.NET 2.0 tabular data-bound controls and data control fields
• Developing controls and components that can access any type of data store and automate all their data operations such as Delete, Update, Insert, and Sort.
• XML Web service, WSDL, Google XML Web service API, SchemaImporterExtension, ISerializable, and CodeDom
• XmlReader, XmlWriter, XPathNavigator, DOM, and XmlResolver
• Provider-Based Services including how to implement a RSS service provider that can feed RSS from any type of data store such as SQL Server, file system, Web services, and so on
• HTTP modules, HTTP handler factories, HTTP handlers, and control builders including developing an HTTP module and an HTTP handler factory that perform URL rewriting and an HTTP handler that generates RSS feeds
• User controls and composite and templated custom controls
• State management and custom type converters.
• Events, IPostBackEventHandler, IPostBackDataHandler, and Page lifecycle

This book is also available as part of the 5-book ASP.NET 2.0 Wrox Box (ISBN: 0-470-11757-5). This 5-book set includes:

• Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Special Edition (ISBN: 0-470-04178-1)
• ASP.NET 2.0 Website Programming: Problem - Design - Solution (ISBN: 0764584642 )
• Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Security, Membership, and Role Management (ISBN: 0764596985)
• Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Server Control and Component Development (ISBN: 0471793507)
• ASP.NET 2.0 MVP Hacks and Tips (ISBN: 0764597663)
• CD-ROM with more than 1000 pages of bonus chapters from 15 other .NET 2.0 and SQL Server(TM) 2005 Wrox books
• DVD with 180-day trial version of Microsoft(r) Visual Studio(r) 2005 Professional Edition

Customer Reviews (10)

Is he paid by the page?
This book is simply a pain to read. The author spends page after page explaining (and re-explaining) the most trivial things, which makes it impossible to get a proper overview of the subject. Conciseness is one of the most important aspects of writing, and this author certainly does not master that skill.

best resource for developing custom server controls
I agree 100% with Terry Hutt's review:

"Server controls are a very complex and potentially confusing subject.
I can grasp some concepts that other authors were unable to explain clearly. "

"If you are interested in developing custom server controls, which you should be, then this is the best resource you can have on your bookshelf. All ambitious ASP.NET developers should own this book. "

Prepare to write your own book
While this book has some valuable content, prepare to do a lot of research. By the time you get through this book, you will have researched so much more than what this book purports to teach and you will be able to write your own book on the subject.

In the Introduction to the book, Wrox Press' standard boiler-plate text states "As you work through the examples in this book, you may choose either to type in all the code manually or to use the source code files that accompany this book" (pg. xxxiv). Well, prepare to download the source code. Half the code is missing from the book. The code snippets that are shown are missing vital pieces, such as attributes that are necessary to make it work. The code that is available is often incorrect or doesn't match up with the book anyway.

In short, you will learn things from this book, but it will take a lot more effort than just reading this book and working through the examples. It would make a good reference book for those times when you need a quick answer. Try to find this book for more than 50% off, because it's not worth even that much.

[Added 2008-07-26]
Well, I'm only at Chapter 13, after having reworked the examples again and again from chapters 1 through 8. That's because the code samples in the book and the source code available from Wrox's web site are so poor.

In addition, I would like to go on record and say that the editors of this book did an absolutely horrible job. The author has a hard enough time trying to get his ideas across and often can't see the forest for the trees. It's the editor's job to bring the author's thoughts into clarity and focus and conciseness. This book has none of that. It makes for incredibly difficult reading.

The index is horrible and references the examples directly, instead of the concepts being taught as they relate to the .NET Framework and ASP.NET. How am I supposed to find something quickly with that index? Consequently, my original suggestion that this would be a good reference book is only half-true—providing you can find what you need, it's a good reference book. As one reviewer noted, however, many examples rely upon earlier examples; and I agree with the reviewer that each concept, perhaps, should have used a different example to make that one concept more concrete.

One other important factor comes back to the code provided for download. It's horribly written. I, for one, like to have my methods and properties and other constructs grouped together in one spot within my classes. In addition, I like to have the properties and methods and other constructs listed alphabetically. This aids in being able to quickly find code constructs within the file while scrolling around. It also just makes for neater code. Shouldn't professional (writing) programmers be practicing what they teach about writing neat code? This code would never pass a "code review" at any professional development organization. (This is partly the author's fault, but the code reviewer for the book had every opportunity to tell the author to clean it up or clean it up him/herself.)

