Customer Reviews

Expert C# Business Objects (Books for Professionals by Professionals)

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

For large programming projects, an object oriented approach is now widely acknowledged as superior to an earlier procedural methodology. On a separate front, for reasons like scalability and fault tolerance, a project might be implemented across different machines, in a distributed computing layout.

As Lhotka explains, there are often times when it would be desirable to combine the two approaches. He lays out a multitier logical structure for a web application. Data is passed back and forth across the layers. A common problem is to validate the data according to some business logic. Traditionally, this might have been done at several layers, leading to code duplication and maintenance problems. Or, if it was implemented in only one layer, feedback about invalid data might be slow. An OO person would say, obviously, that you should wrap the data in an object that implements the business rules.

But passing this object between layers on different machines is not simple, to put it mildly. Lhotka offers us a framework that sits atop .NET to make this possible. He had an earlier version running under COM. But he shows how .NET is a far more powerful environment in which to redo the framework.

He gives us an elegant approach to mixing object oriented and distributed computing under .NET. So much so that you might wonder why Microsoft did not already build this out.

Truly, I think this book is an introduction to Mr. Lhotka's CSLA Framework, and not a text for designing expert business objects. Discovering and designing business objects for an application are tough exercises that are not covered in much detail here.

There are applications that can benefit from the type of design suggested in the book and the CSLA framework, but in the realm of business applications I think they are few and far between. If you want to build an application that essentially pulls records from a database, lets the user view or change that data and return it to the database, then this book offers a very straightforward way to build these types of applications. However it is easy for a developer to believe that this type of design can be applied to every application they face. (When you have a hammer, everything looks like a nail.) Often, I think the result is an application highly coupled to the implementation of storage, with quasi-business objects that have complexity above and beyond their true business complexity, no core system that can be cleanly modeled and understood by non-technical team members, and a user interface that is often no more than just a front-end to a database. Again, I think the CSLA framework promotes this kind of design; it does not enforce it or stop you from building a more solid design.

The book is well written and is not too difficult to follow the concepts offered. This is why I give it 3 stars and not less. However I have to warn the newer developer who is looking for guidance in building OO designed applications in an effort to manage the difficulties of the more complex business applications they are starting to deal with. I don't think this book addresses this need. I would suggest Object-Oriented Design Heuristics by Arthur J. Riel or maybe Object-Oriented Analysis and Design with Applications (3rd Edition) by Grady Booch.

I have written a much more comprehensive review on my website. Click on my Amazon Real Name(TM) above to view my profile and web page link.

First: This book is not "N-Tier for Dummies". It's pretty heavy going. To get value from it, the reader should be pretty familiar with .NET and with object-oriented programming.

The book provides a complete walk-through of application design, using a framework ('CSLA') that provides most of the basic infrastructure needed for a scalable, maintainable application. The framework isn't simple, and one really needs to understand how it works to use it effectively. That takes some time, but for me, it has been time well spent.

This book (and the CSLA framework) provides three important benefits: First, it is a great way to learn application design, from beginning to end. Second, the CSLA framework frees the designer to focus on the business objects that do the work of the applications, without getting bogged down in a lot of low-level infrastructure. And finally, it presents a fully-documented and widely-used application architecture. It's easier to hire and train developers for an application based on the CSLA framework, which has been around for about ten years.

This book probably won't help developers who write simple database front-ends. It's overkill. But I would recommend it to anyone who designs or develops applications that do more than collect user input and display query results.

I entered the world of OO programming by struggling through Lhotka's Visual Basic 6.0 Business Objects. It was eye opening to work with a full application framework that was clearly over my head. By working through his application time and again, I truly learned an immense amount, above and beyond what I would have learned otherwise. So, I enthusiastically purchased this book, expecting no less. Lhotka does not disappoint. I have learned a great deal more than I knew about C# while implementing the framework. Beyond that, the framework itself sovles multiple production level problems. This book is fantastic.

