Customer Reviews

Beginning ASP.NET 4: in C# and VB (Wrox Programmer to Programmer)

5 star:		(35)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

While I've already read Beginning ASP.NET 3.5 by Imar Spaanjaars and moved rather far beyond it, when I had the opportunity to recieve his new book on ASP.NET 4 for review, I took it.

Would I still feel strongly about recommending his work as *the* #1 choice for those new (or relatively new) to ASP.NET? Would it offer enough new content over the previous iteration that I'd recommend a new purchase if someone had the first?

===

First, if you're just getting started with ASP.NET, this is once again *the* book to start with. The way the book reads makes it extremely easy to keep up with where he's at, and why. At the end you'll end up with a functional site, having built it yourself, using a good deal of ASP.NET functionality.

The book also assumes little experience with HTML and CSS, which makes this book a fairly good start for anyone who wants to get started with creating Web sites (using ASP.NET), even going into the developer tool Visual Web Developer 2010.

The book itself is a *vast* improvement over previous iterations, with a much more solid wrap and softer (but still thick) pages. (Although the pages must be somewhat thinner, since the previous iteration of this book is about the same depth as this one, even though this has ~70 more pages.)

The guitar on the cover has left me guessing a bit, all the way from 'rock star' to 'hero' to 'he creates a music-related site' but if you don't get stuck on such things, you'll be fine.

===

If you've purchased and read the previous iteration of this book, Beginning ASP.NET 3.5, you might be wondering if it makes sense to pick this up.

The only new chapter is one on jQuery (although Microsoft AJAX is still covered and used as before), and it's primarily an introduction, which fits within the context of this book. Crawling the jQuery site for a little while will probably get you up to speed just as well. Otherwise, the rest has been updated to ASP.NET 4 and the current versions of software; little else has changed.

If you picked up the previous iteration and couldn't get through it, then don't bother with this, as it's quite similar. Likewise for if you've moved beyond Beginning ASP.NET 3.5, and feel comfortable with the technology; ASP.NET 4 isn't dug into so much here that you can't get the information elsewhere with some basic searching.

===

To conclude, Beginning ASP.NET 4 in C# and VB is *the* book I *highly* recommend to get started with ASP.NET (3.5 or 4). Imar knows the technology as well as how to teach it, from beginning to Web site created. 5 of 5 stars.

I really loved this book! This book is so amazing, i don't know where to start!

You actually learn a LOTS in the book even if its a starting book for ASP.NET.
Actually, ive learned more than expected! This is the first time i buy a WROX book and
i am impressed!

I am a PHP web developper that wanted to learn ASP.NET so i already have a background
in web programming but you do not need to have a background in order to read this book!

It is so easy to read and the information is so interesting that each time you turn a page
you want to learn and know more !

Here, a list of the positive things i found about the book :

- Lots of great examples step by step with a section that explain you the whole process each time.
- Code are written in both C# and VB.NET.
- Very comprehensive writting. The author explain everything and make things clear!
- Very informative even if you are an advanced user in ASP.NET.
- The book cover a nice project which go from a subject to another easily.
- The book refers others book in the WROX collection which is useful if you wanna extend your knowledge later and
i really appreciate this cause sometime you never know where to look at after you've read a book! It refer to others place
if you want to dig into advanced subject later which is really great!
- After you've read the book you know how to make complete website using AJAX and JQUERY along with databases!
- Cover LOTS of subject, even cover AJAX and JQUERY.

Since nothing is perfect, i have only one constructive remark about the book :

- I know that this book is not intended to be a reference book but this still would be interessting
to have some reference section somewhere. This reference section could hold the important informations in a chapter so you
don't have to dig inside each page in order to get some important stuff that have been mentionned. But well this is not really
a problem but that would help from memorizing everything. But since its not a reference book this is not a problem at all!

Overall :

If you looking to learn ASP.NET 4 and don't know where to start, get this book! Do not look anywhere else.. just GET this book!
I really recommand it !

First off, this is one of the best instructional books I've ever read. Imar has a way with explaining things that makes it easy to follow and understand. But it gets even better. I had a question on something that was related to one of the topics in the book, but it wasn't covered specifically. Imar's email address is in the book so I thought, well maybe, if I emailed him, there was a slim possiblity that in a few days he might answer the question. Less then 10 minutes after I sent the email I got a return email with the answer to the question. I was amazed!

He did ask that I post my questions to the forum in the future so that if others had similar questions he could just point them to the forum instead of answering the same question over and over. The forum also gives other readers a chance to learn from each others questions. So that's the way I'll address any questions in the future, but I have to say I am very impressed.

I have found this text to be a concise, interesting and useful introduction to ASP.Net.

As a "non-Windows" database programmer (Pick/UniVerse/UniData) with a smattering of VB6 experience, I have recently embarked on a serious re-training project in C#.Net and ASP.Net. As is often the case with many a "newbie", the combined depth and breadth of the .Net/C#/ASP development environment can be daunting. I am enjoying using this text, as I feel that it is easing me into the subject with clear and simple explanations of each topic, and without laying on too much of the heavy, in-depth detail too early in the knowledge acquisition process.