Again, nothing against the author in all of this, this is the editor's job. I would definitely reference the credits page to avoid other books with the same Editors and Proofreaders/Indexers.

Like another reviewer said, you will learn from this book, it will just take you an inordinate amount of time and lots and lots of patience!

good coverage, terrible writing style
This book covers topics for which content is difficult to find elsewhere and for that I give it the 3 stars.However, the writing style for the book is terrible.Much of the text reads like lawyer jargon and wastes too much page real estate explaining and re-explaining irrelevant items to the topic at hand. Minus 2 stars for the annoyingly awkward writing style.

Unorganized
This book has some very useful information, but it's poorly organized. In many cases, the most complex possible case is explained, followed by more simple solutions. In many cases, I found myself reading through large amounts of code and descriptions only to find an actual explanation of what was going on many pages later.

It's also very difficult to use as a reference because every example relies on specfic code in the previous examples. In fact, the first several chapters are all rebuilding the exact same control. It would've been much better to see a series of different controls each re-enforcing the text of the chapter. I feel like I'm wasting time learning bad techniques for writing a control only to go back and rewrite them multiple times.

Some people have found this book useful, but it's stumped all 4 of our developers here. ... Read more

Product Description

• This unique book offers readers invaluable information from the cream of the crop-Microsoft MVPs-who are now sharing undocumented hacks for the first time
• Packed with superlative advice on ASP, Microsoft's popular technology for Web sites, this book will help readers become more productive developers, find solutions to problems they thought unsolvable, and develop better applications
• During their many years of working with ASP.NET, Microsoft MVPs have answered thousands of questions, putting them in the distinctive position of knowing exactly what readers need to know
• Many of the hacks will apply to multiple versions of ASP.NET, not just 2.0 but 1.0 and 1.1 as well

This book is also available as part of the 5-book ASP.NET 2.0 Wrox Box (ISBN: 0-470-11757-5). This 5-book set includes:

• Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Special Edition (ISBN: 0-470-04178-1)
• ASP.NET 2.0 Website Programming: Problem - Design - Solution (ISBN: 0764584642 )
• Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Security, Membership, and Role Management (ISBN: 0764596985)
• Professional ASP.NET 2.0 Server Control and Component Development (ISBN: 0471793507)
• ASP.NET 2.0 MVP Hacks and Tips (ISBN: 0764597663)
• CD-ROM with more than 1000 pages of bonus chapters from 15 other .NET 2.0 and SQL Server(TM) 2005 Wrox books
• DVD with 180-day trial version of Microsoft(r) Visual Studio(r) 2005 Professional Edition

Customer Reviews (5)

Tips and Tricks from MVPs
ASP.NET 2.0 MVP Hacks and Tips from WROX is a compilation of tips provided by ASP.NET MVPs David Yack, Joe Mayo, Scott Hanselman, Fredrik Normen, Dan Wahlin, J. Ambrose Little, and Jonathan D. Goodyear. Who better to glean tips from than MVPs!?!?

The book is not not an A-Z C# reference or complete primer for Asp.NET nor is it meant to be. It is exactly what the title says it is, a collection of tips that should help you be more productive in your daily tasks. Because of this the target reader should be familiar with developing web projects using ASP.NET and the ideal reader would be a .NET web developer, either professional or hobbyist. Depending on your experience level and knack for gathering these types of things there some things in the book that you may already know or use, but I bet you will at least learn a thing or two.

Chapter 2, "Getting Started" offers some excellent suggestions for organizing your projects/solutions ,including recommending a base class for your pages. Later chapters on providers, debugging, viewstate, cache and deployment proved to be a good refresher and taught me more than a handful of things I didn't know. Scott Hanselman's chapter on Http Handlers and Modules was outstanding as well. Any reader of his blog will find him/herself right at home.

The book was a pleasure to read and is one of those that will have to remain close by so that I can pick it up and browse through it again from time to time. I believe that every time I read it I will find something new - like watching a favorite movie.

