MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-536): Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Application Development Foundation [Hardcover]

Tony Northrup (Author), Shawn Wildermuth (Author), Bill Ryan (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 5, 2006

Exam Prep Guide

Ace your preparation for the skills measured by MCTS Exam 70-536—and on the job. Work at your own pace through a series of lessons and reviews that fully cover each exam objective. Then, reinforce what you’ve learned by applying your knowledge to real-world case scenarios and labs. 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:

• Use system types, collections, and generics to help manage data
• Validate input, reformat text, and extract data with regular expressions
• Develop services, application domains, and multithreaded applications
• Enhance your application by adding graphics and images
• Implement code access security, role-based security, and data encryption
• Work with serialization and reflection techniques
• Instrument your applications with logging and tracing
• Interact with legacy code using COM Interop and PInvoke

Practice Tests

Assess your skills with 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 12/31/10. Details inside.
• Official self-paced study guide.
• Practice tests with multiple, customizable testing options and a learning plan based on your results.
• 450 practice and review questions.
• Case scenarios and lab exercises.
• Code samples on CD.
• 90-day evaluation version of Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Professional Edition.
• Fully searchable eBook.

A Note Regarding the CD or DVD

The print version of this book ships with a CD or DVD. For those customers purchasing one of the digital formats in which this book is available, we are pleased to offer the CD/DVD content as a free download via O'Reilly Media's Digital Distribution services. To download this content, please visit O'Reilly's web site, search for the title of this book to find its catalog page, and click on the link below the cover image (Examples, Companion Content, or Practice Files). Note that while we provide as much of the media content as we are able via free download, we are sometimes limited by licensing restrictions. Please direct any questions or concerns to [e-mail].

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

Key Book Benefits: - Comprehensive study guide written by exam-certified authors - Deeper, more focused coverage of exam objectives and suobjectives—plus instructive case studies and troubleshooting scenarios to enhance your performance on the job - 300 practice questions on CD, wita test engine that enables customized testing, pre-assessment and post-assessment, and automated scoring and feedback - Complete objective-by-objective review section, plus a tear-out exam-mapping grid - Exam tips based on real-world test experience - 90-day evaluation version of Visual Studio 2005 Professional Edition - 15 percent exam discount voucher from a leading authorized testing center (limited time offer) - Microsoft Encyclopedia of Networking, Second Edition, eBook - Practice files on CD - Entire study guide in searchable eBook format

About the Author

Tony Northrup, MCTS, MCSE, CISP, MVP, is a networking consultant and coauthor of Windows Server 2008 Networking and Network Access Protection (NAP).

Bill Ryan is an MVP for Windows Embedded and a frequent speaker at industry events including Microsoft Code Camps and .NET User’s Groups. GrandMasters is an IT consulting firm specializing in content development, exam development, and customized technical support.

I am a Microsoft C# MVP and the founder of Wildermuth Consulting Services, LLC, a company that is dedicated to delivering software and training solutions in the Atlanta, Georgia area. I am also a speaker on the INEA Speaker's Bureau and have appeared at several national conferences to speak on a variety of subjects. I am the author of the book "Pragmatic ADO.NET", the upcoming "Prescriptive Data Architectures", both for Addison-Wesley as well as co-author of several certification books for Microsoft Press. I have been writing articles for a number of years for a variety of magazines and websites, including MSDN, MSDN Online, DevSource, The ServerSide .NET, ONDotNet.com and Intel's Rich Client Series. I have enjoyed building data-driven software for more than twenty years.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 1088 pages
• Publisher: Microsoft Press (June 5, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0735622779
• ISBN-13: 978-0735622777
• Product Dimensions: 5.9 x 2.1 x 9.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (85 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #749,307 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #89 in Books > Computers & Technology > Microsoft > Development > .NET

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

68 of 72 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars This Book + Transcender = 1 Easy Exam June 17, 2007

By Ol' Dirty

Format:Hardcover

The following are my pointers about the book and exam. I hope they'll help calm someone's nerves, because I was a nervous wreck before my exam yesterday.

First, about me:

> I studied in earnest for three weeks, using only the book and accompanying practice exams until the last three days
> I used Transcender during the last three days, and never scored above 60% on the full practice exam
> I am relatively new to .NET (four months exp. writing production-level apps), but not new to software development (working with Java for over four years)
> I passed the exam yesterday, on the first attempt, with a score of 859

With that said...

1. To anyone sadistic enough to take a Java cert exam (like my moronic self), the MCTS is a cakewalk. Unlike the ferocious Java exams which try to bait you into picking the wrong answers, 70-536 seems to do the exact opposite. I'll elaborate on this in point 2.

