Customer Reviews

Microsoft® ADO.NET Step by Step (Step by Step (Microsoft))

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(18)

 

 

First, this book assumes you are already familiar with either vb.net or c#.net. This may be the reason some others have had problems, as her examples require some familiarity. An example from early in the book is "Add a call to the RefreshValues procedure to the end of each of the CheckedChanged event handlers." If you don't understand that sentence, you will have a hard time getting through this. You will want to start with one of the vb.net books (I recommend Coding Techniques for Microsoft Visual Basic .Net by John Connell for starting out).

Otherwise, all of the sample code has worked fine and the errata listed on Microsoft's web site only has a few code sample problems.

So why 4 stars instead of 5? I think that she could have explained some of the topics and code a little more for those of us who are newbies to ADO. She seems to assume that the reader is familiar with ADO and is moving to ADO.NET and as a result does not explain some things quite as well as she could. One example of this is in DataTables. There is a table showing dofferent forms of the Tables.Add Methods. In the table, it shows 4 options and the text describing the entries in the table pretty much matches the table exactly. Then the examples only show 1 of the options and the remaining three options are never further explained or demonstrated.

The other problem I had was that there seems to be no point to the code. You will add a foreign key to a table and the code will add it and then display the name of the key you added. But then it is never used again in he program. There's a lot of how, but not very much why.

Still, I have used this book a few times now as a reference. It is the most complete book I have found so far in showing you how to do something in ADO.NET, so the technical content is very complete.

So, here's the summary. If you're already comfortable with VB.NET or C#.NET and especially if you are moving from ADO to ADO.NET, then I would recommend this book. If you are just starting with .NET programming, start elsewhere and then come back here. At the very least, it makes a good, complete reference to ADO.NET.

Normally I wouldn't give a bad review on a book just because it was too advanced for me. This case is different, however. I am one of the people who came from the fabulous visual basic.net step by step book. It really got me interested in microsoft press. VB step by step stayed true to it's title. ADO.net, however, failed miserably at this. Although it does follow a weak numbering system, it isn't really step by step at all. The flow pattern is horrific. I must admit I was excited after reading the first chapter. It was extremely easy to follow. All hell broke loose though when chapter two came about. There is plenty of room on the market for this book, as I am sure there are many who are ready for this high level of understanding. But please don't publish a step by step book which doesn't follow the usual beginner to intermediate content of other MSpress step by step books. I suppose I will go with the old standby and give vb.net database programming for dummies a try. Perhaps that will cover the foundation needed to give this book another try.

I read the first five chapters and gave up. The book is poorly writen and very difficult to follow. Most of the samples have problems which leaves you spending the majority of your time debugging the code. Many of the programs won't run with Option Strict on. I wouldn't recommend the book to anyone and yes, my copy is for sale.

I bought this book despite it's bad reviews and I must say that I am sorry I did. This book is very poorly written. I got only to chapter 3 and the examples have led me to debug to get them to work. Example, chapter 3 asks you to connect to an Access database (OleDB) with a SQL Object! No, no. It also in the same chapter references a view in the PROVIDED Access database off the disk named OrderTotals thats not even there!

I would have given this 0 stars, but it was not an option.

I thought the book was a good intro to ADO.NET until I realized that every single example is repeated twice! Once with VB code and once with C# code. But instead of just putting both the VB and C# code, they actually repeat all the pictures (which are the same) and all the steps (which are the same). I thought this was a really lousy way to trick the customer into thinking they were getting a more in depth book. Approx half the pages in this book say the same thing!

I don't understand the negative reviews. I have this book and have worked through much of the code without any of the problems described in these reviews. Any "problem" (if you insist on calling it that) that I had even remotely similar to what I see described here turned out to be my own fault... nothing worthy of the bad reviews given here.

By the way, did anyone who gave some of these poor reviews think about contacting Rebecca with questions? An author willing to provide assistance through email or news postings (like Rebecca does) deserves 5 stars.

This book deserves 5 stars, her mastery of the topic deserves 5 stars, and her support of the book (and its students) deserves 10 stars.

To anyone concerned about the poor reviews, don't be swayed. If you want a step by step tutorial on ADO.NET to learn from Rebecca and her book are a great educational resource... RECOMMENDED.

The book is full of typos, the test databases already have records you are supposed to add, and there are syntax errors galore. A proof reader would have been a plus to this book project. The C# examples blow up continually. I am surprised that Microsoft put there name on this. I am not crazy about debugging my own code. I resent paying for a book where I have to debug someone else's. I don't know if the problem is intensified if you are using Visual Studio 2003. If you are and you code in C#, stay away from this book, period.

I bought this book mainly for the MCAD exam 70-315 and this book is recommended by the Microsoft. The exam is very heavy on ADO.NET and I have to confess I didn't do well, although I pass with a thin margin. In fact, this book offer little help in the exam. I rated it 1 star for the following reasons:
1) Too many mistakes.
2) Examples don't work - you cannot open web form or window form of the examples in the CD. The system complains ResX is not valid.
3) Chapter 10 (Data-Binding in Windows Forms) is total mess. I am wondering if the author herself know what she is writing.
4) Function protocol is confusing - Almost all function protocols in the book miss the parameter type, so you have to guess the data type of the parameters. Also, the parameter names use data type name.
5) The material is not in depth enough for the exam.

Microsoft Press has done a poor job to let this book out. If they cannot fix its poor quality, the least they can do is to proof read once to eliminate hundreds of mistakes. They didn't.

I'm doing the C# version of this book (the C# examples follow the VB examples and I am getting the most of the code to work. There are numerous errors (here are my notes form pages 100 to 152):
1. Page 100 the nameof the function is private void daCategories_RowUpdating(object sender, System.Data.SqlClient.SqlRowUpdatingEventArgs e)
2. Page 102 e.RecordsAffected.ToString(); always returns 1 row even if you've changed more than one.
3. Page 105 the function is private void daCategories_RowUpdated (not RowUpdate)
4. P. 120 has the AddRows("AAAA1") outside the try/catch so the code as written generates an exception rather than shows an example of a caught transaction error. It works if you move it inside the transaction code try.
5. As 4. on page 122 (VB)
6. As 4. on page 124 (VB)
7. As 4. on page 126 (C#)
8. The working of the example on Chapter 5 doesn't work the way it does in the book because selection of different customers isn't written in the code, so only the first customer order is displayed.
9. P.152 should say double-click the Create Relation button because that's the code it then goes on to write.

... so that's 50 pages out of over 500. I can't get the rest in inside 1000 words, so I hope the author can get on this site and give us the link with the full list of corrections.

I'd like to not recommend this book but what option does the reader have. It's required material for Microsoft MCAD (maybe the mistakes are part of the test?).

With the help of this book I was able to get to know most of the .NET design environment. It also helped me to connect windows and web forms to databases. This book may not help you to master ADO.NET but is an excellent resource to begin with ADO.NET. I did not have problems with the examples (I used only C#) and most of the examples worked for me.