I highly recommend the book to anyone doing ASP.NET development, especially those that are already fans of the authors - like me :)

Little value to this book, surprising for a Wrox title
Wrox titles are usually well written and have a unique everday developer-centric perspective. This title does not live up to that standard.

First of all, they should stop printing books for beta and pre-release versions of products.Much of this book refers to features that have changed since ASP.NET 2.0 went gold.

Second, one section that I had a particular interest in, URL Rewriting, basically gave a three page review of what it is, and referred the user to go to blog to download code and read more about it. This is not what I would expect as a "MVP Hack"

Third, there were very few useful hacks in here.The O'Reilly Cookbook series is SO MUCH better than this.I don't know if there is an O'Reilly ASP.NET 2.0 book, but the authors of this Wrox title should read it and rewrite this book.

Great Ideas for Advanced Sites
"ASP.NET 2.0 MVP Hacks and Tips" isn't really a reference guide or your standard tutorial manual.Rather, it's more like a cookbook - "here are some interesting things you can do in ASP.NET 2.0 and here's how to do them."

Each chapter in the book covers a topic like "Providers," "HttpHandlers and HttpModules," and "Master Pages" and goes into a few neat things you can do with each.The hacks and descriptions are written in an easy to understand way that makes them simple to adopt for your own purposes.

It's hard to say whether the book will be of help to you or not.As each hack applies to a pretty specific problem being solved, you'd really need to scan the table of contents and see if your application is facing any of these problems or has requirements that touch on any of the areas covered.On the other hand, just scanning through each hack causes you to think about the various ways you can apply what's being described, so there might be some value to you just in the inspiration they bring.

Entry level ASP.NET developers might be helped by looking at the code and learning from it, but the concepts really are more intermediate or advanced level.If you're starting your first ASP.NET site, this is probably not your book; if you have a few under your belt, it could help you out.

While it's not obvious from the title, some of the hacks can be used in ASP.NET 1.1 as well, so for folks not quite up to 2.0, the book still holds some value.

The only downside I really found with the book was the organization.The order of the chapters feels slightly arbitrary, starting with a potpourri chapter that covers a lot of topics, moving into client-side hacks, then server-side, then into deployment and development hacks, back into server-side hacks.If you read from front to back, it makes you wonder why they didn't take two hacks that both deal with the same topic and put them both in the same chapter, or why they didn't centralize all of the control-based hacks, all of the handler/module hacks, etc., into sections of the book closer together.Finally, there's a distinct lack of cross-referencing, which belies the multi-author nature of the book: both chapters 1 and 17 talk about a URL rewriting hack, but neither references the other.It would have been better to put all of the URL rewriting information together, or at least mention in each something like "this topic is also discussed in chapter X."I knocked my rating down a star for poor organization.

Overall it's a pretty good book and offers some interesting ideas for fixes to problems that many intermediate/advanced ASP.NET developers have encountered (or will eventually encounter).A good addition to your bookshelf.

Except for the Name, Very Valuable Stuff
I think there needs to be a new word invented. Hacks or hacking as used in this book title relates to hot shot, sophisticated, creative coding rather than in the bad sense of hacking into someone's system.

The book is written by a series of guys who have been working for years with Microsoft's ASP.NET. They probably started off with ASP.NET on the first version. They've been through each version up to now trying things, working around things, finding ways to make it do what they needed. Being Microsoft MVP's (Microsoft Most Valuable Professionals) the ASP.NET development team listens to them somewhat more than they would listen to the average fellow sending them an e-mail.

Any these guys developed these hacks, or creative solutions, or cool code snippets, or undocumented features and a lot of the ones they developed in earlier versions have made it into the standard code. Here is what they have discovered with ASP.NET 2.0.

This is not a book for beginners, but if you are up to intermediate status here are a bunch of things that will help you make your next project better. These hacks do things that these guys have found desirable. You're likely to find a good idea or two as well.

Want to expand your development skills?
With the word 'Hacks' in the title, this may throw a few people a 'curve' ball, as it were. As explained inside the
well-known Wiley (Wrox) red covers, some people call them 'creative solutions'. Some people call them
Tips and Tricks.In this writer's opinion, 'Creative Solutions' is a much
better name for what's inside. The code explained starts by showing how v2.0 of ASP.Net took some of the 'hacks' or
'creative solutions' for 1.1 and incorporated the obvious needs inside v2.0. Then, the writers take what's given
in v2.0, and extend that much further, finding the 'shortcomings' and extending the possibilities much further.