This book is an in-depth explanation of Lhotka's CSLA .NET framework. It starts out by showing you how the framework was built. Then it shows you how to use it. A beginner should not read this book. It's very technical. I'm not a beginner but I'm also not an expert and there were points where I just gave up on understanding how he built the framework. As I gain more .NET experience, I plan to go back and read the first part of the book again.

I've been desperately look for a C# book that discussed a 3-tier architecture and how it should be applied in .NET. This book does show you how it can be done but it's very complicated.

In reading this book, I've gained a good understanding of what can be accomplished by using a well thought out framework. Am I using it? No. I got too confused trying to implement it. That doesn't mean I don't want to use it. It just means that my experience level at the moment is holding me back.

This is a huge book that covers a large swatch of business object material for .NET. It's unusual because I would expect to see this type of material for Java. It starts with a technology overview of the web and related technologies. It then goes into Object Oriented Analysis and Design. And finishes off with the implementation of these architectural concepts on the .NET platform. About a third of the book is spent in each area.

I found the overall content wasn't particularly tight and focused, which adds to the books size, which is large for an architectural book. That being said there are a lot of good ideas and the content is well organized. If you are an architect looking to migrate to the .NET platform you should have a look at this book.

This book has a very good discussion of frameworks and includes the details of the CSLA (Component Scalable Logical Architecture) framework. However, I don't believe the book is worthwhile for the discussion of frameworks alone. If you're required to use CSLA, then this is the book for you.

I give the book three stars because its contents can't be separated from the design of CSLA. The problem with CSLA is the layers. The use of "fat", fully encapsulated business objects has fallen out of favor recently and is not the best architecture for enterprise applications. Despite what the author says, I don't believe CSLA is truly a layered architecture, either.

The book lacks a discussion of when CSLA is a good choice and when another architecture is better. Choosing to use CSLA pre-determines your architecture (the "A" stands for "Architecture", after all). You should always choose your architecture based on your requirements and never select an architecture in advance.

That said, CSLA can be a good architecture for smaller projects. New developers often have issues understanding true multi-tiered architectures. Because CSLA uses an encapsulated architecture that's similar to the OOP training they had in school, those developers may find CSLA a good choice because it's easier for them to understand.

After carefully going through one c# book on design patterns. I had anticipated that going through the lhotka c# business objects book would be a breeze but boy was I wrong. Mr. Lhotka uses OO to the extreme in his framework and outlines his reasons behind tailoring the OO to his base classes in his framework unlike other book. Design patterns are for small apps. Enterprise applications take advice from this book. I have yet to see another book with this kind of detail and quality.

This books is as good as his c# 1.1 book.
I have noticed that it helps to know his c# 1.1 business
object book first since this 2005 book builds on top of
the first so it's good to have both projects (1.1 and 2.0)
open side to see the improvements.

Covers improvement in architecture from the csla framework
whilst taking advantage of the new c# 2.0 features.

This is a must read if you want to learn how to develop best practice, scalable, object-orientated .NET systems. It starts off by discussing the issues which need to be faced, and the various tradeoffs that need to be considered. It introduces the advanced .NET techniques that will be required, and then works you through the development of a practical, free to deploy, framework within which to develop your applications.

Finally the book uses the framework to develop some example business objects, then deploys the BO's in three different modes; a Windows Forms application, a ASP.NET internet application, and as Web Services.

This is a real-world application framework that many people are using for their applications. Visit the author's web site to see the community which has formed around this book and framework. I can't post html here, but as a hint try the author's surname dot net. There is an article there which illustrates, via example, the many benefits that you will get from reading the book, using the framework, and joining the community.

I found this book to be a great book to learn the ins and outs of designing and implementing a Business Framework, and how to implement real world OOP. I have had a lot of trouble in the past reading all the examples in books about OOP in general. They would start off with the analogy of a car, an airplane, a person, etc. a lot of detail would go into designing that object. All well and good but how do I really break down these objects so they can be used in a business model and extend that same object. Well this book has moved me a long way down the road in that regard. I have had the privilege of seeing Rocky at a training event. This book is not a hypothetical to him but real world knowledge put into practice.