MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-505): Microsoft® .NET Framework 3.5 Windows® Forms Application Development [Hardcover]

Matthew A. Stoecker (Author), Steven J. Stein (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0735626375 | ISBN-13: 978-0735626379 | Publication Date: February 25, 2009 | Edition: 1 Har/Cdr

Ace your preparation for the skills measured by MCTS Exam 70-505—and on the job. Work at your own pace through a series of lessons and reviews that fully cover each exam objective. Then, reinforce and apply what you’ve learned through real-world case scenarios and practice exercises. This official Microsoft study guide is designed to help you make the most of your study time.

Maximize your performance on the exam by learning to:

• Create the user interface, configuring controls at design or run time
• Apply best practices for UI design
• Access, query, bind, and display data
• Enhance usability—MDIs, drag-and-drop, persistence, accessibility
• Manage the print process
• Use asynchronous methods to optimize UI responsiveness
• Develop custom Windows Forms controls
• Configure and deploy your application

Assess your skills with the practice tests on CD.

You can work through hundreds of questions using multiple testing modes to meet your specific learning needs. You get detailed explanations for right and wrong answers—including a customized learning path that describes how and where to focus your studies.

Your kit includes:

• 15% exam discount from Microsoft. Offer expires 12/31/13. Details inside.
• Official self-paced study guide.
• Practice tests with multiple, customizable testing options and a learning plan based on your results.
• 300+ practice and review questions.
• Code samples in Microsoft Visual Basic® and Visual C#® on CD.
• 90-day trial of Microsoft Visual Studio® 2008 Professional Edition.
• Case scenarios, exercises, and best practices.
• Fully searchable eBook of this guide.

A Note Regarding the CD or DVD

The practice test materials are available as a download along with your ebook version of the kit, and will be located in your account. Please direct any questions or concerns to [e-mail].

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Matthew A. Stoecker, MCP, has written numerous books and articles on Microsoft® Visual Basic®, Visual C#®, Windows® Forms, and Windows Presentation Foundation, including the Self-Paced Training Kits for Exams 70-502, 70-306, and 70-316.

Steven J. Stein, MCP, has been a programmer writer on the Microsoft® Visual Studio® team for eight years, where he develops documentation and code samples. He and Matt Stoecker also coauthored the Self-Paced Training Kits for Exam 70-526.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 720 pages
• Publisher: Microsoft Press; 1 Har/Cdr edition (February 25, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0735626375
• ISBN-13: 978-0735626379
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.6 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #467,202 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #75 in Books > Computers & Technology > Microsoft > Development > .NET

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Satisfactory for 90% of exam topics, but missing some topics completely, April 1, 2009

By 

Mark Price (London, England) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-505): Microsoft® .NET Framework 3.5 Windows® Forms Application Development (Hardcover)

If you have little or no existing experience with Windows Forms and want to pass the exam, this is a good place to start learning.

But if you already have experience with Windows Forms, you might be disappointed...

This is effectively a second edition of the book that covered the Windows Forms 2.0 exam (70-526). It seems as though 95% of the content is identical, so I do *not* recommend buying this edition if you already have the 2.0 book.

The authors have only added content for two new topics: 24 pages on LINQ and 3 pages on hosting a WPF control by using ElementHost. But they have missed out some important deployment-related topics that appear on the exam:

1) Install a Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) browser application by using ClickOnce
2) Install a Visual Studio Tools for Office (VSTO) application by using ClickOnce
3) Configure and work with Windows Vista User Account Control (UAC) by using ClickOnce deployments
4) Set appropriate security permissions to deploy the application. This objective may include but is not limited to: elevated permissions
5) Configure Trusted Application deployments
6) Configure security features in an application. This objective may include but is not limited to: Configure code access security, configure the application to work with UAC, configure Windows manipulation permissions, configure appropriate file access permissions for the application, control printing security for the application

So if you have the previous book or you're already experienced with Windows Forms 2.0 then you're better off simply reading Microsoft's free MSDN site. In particular, read the topic titled "What's New in Windows Forms for the .NET Framework 3.5" in combination with Microsoft's official preparation guide for the exam. I wish the authors had!

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good enough to pass the exam, April 1, 2009

By 

PH Bible Student (CA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-505): Microsoft® .NET Framework 3.5 Windows® Forms Application Development (Hardcover)

Along with the other two MS Training Kits I have used (Exam 70-536, 70-502) this book (and the included practice exams) was sufficient to help me pass on the first try. As far as the MS Certification system is concerned, passing any single exam is not going to make you an expert, not going to grant you any inordinate respect among your peers. Nevertheless, there seems to be a cumulative effect, such that the total understanding I have gained as a result of the three exams I have passed thus far is greater than the sum of the three exams considered individually. As someone moving from the Linux world into the MS world, I feel these training kits have been indispensible in helping me with the transition.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Tedious reading, July 24, 2009

By 

Mike (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-505): Microsoft® .NET Framework 3.5 Windows® Forms Application Development (Hardcover)

I bought this book in hopes of getting a solid understanding of Winforms 3.5. Unfortunately, this book is mostly step-by-step tutorials which really slows down the knowledge transfer (and makes for a large book). I have to go through a 4 page tutorial just to find the 10 lines of relevant code that will be on the test. It would have been better if the relevant code snippets where extracted and explained and the remainder was removed.