A few pages in the beginning, along with an entire chapter (16) deals with Master Pages, one of the more colossal
additions to ASP.Net 2.0, and rightly so, having its origins in Paul Wilsons Template pages, back in the 1.x days. Again,
this book takes a quick look at how to build Master pages, along with Content pages, and then shows how to extend
and nest them. But, then, this is only a start.

When reading this book we are taken through the steps of adding client side scripting to GridViews (and much more),
creating your own RSS viewer control, through Cache, Viewstate, Security and Deployment hacks/tips, and finally ends up with HTTP Handlers and Modules.

This book is not a beginner's book, by any means, but it can take an intermediate or even advanced
developer and really help him/her get to the next 'level'. Looking back, it's just as much as an 'eye-opener' type of book. Yes, it shows code and explains how to do a whole lot of new programming, but just as much, it expands your horizons, enabling you to not only see those horizons, but realize then, how to get past them.

If I were to find one fault with the book, it would be that 90% of the code samples in the book are with C#. There are a few
VB.Net samples sprinkled here and there, but coming from a VB.Net development background, I did find this a shortcoming.
However, if that's all that I could findas a 'con', the 'pros' far outweigh them. ... Read more

Product Description

Essential ASP.NET 3.5 Skills--Made Easy!

Learn how to create database-driven ASP.NET 3.5 websites using C# 3.0. ASP.NET 3.5: A Beginner's Guide shows you just what you need to know to build rich Internet applications quickly and easily. You'll find details on Web controls, CSS, event handlers, validation, SQL, ADO.NET, data binding, text files, and security. Coverage of the latest technologies, such as LINQ and Ajax, is also included. All examples use Visual Studio 2008 to ease you through the learning process, and all the source code is displayed. Start building dynamic ASP.NET 3.5 Web applications today with help from this fast-paced tutorial.

Designed for Easy Learning:

• Key Skills & Concepts--Lists of specific skills covered in the chapter
• Ask the Expert--Q&A sections filled with bonus information and helpful tips
• Try This--Hands-on exercises that show how to apply your skills
• Notes--Extra information related to the topic being covered
• Tips--Helpful reminders or alternate ways of doing things
• Annotated Syntax--Example code with commentary that describes the programming techniques being illustrated

Customer Reviews (5)

ASP.NET 3.5: A Beginner's Guide
The book is a good introduction to asp.net, and explains the main concepts without going too deep and putting off the beginner. It will have to be supplemented by more advanced books to get the best out of the technology, but as a starting point it is pretty good.Book was delivered earlier than expected and in perfect condition.

ASP.NET 3.5: A Beginner's Guide
ASP.NET 3.5: A Beginner's Guide is a decent book regarding the basics of ASP.NET.

I chose to read this book as it was a required book for my first college course in learning ASP.NET.The book is a great beginner's guide that covers a variety of topics. Each topic has an example with the code alongside it.I have retyped every example and from what I can tell, each one works. Unfortunately, there are no practice exercises or sections to test what you have learned.The chapters do not go into any notable depth, especially regarding the topics detailed on the front cover.It does give you a basic enough knowledge with which you can, on your own, delve deeper into each topic.

There is a significant amount of spelling/grammatical errors in this book.

Clear, concise, fast read.
I was familiar with ASP (the OLD version - pre ".NET") before reading this book, and I found this an extremely fast, clear, and useful way of bridging the gap to the new language and programming framework.I was literally able to breeze through the book in just a few days.I suspect there might be a bit more ramp-up time involved for someone without a pre-existing computer programming background, but anyone who already knows their way around a web programming language should do very well with this material.I'm a very satisfied customer.

Handy reference
I first got a glance at this book at a local developers meeting by the end of last year. As a veteran ASP developer of more than 10 years of hands-on experience, I found that the author has covered a broad spectrum of latest technologies and recent developments in ASP.NET. Although it's titled as a beginner's guide, I've been using it as a handy reference, whenever I need it during my daily work.

