Customer Reviews

Official PowerBuilder® 6 Fundamentals, Second Edition

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I bought this book in desperation, after having trudged through the awful Using PowerBuilder 6 by Que, and having learned very little. It is an excellent, well designed, and thoughtfully laid out introduction to PowerBuilder that will have you up and coding in no time. I was a little put off by the 'Official' tag, expecting a re-hash of the online help, but this is an outside publication, written by people who know what they are talking about, and more importantly, know how to explain what they know. The book is divided into sections, each building on the previous. The tutorial in Section B is a great introduction to building applications with PowerBuilder. Forget Que's book, this is the introduction for beginners, and it also covers more advanced topics not even mentioned in Using PowerBuilder, like modifying the database .ini files. In summary, a great buy!

This book is an excellent tutorial, even for the beginning programmer. If the instructions are followed as written, the results on the screen match the results in the book...the first time this has ever happened for me. It gives one a real sense of confidence. The book is wonderful, but the CD isn't. I got the 30-day demo to run by downloading and installing the one from the PowerSoft internet site, and haven't found much on the CD that has been useful yet.

I had no PowerBuilder experience whatsoever, but after going through this book I have developed several applications. The book is written in a very basic and step-by-step manner. This is the best PowerBuilder book I have come across for beginners ever!

I highly recommend this book for beginners; definitely this is a great value! I started as a programmer two months ago. I had never been exposed to PowerBuilder, and I had to make some modifications to an existing PowerBuilder application. By reading the book and following the tutorial application, in less than two weeks I was able to understand the basics of how PowerBuilder works. The book is also so well organized; it was very easy for me to locate which events to modify within the application, and which PowerScript commands to use. The book is so easy to follow and understand.

When I thought of teaching myself Powerbuilder, the biggest dellima that I faced was to choose a good book. I tried out books which teaches step by step procedures in getting started with powerbuilder, but the biggest draw back of those books were that they were more like a receipe rather than providing with concepts. The official Poerbuilder 6.0 fundamentals was the best book that I read. It provides good explanation and also in deatils the real working of an application. I strongly suggest this book to anyone who is interested in the fundamentals of Powerbuilder.

I'm a VB, ASP and Coldfusion programmer. I've read the "Using Powerbuilder 6" and the "Powerbuilder Unleashed" series. The "Powerbuilder Unleashed" is a good reference for the intermediate and the "Using Powerbuilder 6" is worthless!! After purchasing this book I was up and coding, creating a multi-form application in a week. If you're a beginner and want a solid foundation this is the book.

This PowerBuilder 6 book is a fast paced introduction to PowerBuilder. The CD includes a 30 day demo version of PowerBuilder; although the book is 650 pages, 30 days is satisfactory. The authors introduce PowerBuilder by leading the reader through several hands-on examples that eventually culminate into a small application. It was helpful to have each example relate to a single project. The first half of the book teaches the basics of PowerBuilder with very detailed and thoroughly explained examples. The second half introduces several more advanced topics without spending a lot of time on any single subject. I was impressed enough with this book that I plan to order the next book from Sybase Press on Advanced PowerBuilder.

Of all the books for PowerBuilder I have used this is the greatest! I learned PowerBuilder in depth in less than a week with this book. While I have an extensive programming background, it would not be necessary to make use of this book. Well written and documented. If you are using PB 6.5 there are some minor differences between what is in the book and how your PB will work. The book was written with a prerelease version of PB 6. Hats off to the authors, this is one of the best books I have bought in a long time!

This book is a must for those looking for a book on Powerbuilder 6 from people who know how to transfer their knowledge. Unlike many other authors, Erlank and Levin are excellent 'teachers'. Persons new to the subject and object oriented programming, will find the subject matter extremely easy to follow. A highly recommeded text. Money well spent!!

What a wonderful book. I have not written a line of (commercially usable) code in several years and was therefore new to hands-on GUI development. If you are like me: this is the PowerBuilder book for you !!!