2. Remember taking the SATs and being given the advice to first eliminate clearly wrong answers before analyzing the ones that might be right? Do that on this exam, and you'll immediately cut your answer choices in half on nearly every question. For the vast majority of the questions, Microsoft practically GIVES you the answer - almost like they're trying to sell you on how intuitive their framework is. These questions are multiple choice, with one answer choice being cartoonishly incorrect, another answer being kind-of-correct but clearly too convoluted, then two or more other answers that are extremely similar, except for some minor detail.

3. You do not need to go into the MSDN and know every object mentioned in the book like Adam knew his wife.... You should, however, be very familiar with the methods and signatures of Stream objects, Serializer objects (XMLSerializer, especially), AppDomain, and Culture/Region Info. As for the rest, just pay close attention to the methods and objects used in the book's examples.

4. The Transcender exam is WAAAAAAAAAAAY HARDER than the actual 70-536.

5. The MeasureUp exam that comes with the book is slightly easier than the actual 70-536.

6. On my particular exam, there were no questions whose material hadn't been covered by the book. Be careful, though, because from the Transcender exams it seems the book's authors left out at whole lot about interoperability.

Seriously folks, this exam isn't that bad if you're a seasoned software pro and familiar with OOP. Get a solid grasp of the stuff in the book (the labs really help), use Transcender for some details that the book misses, take the exam, and pass that sucker.

Good luck! Read more ›

30 of 31 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars I passed the exam using this book January 2, 2007

By A.M.

Format:Hardcover

I used this book as my primary resource for the exam, backed up with a transcender for additional practice tests. I passed the exam on the first attempt. Based on that, I'll rate it as 4 stars (more like 3.5).

Yes there are errors - so make sure to get the errata. Do the practice tests on the CD (several times!). I can't imagine not using this book, given that it's the only one at present. If you look at the exam topics on the MS web-site, you could spend weeks or months on MSDN chasing down the relevant information. This book brings it together in one place, and avoids you spending loads of time on irrelevant topics. I think the book covers just enough to get you through the exam - provided you know the content very well. This is not an easy exam.

As for a general .NET book, the various chapters provide a useful introduction to each topic, but don't go into that much depth - just enough for the exam. Part of the issue is the exam covers a very wide range of topics, so it's difficult to go into much more depth without making the book 2,000 pages long.

At the end of the day, it got me through the exam, which is ultimately what matters.

36 of 39 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars SECOND EDITION - STILL ERRORS!!!!! March 8, 2007

By David Busch

Format:Hardcover

Simply unbelievable. For those of you who have not heard, the "first edition" of this book had a ridiculous number of errors in it. In fact, I originally had a copy of it from my work, and I had to print off the errata (list of corrections and fixes) and it was OVER 60 PAGES. Yeah, it was really fun trying to read the book on one side of my desk, and having a 60+ page document on the other side trying to find all the errors and bad code examples.....so anyway, I bought the "second edition" from Amazon. While it looks like the 60+ pages of errors that were found in the "first edition" were all corrected, there ARE STILL MORE OBVIOUS ERRORS IN THE BOOK. I cannot express in words how amazing this is to me. Did ANYONE with a technical background actually proof-read this book the first time? If not, shouldn't someone have done it before printing a second edition that was made because ONLY because there were 60+ PAGES OF ERRORS in the first edition? This to me is inexcusable. And how Microsoft could put their stamp on this book is baffling.

Anyway, other than the errors, the book is fine.....it just makes it hard to read this book for an exam, because can you really trust the content 100%? I say no. And, to top it all off, this (to my knowledge) is the only book out there for the 70-536 Exam. Good luck.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Poor learning tool July 13, 2006

By Robert A. Blinzler

Format:Hardcover

I bought this book in preperation for my first MC exam. It does a good job of getting across what material will be covered on the exam, but that's about it.

Much of the material lacks context and is poorly written. I spent more time on the internet looking up material that was in the book in order to get an understanding of it adequate to answer the sample questions than I did in the book itself.

This book, like many I've bought from Microsoft Press, has many editing errors, but I found many of the exercises, labs, and sample questions contained errors, making study for the exam very frustrating.

The practice tests and lesson review application that shipped with the book is also disappointing. You can't choose, for example, which lessons or Chapters you want to practice, instead you have to choose groupings of topics that include topics scattered throughout the book and that aren't necessarily related. The menu and interface layout is difficult to use, I mention this only because I find it ironic that such a poorly thoughout app is shipped with a book essentially about application design...