Customer Reviews

.NET Enterprise Design with Visual Basic .NET and SQL Server 2000

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

First of all this book is not about learning a new language syntax! The book is also not filled with code listings. Code fragments are just printed if they have added value in the book. The author provides code examples separately (provided with comments). So it is not a book that the fellow below is looking for (a book that teaches him how to contact SQL Server from Visual Basic .NET)

The book is focused on people that want to learn more about building (large scale) enterprise applications using the Microsoft .NET platform. I personally think this book is as well suited for architects as well as more code addicted people.
The author provides guidelines and patterns for developing and designing data centric N-tier enterprise applications using the .NET platform (using ADO.NET, COM+/.NET Component services, VB.NET/C#) and SQL Server (including T-SQL). Some subjects being discussed in this book: where to put business rules, how to implement these business rules, a new data access pattern, concurrency control, transactions etc.
The book also provides guidelines (not just on the end of the book!) for dealing with testing, error handling and preparing for debugging so it has a positive impact on quality as well as productivity.
The author uses VB.NET for coding examples. I personally prefer coding using C#, but I don't find it inconvenient that the code is in VB.NET.
I like the author's way of writing and the structure of the book. I like the way he describes the pros and cons for solutions and the influences on performance, productivity, scalability and extensibility. He also describes his own experiences (not just theory).
The book gives you guidelines (not only how but also why) so you can evaluate for yourself what will be the best solution for your situation (after all, every advantage has a disadvantage).

I found this book very helpful. It is a long time ago I read an ICT related book from beginning to end!

If you are looking for a book that gives you a blueprint for building a scalable enterprise database application using the .NET framework and SQL Server 2000 then this book hands it to you on a plate.

Don't buy this book if you are looking to learn Visual Basic .NET or SQL Server because this one is all about applying those basic skills taught in other books to produce a "real" application.

Most books on this subject fit the 80:20 rule, they take you 80% of the way and then ask you to just finish things off yourself. Anyone who is familiar with the 80:20 rule knows that the remaining 20% needed for completion is as much effort again as the first 80%.

This one introduces, designs and builds a real application to completion, consisting of n-Tier architecture with full transaction control, business rules and data access with concurrency control. It doesn't ignore real world requirements such as performance, debugging and testing.

The author imparts tips and tricks learned over the years and gives you a working example of one of the most important design patterns in database access, "Batch Command" (sometimes referred to as "Unit of Work"). This pattern minimises multiple trips to the database by compiling separate SQL statements into a single script that is send and executed in a single call. All code examples are in VB.NET and are accompanied by UML diagrams where appropriate.

In summary this book fits hand in hand with Microsoft's .NET data access strategy and basically hands you the design, implementation notes and source code of a working, scalable, enterprise class application on a plate.

Well worth it!

There's enough "learn VB.NET" books out there, most of them not too bad, but nobody dares to stick his neck out at this early stage and suggest an "architecture proposal", which makes these books scaled down product manuals (although easier to read).
Jimmy stuck his neck out and suggests do this and don't do that. Some of his suggestions are not totally OO and so on, but the beauty is that you can see these ideas have been tried and tested in real life scenarios.

If you need to design and maintain enterprise apps, this book should be a very valuable companion.

First of all this book is not about learning a new language syntax! The book is also not filled with code listings. Code fragments are just printed if they have added value in the book. The author provides code examples separately (provided with comments). So it is not a book that the fellow below is looking for (a book that teaches him how to contact SQL Server from Visual Basic .NET)

The book is focused on people that want to learn more about building (large scale) enterprise applications using the Microsoft .NET platform. I personally think this book is as well suited for architects as well as more code addicted people.
The author provides guidelines and patterns for developing and designing data centric N-tier enterprise applications using the .NET platform (using ADO.NET, COM+/.NET Component services, VB.NET/C#) and SQL Server (including T-SQL). Some subjects being discussed in this book: where to put business rules, how to implement these business rules, a new data access pattern, concurrency control, transactions etc.
The book also provides guidelines (not just on the end of the book!) for dealing with testing, error handling and preparing for debugging so it has a positive impact on quality as well as productivity.
The author uses VB.NET for coding examples. I personally prefer coding using C#, but I don't find it inconvenient that the code is in VB.NET.
I like the author's way of writing and the structure of the book. I like the way he describes the pros and cons for solutions and the influences on performance, productivity, scalability and extensibility. He also describes his own experiences (not just theory).
The book gives you guidelines (not only how but also why) so you can evaluate for yourself what will be the best solution for your situation (after all, every advantage has a disadvantage).

I found this book very helpful. It is a long time ago I read an ICT related book from beginning to end!

