Most Helpful Customer Reviews
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Great - but don't let the title fool you, November 16, 2001
This review is from: MySQL: Building User Interfaces (Landmark) (Paperback)
Let me say this right away: This is a good book. If you already know your way around MySQL and have at least a basic knowledge of C, you'll very quickly get up to speed in creating a MySQL GUI (GTK+) application for your co-workers or your client. The introduction lays out some of the foundations, and the reader is warned that some skills are required before delving deeper into the book: Basic knowledge of C, SQL, Linux are all required to gain anything from this book. Some experience in VB, Delphi or other form-based IDEs will also give you a good start on the book. The first section of the book gives a good run-down on MySQL, GTK+ and Glade. There are a few non-critical errors in the text (stating that a MySQL table is limited to 50 mio. records; claiming that Qt is not free, although the Qt/X11 is released under the GPL). The chapters on GTK+ also give the reader the first taste of the author's preference on using page upon page of commented source, rather than explanatory body text. The second section is a walk-through of three Real-world implementations. The first is a relatively simple order entry application; the second a commissions calculation application and the third a fairly complex report generator. In all three examples, the focus is primarily on Glade and GTK+, and very little mention is made of MySQL. The third section is a short discussion on using the XML files generated by Glade, which may -- in some very specific cases - allow the programmer to make changes to an application without recompiling a project. This discussion really is too short, and I wonder whether the reader might be confused more than helped by this chapter. These pages could have been of much better use if the author had spent some more time discussing security issues in MySQL and applications, something which this books sorely lacks. There is some discussion on the subject, but it's much too short and general. One thing I really like about the examples is the "running commentary" on how to distribute programs, moving from a simple "copy the executable" over "make install" and ending up at "building an RPM". I like examples, and a good tutorial should contain a lot of them. Some of the code examples in the book are very good -- those where a small section of a program is shown, and each important line of code is emphasized and explained. In this book, the author has chosen to give us page up and page down of program listings, which, although well commented in-line, make for extreme terse reading. More than half the book is comprised of program listings, and that's not counting the last 150+ pages making up the appendix, consisting solely of program listings. I have serious doubts that anyone will ever be reading these. The title of the book is, unfortunately, very badly chosen. "MySQL" suggests that you can only use this book with the MySQL DBMS, even though many of the SQL examples are really quite general in scope; "Building User Interfaces" suggests that this book contains a general discussion on UI, while it is in fact very heavily centered on GTK+. The layout of the front page also suggests that the main focus on the book is MySQL, which is not true -- only about 25% of the contents are set off for discussing MySQL, the rest of the book is about Glade and GTK. If you're coming from a Windows/MS-Access background and wish to know more about writing GUI applications for MySQL, program deployment, this book is definitely for you. If you've never worked with MySQL (or any other SQL database), you should get some more experience before getting this book. I'm giving five stars for the contents minus one for a misleading title page.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
MySQL: Building User Interfaces "using GTK", September 16, 2001
This review is from: MySQL: Building User Interfaces (Landmark) (Paperback)
If you have a fairly strong background in `C' programming (understanding pointers is required), and you are familiar with SQL, and you work on a Linux platform or plan on working in Linux, and you would like to use GTK for the user interface, then this book is for you. If you just looked at the title of the book, you would expect a generic explanation of how to design and build user interfaces and how to build connectivity to a MySQL database. This is all true, but more specifically, the book uses GTK solely for building user interfaces. "MySQL: Building User Interfaces" starts with an introduction to MySQL, proceeds with comparing MySQL to other databases, and then instructs the reader in building connectivity to a MySQL database. After the reader gets a good taste of MySQL, a nice introduction to GTK follows. It includes an extensive widget tour, which is a do nothing program that shows how to code the various widgets available with GTK. The rest of the book gets very deep into working with GTK, `C', and MySQL. GTK is like Visual Basic for Linux. In the Visual Basic world you would use C to build a dll that gives you connectivity to a database. With GTK, you use `C' to connect to a database (MySQL in this case). GTK (GIMP Toolkit) is a library for creating graphical user interfaces. It's an object-oriented API that is written in `C' and uses classes and pointers to functions for accessibility. For a better explanation on GTK and a great place to start learning it, including downloading, point your browser to http://www.gtk.org/tutorial/ch-introduction.html. While the author does a very good job of teaching GTK, the website has some additional information for getting started with GTK, including its own tutorial. Overall, the book has extensive information for building GUIs with GTK and MySQL, with plenty of examples and screen shots. It's definitely geared toward a narrower audience. But, it you are a programmer with a background in `C' and would like to build an application with a GUI, I would strongly recommend using this author's methodology of using GTK and MySQL
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Good Niche Book, August 17, 2001
This review is from: MySQL: Building User Interfaces (Landmark) (Paperback)
When I first heard of this book, I was expecting a book on web user interfaces. This is not the case, but rather on GUI user interfaces, specifically GTK+ Linux GUI user interface. Before you should buy this book, make sure that it is for you. Programmers would be able to take make the most of this book, although this book is also good for deciding whether or not to use Linux / GTK+ / MySQL for their project(s). Project managers will probably find value in the first section of this book if they are thinking about using Linux for their database needs. For the programmer, you should first of all know and want to use C for your MySQL user interfaces. You should have experience with creating and modifying databases, including (if you want to get the most out of the examples later in the book) understanding about SQL and relational database theory and practice, meaning that understanding why two database tables (for example) were joined would be helpful in really grasping the examples; if you don't know the basics of MySQL, I strongly urge you to get MySQL by Paul DuBois beforehand or while getting MySQL Building User Interfaces. You should definitely feel comfortable with Linux and desire to use Linux for programming (if you haven't heard of gcc, it is a pretty good sign that you may find more information on Linux useful). The author suggests that the reader has experience with GUI development, although he seems to be pretty thorough with his explanations. Regarding the structure of the book, the first unit, "Quick and Dirty", is roughly one third of the volume of the book. The first chapter compares MySQL with Access and SQL server, including a section called "What MySQL Lacks." The other 4 chapters include 2 chapters for VB developers and 2 chapters on GTK+. The next unit, taking a little over a third of the volume of the book, is "Real World Implementation" and includes 3 projects. The next unit is a tiny sliver of book with one chapter on dynamic user interface control with XML. The rest of the book is taking up by the appendix and index. This book is more of a niche book than MySQL by DuBois and if you fit into this niche, then you have struck gold with this book. If you don't fit this niche, buy DuBois' book.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
|
