Customer Reviews

Database Programming With C#

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

Database Programming in .NET is accomplished via ADO.NET which dominates the middle layer of any .NET database application. It can be done via C# or any other .NET language, and there are command line tools as well as Visual Studio.NET to assist the developer. So in a book titled "Database Programming with C#" we expect to find an in depth description of ADO.NET with C# examples demonstrating the use of the classes/methods to accomplish common database tasks.

We can cut this review short by just saying that the author delivers on the expectation with ADO.NET being covered in 2 (out of the 11) chapters. Chapters 3A & 3B describe the connected & disconnected layers and constitute more than a third of the book's size. However, what dominates these chapters and indeed the rest of the book is the many lengthy tables listing methods of the various framework classes. Not only does this get in the way of an enjoyable read but it is just a rehash of the already excellent help system.

Reading this book cover to cover can also become tiresome due to a lot of repetition. The flip-side to this is that the book can be used as a reference text. Claiming the user level to be intermediate-advanced is ambitious although absolute beginners will find an abundance of useful information.

So what do the other chapters cover? The first one claims to be a 'quick intro to C#' but ends up being an overview of .NET in general; The second one introduces databases at the most basic level and really should have been considered prerequisite knowledge (i.e. read Codd, Date or Elmasri etc); the fourth chapter describes VS.NET with its database tools/wizards and the fifth one describes structured exception handling (why?!). There is some good material in chapters 6-8 on stored procedures, views, triggers and message queues. SQLXML is introduced in the appendix but it would have been nice to see more XML coverage throughout the book.

To summarise, if we can leave aside the style and bad organisation of the book, most of the content will more than satisfy beginners.

Ok, I don't get it. I bought this book based on last reviewers feedback and I'm disappointed. In brief, this is what I found:
1. No in-depth ADO.NET concepts
2. Author spends too much time on MSDN tables (classes, methods and properties). Doesn't make sense.
3. Using Author's custom databse "UserMan" is confusing. If you don't understand the database schema, you'll certainly get lost.
4. Didn't find nothing on DataGrid and other data-bound controls.
5. I'm still looking for transactions and a concrete sample on concurrency.

Good luck.

This is a really good book. I was one of those not completely satisfied with the VB .NET version,
but this one more than makes up for the issues found in the VB .NET book. I particularly like the
concurrency description and sample code, but also the SQLXML chapter is great.

Personally, I think that the many tables in chapters 3A and 3B should be moved to an appendix,
but as they're referenced in the chapters they do serve a purpose other than filling the book,
which was my original impression.

The chapter on exception handling is very good, and I particularly like the coverage of the Debug class,
which is something that I as a veteran VB programmer isn't all that familiar with.

I got this book mainly for the SQL Server coverage, but I deal with other database, such as MySQL
and Access now and then, so the inclusion on sample code for connecting to these database is just great.

Thomsen, move those tables to an appendix and you'll have the best C# database book out there. Still,
5 stars is what I rate this book, because the coverage of various database topics, including
Message Queuing, Active Directory, and Microsoft Exchange Server, all of which I deal with occassionally,
can't be found elsewhere.

I haven't finished reading the entire book as I only just got it, but the stuff that I've read and the bits I've flicked through
makes me say; Good job, and a much better job than your previous work.

I didn't plan on investing in this book (got someone else to pay), based on the VB .NET one, but after reading what I've read so far, I can only recommend it; it's so much better.

I did some checking up on the author, which means I saw the rather mixed reviews about his first book. Based on that I decided to

take a chance with this book and I certainly don't regret it. I never read the other book, but this one is really good. It gives me

everything I need to get started with ADO.NET and C#, but also a great deal more. The best chapter is the SQLXML one, which is covered

so detailed any 'idiot' can use it, but also the chapter about server-side processing is cool. I especially like the bit on using

stored functions and procedures with Oracle.

In these days when all publishers rush to press with their 800+ page offerings on the new .NET technology, it is quite refreshing to find an author that truly knows the subject matter, and knows how to communicate the information without simply rewriting the online product documentation. While reading this book I had the feeling that the author, like me, made his living doing database programming with C#.

The author, Carsten Thomsen, says that this offering is based on his earlier book Database Programming with VB.NET. It seems clear that both his prior experience in writing about this topic, and his prior experience with database programming in general have been combined to produce both a great tutorial, but also a good reference.

My stack of .NET books is well over 3-feet high by now, and I've found this book more useful than most.

I expected this book to be about getting to SQL Server from .NET. It certainly is but it also goes so much further. Thomsen gives his main examples using SQL Server but also includes Oracle, MySQL and other databases in his coverage. He also goes into depth about Active Directory (and other LDAP) access, interfacing to Exchange Server etc. There's even a handy reference to the Normal Forms, which I always need to look up somewhere. A real database book!

Thomsen does, of course, cover ADO.NET, splitting it thoroughly into two camps, connected and disconnected. This is a good approach because with pure .NET you really want to keep away from connected but you may be willing to 'compromise'. There's a useful chapter on Message Queuing, which I haven't seen covered anywhere else so well.

Even though I code with VB.NET as well as C#, this book had a useful chapter on making full use of Visual Studio for database development and will certainly speed up my future developments.

He uses a simple application of his own (software isn't provided but can be downloaded) to illustrate his points throughout. I like this approach and also find it refreshing to get away from the Publishing world for the examples.

If you don't know C# at all, get another book as well as this one. If you need to do any kind of data access, including even designing your own database, get this book.

I'm pretty fanatical over anything relating to database technology as well as .NET. So I'm probably quite biased but I think this book is really great. It's written such that a total beginner could pick it up and get going, but there's a lot of great material intertwined that I think intermediate developers would enjoy it too.

My number one criteria for a book is that it's interesting. I read the whole thing and never got bored even though I was already familiar with much of the material. That's a big plus in my book. The content is good and the examples are practical and well discussed. On the other hand, I think he does a great job of discussing things in proportion to how important they are. Let's face it, twenty examples of using the DataAdapter Configuration wizard is silly and there's a title or two out there that goes down that road. This is what I really enjoyed because he shows you both ways of doing just about everything (using code or doing it with UI tools) and explains the what's and hows.

I've liked every book he's written and this is no exception.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book, because the authors writing style makes it real easy to pick up the information in the book. Speaking of information, it looks like it has taken quite a while to write the book, as the book is literally packed with detailed information. My favorite chapter is the message queues one, which I'm fairly new to. Like the other chapters, it starts at beginner's level and then gradually adds more and more information to the pile and by the end of the chapter I felt rather comfortable with message queues. That's how a book should be! Oh, and the concurrency bit was execellent.

I found this book unstructured and out of flow. How about author first decide before write. Putting things here and there don't make a book. Book has more unrelated topics than real database programming. I found how book discusses basic DB concepts and targets advanced readers. Look at ADO.NET Essentials.

This is a great book I must say!

First I like how down to earth Carsten Thomsen is, it makes this book a joy to read. A little bit of dry humor is peppered throughout this book and I enjoy that! At first I was a little bit nervous about diving into this book because on the back it says the user level is intermediate-advanced and I felt that I was still in the beginner stages of developing ADO.NET apps. Well, even if you are a beginner (with ADO.NET that is... if you are brand new to programming then you should look for other books tailored for your needs and pick this one up later) but even if you are a beginner then I still recommend picking up this book. Although the book does cover advanced topics, it never seems like it's too much to handle. Thomsen does such a great job at introducing new concepts that before you know it your learning a great deal more then you ever thought!

If you are looking for a book aimed a database programming then look no further!!!