Indeed if you are a novice user of ASP.NET, this book would undoubtedly help you build a solid foundation and gain a deep understanding in this area. However, if you are like me -- an occasional reader -- this book serves perfectly when you need some quick and all-in-one reference (than googling around).

-Review by Lily He, OC.NET User Group member

The best introduction to ASP.NET 3.5
Full disclosure: I was the technical editor for this book.I had the pleasure of working with Mr. Sanders as he wrote this book.

Throughout the months that I worked with Mr. Sanders, I was amazed by the dedication and thoroughness he displayed in writing this book.His knowledge of the subject really comes out in this book and no topic is left untouched.

As you can imagine, I've read this book a number of times.Most that are beginners to the technology will likely do the same.Each time I read the book, I discovered a new item that I missed the times before.

Mr. Sanders put forth a concentrated effort in writing this book and I think as you read it, you'll find evidence of that all over.It was a pleasure to be a small part of such a well crafted presentation of ASP.NET 3.5.If you're evaluating introductory books for ASP.NET 3.5, definitely give this one some consideration. ... Read more

Product Description
Now you can uncover the secrets behind accessing and retrieving data from a wide range of data sources such as SQL Server and XML sources. This book walks you through the array of ADO.NET 2.0 features and clearly shows you how they can be used to develop database-driven web applications in ASP.NET.

You’ll first gain an in-depth understanding of the data source controls that enable data binding in the ASP.NET platform. Next you’ll uncover the advanced features of ASP.NET, including site navigation, implementing sorting and paging, and editing data in templates. You’ll then focus on designing transactions in ADO.NET 2.0, displaying data, and utilizing SQL Server 2005 XML.

Throughout the chapters, you’ll find examples and source code (with ASP.NET examples written in C#) that you can integrate into your applications. This will enable you to leverage ADO.NET and ASP.NET features so you can easily create a scalable N-Tier web site.

Some of the topics covered include:

• ASP.NET 2.0 Data Controls
• Data Binding with the SqlDataSource Control, XML Data, and Objects
• Selecting, Updating, Deleting Records
• Programmatically Creating and Adding Controls
• XSL Transformations with XmlDataSource Control
• Using Generics with the ObjectDataSource Control
• ASP.NET 2.0 Site Navigation including Implementing Breadcrumbs and Binding to Other Controls
• Displaying and Editing Data Using Templates
• GridView Sorting and Paging
• Advanced Data Source and Data-Bound Controls including Master/Detail Display, Displaying Images from a Database, and Using Themes with Data Bound Controls
• Transactions in .NET and Interoperability between System.Transactions and System.EnterpriseServices
• Advanced ADO.NET for ASP.NET Data Display including DataSet Object, ADO.NET 2.0 DataTable, and Provider-Independent Data Access Code
• Accessing Data from SQL Server 2005 including CLR in SQL Server 2005, New XML Features in SQL Server 2005, and Working with XML Data-Typed Columns from ADO.NET
• N-Tier Architecture with ASP.NET 2.0 and SQL Server 2005
• Best Practices for Creating ASP.NET Web Sites including Implementation of CLR Stored Procedures and Implementation of Layers

Customer Reviews (1)

Great ASP.NET 2.0 book for Real Developers
There are many ASP.NET 2.0 books on the market now, but they either come in two categories: The beginner who knows another server-side technology (ASP or PHP or even Java) or the advanced who wants to knows about web services or XML implementations or advanced web architecture.I have not found a book that is a solid intermediate ASP.NET 2.0 book on teaching the reader solid, real-life database applications, until now.This book fills in the gaps of so many other books out there on ASP.NET that it really should be the 2nd ASP.NET book you get. If you're already familiar with ASP.NET then this should be your first book.Because pretty much after you know how to use the basic controls and create some master pages and maybe some web parts you really know as much as the majority of the basic ASP.NET developer. This book by Thiru Thangarathinam really gives you a great understanding of "real-world" implementations of ASP.NET applications using any type of database.