Although I haven't read this book, I wanted to make sure the above review does not discourage people from reading this book. This book is not about teaching Visual Basic.NET or SQL Server fundamentals. Instead it explains how to create an N-Tier architectue using those technologies. Furthermore, of course there won't be "complete" samples in a book like this. A decent size N-Tier application could possibly take a couple of hundred pages to thoroughly explain (look at the IBuySpy or Fitch and Mather applications). Instead (it appears from the sample chapter/table of contents) that the authors focus on specific points in the distributed application to examine closely. To reiterate, if you want to learn simple VB.NET or SQL Server - Don't buy this book or you'll end up frustrated like the fellow above. If you would like to learn about DNA or N-Tier architectural concepts (or if you would like to migrate your existing DNA skills to .NET) I would highly recommend this book.

This book is perfect for the VB developer who is interested in Enterprise programming, which I define as building apps that scale well and have a maximum amount of fault tolerance and are easy to maintain. It doesn't hold your hand with sample code or screenshots. Instead, it provides Jimmy Nillson's insight into how large, real-world programming projects are built. Its very well written, and Jimmy Nillson provides several different solutions to problems in addition to the one he prefers.

It is well worth buying. One caveat is that this book doesn't cover the details of the language such as ADO.net data access, etc. so you'll want a separate book for that. This is actually the strength of the book because you can find all of that information in the helpfiles, whereas the information you'll find in this book won't be easy to find anywhere else.

I've been working with SQL Server since it was released over a decade ago and building business components for enterprise aps for quite a few years. I have spent hours searching for a book that addressed performance, scalability, data access and other real world issues. This has been by far the best book I've read on that subject - and, even better, it's centered around .NET (however, even seasoned COM+/DNA developers would gain a lot from this book).

The author's .NET architecture proposal is very close to what we've been doing with COM+/DNA for several years in real applications. We're going to implement some of the author's suggestions on tracing and error logging. The author is not afraid to make some non standard (to some developers) suggestions on implementing business rules, transactions and efficient data access. The author has definitely provided me with inspiration rather than definitive solutions (which he states in the Preface).

I agree with the Tucson (1/22/02) reviewer that this book is not a teaching book on .NET and SQL Server, but rather provides solid suggestions for building real world enterprise applications. Even so, many code examples are shown that illustrate the author's points.

Especially interesting is the author's candid reflection of the pros and cons of his suggestions relative to factors to consider in choosing a solution.

FYI, I have no relationship with the author or publisher, just a very satisfied reader. I've already recommended this book highly to many of my peers.

The book is very much a hand's-on architect's/programmer's book. Not much emphasis on an academic viewpoint, but more the practical lessons from someone that has learnt from 10 or more years of design/programming. It contains many little insights that come from experience.

It is (thankfully) not another beginner's book. It is set at the enterprise level.

Good detail on testing and debugging. Throughout there is reference to scalability, fault tolerance and performance. I liked the way he introduced the test bed and using the same debugging approach across different layers.

He is quite bold in suggesting the how things will go in the future (best architecture/design approach), offering various options, but admits some may be wrong.

I would like to have seen more test results, I know these will be available with the non-beta code, but to compare methods, it is useful to see comparative details in the book.

It is a good overview of the possible current architectural solutions. He realises there are many solutions to a problem, like life, the answer is a matter of balance and compromise.

Good size book. Easy to read, so it must have been well written!

This is a good book. It is definitely more of a design book than a programming book (as the title says). A good developer has books like this in his or her library though.

Unfortunately, Jimmy's writing is very hard to follow at times. English may be his second language, and it shows. Next time get a better editor -- a very poor job of editing the book was done. Some sentences just run on forever and use a bunch of unneccesary words. This may sound picky, but this type of book is read through entirely and it should be better written and organized.

I do really like how Jimmy expores different design possibilites. He gives the pros and cons of each option, including the one he proposes. He obviously understands the technologies very well and has much real-world experience. You can tell he is an experienced developer.

So remember, this is an enterprise design book. If you follow his proposal you will have an application with many layers/tiers that also makes use of COM+ / component services. For smaller applications this type of design is usually overkill. But for very large applications a good design is critical.

Good book.

This book is a must for developers of COM+ applications developed using any .NET language and any database. The ideas discussed within it apply equally to all languages and databases. Some of the code will need to be re-written in order to work on other databases/lanaguages, but this does not negate the fact that the author covers the concepts relevant to developing the business and database tiers of a multi-tier application.

The author covers testing, debugging, error logging, configuration, transactions, business rules, COM+ settings, data access, error handling and concurrency issues. With each of these subjects, he disusses the subject and then suggests a suitable approach to handle the point in question.

The author obviously has a lot of experience in developing COM+ applications, and this book helps with a lot of the important aspects of distributed application design.

I would defintely recommend this book to anyone designing distributed COM+ applications.