I was initially attracted to Wrox "Beginning..." texts when I purchased a copy of "Begining Visual C# 2010" at a local bookshop. The presentation of digestible tracts of information, followed by "try it out" exercises, then an explanation of "how it works", is common to both texts and works very well for me. I feel that it is paramount to any professional to have in-depth knowledge of their chosen vocation. I will not get that from any introductory text on the subject, but I feel that this one is providing a solid introduction in an interesting and comprehensible manner.

I would like to thank Mr. Spaanjaars and the Wrox team for a fine text that is good value for money.

Author Imar Spaanjaars in the Acknowledgement section of this book writes: "I really enjoyed writing this book." Spaanjaars has done a splendid, meticulous job and you can tell he really enjoys his work. The challenge of this type of technical writing is to provide readers instruction for a development environment (graphical user interface) while integrating external objects, new techniques and languages within that development environment. Jaanspaars like Ben Forta (ColdFusion 9 Web Application Development) has mastered this kind of instruction and others should take notice. There are detailed explanations, "TRY IT OUT" exercises and "How it Works" sections to explain code concepts so it all makes sequential sense. All "hard" programming examples are bilingual in that Spaanjaars provides C# AND Visual Basic code. The book does an excellent job of introducing you to Microsoft Visual Studio via (free download) Microsoft Visual Web Developer 2010 Express. You are guided step by step through Visual Web Developer's many intricate and useful tools. I come from the days of Allaire ColdFusion and now feel the need for ASP.NET. If you are experienced, you will appreciate how the ASP.NET 4 state engine maintains state and realize the potential. If you are a beginner, this book provides you with the basic tools you need from HTML, cascading style sheets, XML, AJAX, C#, Visual Basic all the way to the class(y) basics of object oriented programming.

I have been for a while trying to find a book to learn ASP.NET. I have tried different ones and even videos online but never felt I was either learning or there was a right or easy way to learn.

After reading previous reviews, I took my chances and bought the book. I have no software programming experience whatsoever. However, this has been the best book to learn ASP.NET I have found so far. It is well written and VERY easy to use. It explains the how's and the why's. It presents in a very easy language everything you need to know. It takes you every step of the way from the most simple things to the most complicated ones.

Before reading it, I was a little bit worried as I had been reading books about ASP.NET from previous versions and I didn't know what to expect from it. It was a relief to see how easy to understand the book is and how it starts from the most basic things that any software programmer needs to know.

This book is AMAZING. I love it!!!! I highly recommend it.

If you are the kind of person would like to take the ASP.NET bull by the horns, you should read this book!

I want to say that this is one of the best instructional books I have ever read. My background: I have dabbled in programming for a bout a year, starting with Python, then C++. I then took an interest in web applications and got a book on HTML and CSS - I read about half the book then got bored.

I started an online tutorial in PHP but I personally didn't enjoy coding in the language. From there, I did a bit of research online and found this book. WOW! As soon as I started reading it I could tell this was the framework I was going to use to make my web applications.

Firstly, let me say this about ASP.NET in general: ASP.NET is in my opinion perfect for people who do not have a development background. It simplifies a lot of things, while at the same time ensuring flexibility. I personally enjoy using it a lot.

Now as for this book: it's simply phenomenal. You go from nothing to a fully functional, dynamic website in 800 pages. That's impressive. The explanations are excellent and the examples well crafted. You learn how to work with Visual Studio, you learn HTML and CSS basics, you learn C# and VB, you learn how to work with databases using ADO.NET and LINQ, you learn how to work with jQuery to do client side scripting, you learn how to work with AJAX to do partial postbacks to the server.

All in all, you get a good grounding in every aspect of web development using this book. From there, it's quite easy to extend your knowledge using additional resources.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone who has no web development experience.

One thing: it really helps if you have a working knowledge of HTML, CSS and some programming language (preferably C# or VB). While the author makes no assumptions and covers these topics, it obviously helps to know these things before beginning. I personally struggled a little with some of the examples because I had never used VB or C# before. Consider getting and introductory book on C# or VB to supplement this book of you have never used either language before.

I really liked the book; My friend Imar has done an outstanding job putting all the new pieces together.

If you're a newbie trying to ramp up on ASP.NET 4.0, or an aged asp.net dev looking to learn the new features in asp.net 4.0 this is the perfect book.

The best of all is that the book has been written in a very simple, yet understandable way, all the examples and code are very illustrative and the perfect complement to get some hands on the learned material.

Things I liked:

- Code in vb.net & C#
- Simple and useful examples
- Written in a very comprehensive way.
- Even if you're an experienced web developer, you'll find the top features implemented in ASP.NET 4.0
- For newbies, has a lot of detailed information and examples
- Covers complimentary technologies such as AJAX and JQuery.

So if you're planning to learn ASP.NET 4.0 or update your skills in ASP.NET, don't look further, this is the perfect book for you!

I wish every technical book was written this way. The subject matter is presented in a way that makes it very easy to understand, learn and recall. The author deserves his Microsoft MVP status. I highly recommend this book.

This book turned out to be exactly as I needed. Learning the new .NET 4.0 framework and Visual Studios 2010, this book breaks it down for the beginner like myself. I had not used .NET since 2.0 and Visual Studios since 2005, wow there are alot of new upgrades and features I have lost out on. This book is a great review for semi-novices and the true beginner. I would recommend this book as a starter learning resource and I will be ordering the PRO version in a week or so, to learn more advanced development techniques. A great buy!