Like any book, there always will be an introduction on the technology taught, so basically the first three chapters caters to refresh the reader on this technology. Chapter 1 introduces the ASP.NET 2.0 technology and terminology, the new data controls, how master pages work, and web parts framework. Chapter 2 is a very important chapter because it sets the stage for later chapters focusing on ADO.NET. You do not know how many books I have gone through trying to find a book with anything more than 20 pages on ADO.NET. It amazes me that no book (other than this one), really takes the time and explains this corroborating technology in detail when talking about ASP.NET.Yes, I have seen the pure ADO.NET books out there, but they put most of the explanation towards Windows forms, not web forms. I like how the author organizes the material and then further gives greater detail in other chapters (13 and 14). Chapter 3 introduces the reader to the updated data controls with some good detail on the advantages and disadvantages of using them, the new ObjectDataSource control, and how to incorporate the usual data-bound controls (GridView, DetailView and FormView) to them. A very good introduction to the basics.

The book (Chapter 4) then goes into using the SqlDataSource control (a good 35 pages) with topics like: Executing stored procedures and returning data, How to process return values from a stored procedure, How to handle null values, How to handle exceptions raised by the SqlDataSource control, How to detect conflict during updates, etc.Not to be overly praising this book, but I cannot remember one book that covered all these interesting topics before. Maybe I've seen this in two or three but not just one. A great chapter. The following chapter (5), the author reviews how to data bind XML data using the XmlDataSourceControl, how to filter the data, applying XSLT stylesheets, programmatically creating a XmlDataSource control, etc. A very thorough explanation of a control that is not talked about enough in other books.

One of the most interesting chapters of this book in my opinion is Chapter 6 which shows the basics (and much more) of data binding with objects.Instead of always depending on inline data source controls, you can create n-tier controls (though somewhat limited) and separate the code logic in separate classes. Though this chapter is semi-misleading because it still is talking about using a control (ObjectDataSource) in its examples. A better title would have been: Creating Object with the ObjectDataSource Control (or something like that). In any event, this chapter opens your eyes on one of the ways you can create some "real-world" development techniques.

The next two chapters (7 and 8) focus on making site wide changes to either your web pages (site navigation - SiteMapDataSource control) and how to modify existing controls like the GridView to create template columns and fields to unify your page look.

A great chapter that I automatically started reading right away was chapter 10 which focused on advanced data binding concepts such as creating a master/detail page (or parent/child), displaying selected rows in a GridView, creating custom templates in a GridView, using themes, using other controls (DropDownList) in a GridView, and extending the GridView.Lots of good stuff in this chapter that you will find on a bunch of websites or blogs or forums.

The last few chapters the author goes through creating a nice application (Rental Resevation System) and puts everything taught together.I think every book should have the last couple chapters of the book to put all the pieces together so the reader can get some ideas on how to use them in their own web applications.The code in the book is in C#, so for all you VB.NET developers you'll need to spend some time converting the code.

Apart from that this is an excellent book that teaches the reader how to really use ASP.NET 2.0 to its full potential and lots of tricks of the trade that would take you hours of searching online to find the answer. I highly recommend this book to any ASP.NET developer. ... Read more

Product Description
The Web application infrastructure ASP.NET, introduced as part of version 1.0 of the Microsoft .NET Framework, provides the thin-client counterpart to Microsoft Windows® client development. With dramatic improvements in performance, productivity, and security features, Microsoft Visual Studio® 2005 and ASP.NET 2.0 deliver a simplified, high-performance, and powerful Web development experience. ASP.NET 2.0 features a new set of controls and infrastructure that simplify Web-based data access and include functionality that facilitates code reuse, visual consistency, and aesthetic appeal. Now you can teach yourself the essentials of working with ASP.NET 2.0 in the Visual Studio environment—one step at a time. With STEP BY STEP, you work at your own pace through hands-on, learn-by-doing exercises. Whether you’re a beginning programmer or new to this version of the technology, you’ll understand the core capabilities and fundamental techniques for ASP.NET 2.0. Each chapter puts you to work, showing you how, when, and why to use specific features of the ASP.NET 2.0 rapid application development environment and guiding you as you create actual components and working applications for the Web, including advanced features such as personalization. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (28)

Disappointed highly
No doubt the author knows subject matter. Before releasing this book, some one should have asked several people who dont know asp.net to actually use the book and learn form it by following step by step in each of the chapters to the 'T', they would have found out that they cannot do it.
Too many errors, and missing steps. This is not a step by step book, it should be called "Missing steps book", it is not for some one who does not already know asp.net; then again if you already know why would you want to get this book anyway.

