Professional ASP.NET 1.0 (2002 Edition) [Paperback]

Alex Homer (Author), Dave Sussman (Author)

Book Description

Series: Programmer to programmer | Publication Date: February 2002

This comprehensive compendium provides a broad and thorough investigation of all aspects of programming with ASP.NET. Entirely revised and updated for the Golden Release of .NET, this book will give you the information you need to master ASP.NET and build dynamic, successful, enterprise Web applications.

With this Special Edition, you can access this book free for one year on Wroxbase - Wrox's new online library of books.

Those who have purchased the previous edition of this book will be able to access this book at Wroxbase at a specially reduced rate. To find out more about Wroxbase, visit wroxbase.com.

In this book, we:

Explain what ASP.NET is, and how it makes building applications even easier
Show how easy it is to work with ASP.NET pages and server-side controls
Access data of all kinds in our ASP.NET pages, and introduce ADO.NET
Examine how XML is an integral part of data manipulation
Use Web Services to provide asynchronous background services to applications
Discuss and demonstrate the ASP.NET application framework
Show how easy it is to build and deploy custom ASP.NET controls
Combine the concepts discussed in the book into an ASP.NET application
Discuss how it is possible to migrate from ASP to ASP.NET

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

This book is aimed at experienced ASP developers who are working at the leading edge, rather than the casual ASP developer or beginner. For example, we do not cover the basics of COM, ASP, or the programming languages we use in this book.

You don't need to be experienced with ASP to make the most of this book although being relatively comfortable with ASP concepts with certainly help. This book is also ideal for Visual Basic developers who want to make the move into Web application design. You should also understand the general principles of the use of components, and have knowledge of Visual Basic (or VBScript). Some of the samples are written in other languages, such JScript and C#, but you don't need to be fluent in these languages to be able to use this book.

From the Back Cover

What you need to know

This book is for people that:

• Have a solid understanding of ASP
• Are familiar with VB or C-based syntax (C++, Java™, or C#)
• Want to develop sophisticated ASP.NET applications using the .NET Framework
• Want a comprehensive and in-depth guide to this exciting new technology

Comprehensive, in-depth, and practical, this Professional guide to ASP.NET development will enable you to fully master the power and possibilities of web application development with the .NET Framework.

What you will learn from this book

• Getting started with ASP.NET and the .NET Framework
• Creating ASP.NET pages, working with server controls, and data management
• Developing, securing, and configuring web applications
• Base class libraries, components, and extensibility
• Web Services and ASP.NET in the mobile arena
• Debugging, performance, migration, and interoperability
• Integrating this knowledge in real world development contexts

"I was blown away when, way back in 1997, I first saw ASP 1.0. As subsequent versions appeared, I often thought that there wasn’t much else they could do to improve it – but I was wrong. Get ready to be blown away all over again by ASP.NET."
Alex Homer, Software Developer and Wrox Technical Author --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 1300 pages
• Publisher: Peer Information; Special edition (February 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1861007035
• ISBN-13: 978-1861007032
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7.3 x 1.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.4 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,539,079 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

38 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Occasionally Great, Usually Mediocre, March 24, 2002

By 

Gary - See all my reviews

This review is from: Professional ASP.NET 1.0 (2002 Edition) (Paperback)

This was just about the first ASP.NET book out there. The first edition dates back almost a year! Many ASP.NET developers used this to get started (like me), and believe me, it wasn't always easy. There are some great parts, some incredibly repetitive parts (the effect of having so many authors), and some infuriating mistakes. Finally they fixed those in this edition--did anyone else but me struggle with the completely wrong description of security rule priority?

The factual problems are fixed in this version, but it is still a painfully disorganized way to learn. It's best for programmers with hefty .NET and ASP experience. Many fundamentals (like session state) just aren't covered. Now there are other best first choices. I particularly like ASP.NET The Complete Reference (McGraww Hill), which has a comprehensive look at code-behind development, VS.NET, and best practices, which most books ignore. ANother good one is Programming ASP.NET (Oreilly) which covers everthing in VB and C#! AsP.nET unleashed is a solid title too (very comprehensive), but it is a little wonky in places. Who would use a database trigger to write a file on updates? That's one of the most unscalable ideas i've ever heard. One thing I've discovered is that books that pretend to be more specific, like e-commerce with ASP.NET, or data-driven sites with ASP.NET, are really just basic ASP.NET introductions that don't cover all the features. You are best off (right now at least) with an all in one.

In short, this book will do, and has good parts. But why bother now that other books (written carefully by a single guru instead of patched together from a whole comittee) are available?

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Vast amount of information, April 4, 2002

By 

Jason Richards (Princeton NJ) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Professional ASP.NET 1.0 (2002 Edition) (Paperback)

I found that this book contains a vast amount of information on virtually everything you will need to know to really get up to speed with ASP.NET. I wasn't sure whether to go for this big Wrox book after reading some negative reviews about the old edition, but I've been as impressed by this title as much as I was by Wrox's former Professional ASP.

Make no mistake, this is not a book for beginners. This reflects the complexity of ASP.NET. But as a comprehensive and high level study of ASP.NET, it would be hard to beat. If you're looking for a book that starts with the basics, and gradually builds up your knowledge, this book mightn't be for you. It tackles all the important topics of ASP.NET, and so assumes that the reader can keep up a fast pace.

Unlike the earlier reviewer, I didn't find any bugs in the code download. In fact, I found the code to be very well organised, and free of errors.

16 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Possibily the most frustrating book on asp.net, May 24, 2002

By 

"japanfirst" (Yokohama-shi, Kohoku-ku Japan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Professional ASP.NET 1.0 (2002 Edition) (Paperback)

I found this book frustrating for so many reasons but the most prominent are:

* most of the code in the book is in VB.net and a smattering of C# - and no matter what the authors say you can't learn this in two languages. It would have been nicer to see a separate C# edition. I kept trying to port the vb code to C# and ran into problem after problem.

* most of the sample code is buggy and a pain to get going. trying to follow the examples in the book with the code provided felt like a great waste of time. But more than that the way they structured the code was weird. They put the connection string in a usercontrol. Dont you think putting it in the config file or a db class would have been better. And dont even get me started on why they use three different connection methods. And not once did I see code behind.

* Structure of the book could have been better as well. There is little sense of evolution in your work - each chapter is self contained and that has its benefits but you couldnt see how to put everything together - enterprise class system design is definitely not present.