Simply Terrible. Did ANYONE edit the exercises in this book
I've been a software developer since 1987. I've been doing .Net work since 2006.Most of the asp.net and C# stuff I picked up by reading books and experimenting.I've read many, many teach yourself type books over the years and this is among the worst.Sure, you will learn some things but you will tear your hair out trying to get through the exercises. It's clear that this book did not get close attention from the editing staff and certainly no one actually worked through these exercises.There are fields and properties that are declared with one name and then used with a different name:Example:

Text{ get... set...} and then used in the methods as PalindromeText.

Fortunately, I had enough experience to figure things like this out but a newbie would be hopelessly misled.The chapter on Webparts doesn't mention ANYTHING about the required infrastructure and configuration that needs to be in place in order to use Webparts.Chapter 8 "A Common Look and Feel" is missing steps in both the master pages and themes section.

This is a very shoddy piece of work and if I were the editor and author I would be totally ashamed of this product.No way would I put my name on this work.

Run, do not walk, away from this book
Easily the worst written book, on any topic, I have ever read.Filled with errors and typos, I could not get a single piece of code to work as written.The author leaves out essential points, and jumps around from point to point like a squirrel on meth.The text is virtually unreadable, and most of the code is useless.The author and publisher should be made to publicly apologize and compensate anyone unfortunate enough to have wasted their time on this book, which they apparently put an insultingly low amount of effort on.

I could say more, but then I would waste even more time on this book, which does not deserve it.Trust me, do not waste a penny, or even more valuable, your time and brain cells on this.

dont bother
I have worked through the first six chapters and it just gets worse and worse.The code, both in the text and the CD is laced with errors.There are sudden jumps with no explanation. I do think the choice of topics and the examples are well chosen but the book book is so sloppily edited that it is not worth the time and money.This is more like a rough draft than a final copy.I am an experienced C# programmer and this book has caused a lot of frustration and time waste.

I would be ashamed to have my name on something this shoddy.

This book is useless!!!!
Dont buy this book.Many omissions and typo errors.You will spend all your time trying to get the examples to work. ... Read more

Product Description
Get an expert introduction to the new JavaScript enhancements (code-named "Atlas") for Microsoft ASP.NET 2.0. More than a basic AJAX (Asynchronous JavaScript And XML) script library, the Microsoft implementation brings object orientation to JavaScript, together with enhanced client-side and server-side controls that greatly simplify coding while delivering enhanced Web experiences with any browser. Scheduled for release with the next version of Microsoft Visual Studio®, code named "Orcas," AJAX extensions and tools can be used by developers today. This book offers expert insights direct from the Microsoft product team and noted ASP authority Dino Esposito, as well as hands-on instruction and examples of Web development with AJAX. This ideal reference will be updated online, keeping readers up to date with the evolving tool. The book includes code samples in ASP.NET 2.0 created using C# and JavaScript. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

Get Intro Book With Great Explanations
This book is a great one introducing with the AJAX technology. Well explained technical details. Best part is writer didn't just explain in theory, he also gave example codes with pictures to visualize what he was trying to explain.

NOT EXPLAINED WELL
I coem from a JavaScript background, and his explanation of the javascript client library was not very good at all, on top of this, he went into all this stuff before even mentioning or talking about update panel and the easier entry microsoft server controls.

i remember dumping the book several times.

he also has a tendancy to talk about conceptual and technical details before even demonstrating any examples, this really makes it almost impossible to absorb the benefits of the explanation (mmainly when it is a deep level concept) and the reading becomes pointless and you have to see an example, then go back to the start where the theoretical information was given in order to create a proper flow of reading and thought.

Basically, this book is structurally unsound and has no order, however... I hope this isn't characteristic of dinos books in general.

An easy read for a newbie
I am using this book a lot.Even though I am a newbie to AJAX I foud this book and the examples easy to follow and implement into my own apps.If you are new to AJAX add this book to your library.

Charles

Thanks!
If you've already had a good introduction to the ASP.NET Ajax Extensions, then this short book is all you'll ever need.The thing I appreciate about Dino's writing is his exploration underneath the hood.This can be said about all of his books.Knowing how things work under the hood seperate the rock stars of the industry from the rest!

Nice work and thanks.

Good introduction
This book is a very good introduction to MS Ajax. It teach the basic and some more advanced topic as well.
It begins with the Ajax programming model, the Client Side of ajax and the Server side (UpdatePanel and friends).
It gives also a quick view to the Ajax control toolkit.
... Read more

Product Description
Learn how you can use ASP.NET to accomplish real-world, professional tasks. Incorporating five hands-on projects, Microsoft ASP.NET Professional Projects is your key to unlocking the power of ASP.NET. Each project is based on a real-world situation. Work your way through as you build a Web-enabled personal finance manager, develop an inventory management system, and master the Visual Studio development tools. You will be able to use the skills that you develop throughout the book to modify the projects as needed to fit your professional needs. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

One of my open-on-table books
I never write reviews, but this is an ex.Message :-)
The most helpful part of this book is author's business and architectural approaches.
There are some bugs in the code-examples, but!
Even if you're not experienced developer you can find and fix them.
More you can take it as sudoku puzzles.

Only one thing I would consider as a pros - is an examples based on the OLEDB non-SQL provider, which is little bit outdated, for small and medium-size companies.

Book is especially helpful for developers who specialized on the in-house extranet applications.

With the Best Regards to Author!

Unsupported and Outdated?
I got this book mainly to reuse the GenEditAdd component described in it. However, it seems that the book is totally unsupported now.

The author's web site has not been updated recently. The versions of the source code available from the author and the publisher are different, and at least one of those versions appears to be based on a .NET beta.

The author's contact email address does not seem to be working. Neither does the contact form on his website.

Ok, but...
The writing style is great and his projects are pretty well thought out. However, I have to downgrade my rating of this book because:
1) Appears to be based on an early beta.
2) Most of his coding examples produce poorly structure html. To borrow a phrase from the xhtml/xml world, it is not "well formed." In other words, it doesn't follow accepted w3 standards.
3) His use of CSS is just flat out not right.

good book
~Part I - The ASP.NET Programming Environment
Chapter 1 - Introducing ASP.NET
Chapter 2 - Introducing ASP.NET Web Forms and Controls
Chapter 3 - Using ADO.NET in the .NET Framework
Chapter 4 - Data Binding
Chapter 5 - Input Validation
Chapter 6 - User Controls
Chapter 7 - Custom Controls
Chapter 8 - Business Objectives
Chapter 9 - Working with ASP.NET Web Services
Chapter 10 - ASP.NET Applications
Chapter 11 - Caching
Chapter 12 - Tracing
Chapter 13 - Security

Part II - Projects
~Project 1 - A Personal Finance Manager

Chapter 14 - The Design of the Personal Finance Manager
Chapter 15 - Chart of Accounts
Chapter 16 - Transactions
Chapter 17 - The Trial Balance Report

Project 2 - Web Services
Chapter 18 - Creating a Generic Database Web Service
Chapter 19 - Designing a Navigation System
Chapter 20 - Incorporating Web Services in the Chart
Chapter 21 - Incorporating Web Services in the Chart of Accounts Form
Chapter 22 - Incorporating Web Services in the~~~ Trial Balance

Project 3 - Inventory Management System
Chapter 23 - The Design of the Inventory Management System
Chapter 24 - Inventory Masters
Chapter 25 - Inventory Movements
Chapter 26 - The Inventory Balances Report

Project 4 - The GenEditAdd Control
Chapter 27 - Using the GenAdd Control
Chapter 28 - Extending the GenEditAdd Control

Project 5 - Visual Studio.NET
Chapter 29 - Displaying Database Data Using a Strongly-Typed DataSet
Chapter 30 - Writing CRUD Applications with~~ Visual Studio.NET
Chapter 31 - Creating a Web Service Using Visual Studio.NET

Part III - Appendixes
Appendix A: Installing the Sample Database
Appendix B: HailStormIndex~

Great real world examples
The author's ADO chapter was excellent. I found the entire book to be a great source with well thought out examples. I have 6 other ASP.net books, and I highly reccomend this one. ... Read more