Customer Reviews

Programming Microsoft Internet Explorer 5 (Microsoft Programming Series)

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

 

 

If you're a VB programmer and want to automate Explorer, just somebody who wants to learn a [little] bit more about what's under the hood, or an advanced programmer who is willing to pay for a little push, this may be the book for you.

If you are hardcore: This is not a great book (by almost every metric); I lament that, as a technical book, it does not [even] compare favorably to MS Press books such as Rogerson's now-semi-classic Inside COM (from three years ago) or [let alone] the great Ray Duncan's Adv. MSDOS Programming (from twelve years ago; ack!); it's a bad sign that MS Press can no longer deliver for such an important platform (esp. if they want to compete with the Mozilla platform where source is avail.). Roughly half the book is devoted to what is essentially web page development ([MS]HTML, scripting, [MS]DHTML) which is covered [better] in many other books; the *presentation* *is* oriented to development of applications with browser front-ends, but its a waste of space. The rest of the book is a subset of documentation and examples available at msdn.microsoft.com/workshop. Needless to say, there is no mention of cross-browser development issues and API's (e.g. NS plugin API or DOM compatibility). The redundancy in the book may be useful for getting started if you can spare the cash (to better see how the COM-bone connects to the registry-bone connects to the web-accessory-bone, etc.). Just remember that there are many powerfull API's (= things you can do, but arn't in the book) that are [poorly] documented elsewhere or not at all; see msdn and the relevant newsgroups. This book is a missed opportunity.

Even though I've only made use of Chapters 6 & 7 to date (Automating Internet Explorer and Internet Explorer Events), the book has already paid for itself in terms of the development time it has saved me researching this information. Mr. Roberts does a fantastic job of explaining not just one, but many ways of controlling Internet Explorer via a seperate program and provides many examples. A great resource for the web developer!

If you want to know how to use the WebControl features of IE this is the book to get. Not only is it written clearly, and by someone that really knows his stuff, it is loaded with examples. You can't do better!

Whether you want to use the web browser control in your own program or automate a running instance of Internet Explorer this is an awesome book. To get the most out of some parts of this book you need to have at least a basic understanding of COM, but it does offer a brief introduction.

This book goes in to the right amount of detail on the WebBrowser control and other IE5 technologies, and fills in many gaps in the docs and MSDN.

I've noticed a disturbing trend in MS books that I have recently read. Both this and "Programming ADO" have been written by support guys at MS who seem to have a reasonably broad handle on the subject matter, but not a very deep one. This book, in particular, teased me with the richness of the IE development environment without really drilling down. This would have been a better book if it was lighter on scripting (there are much better books out there for that) and really explored the IE interfaces (of which there are a ton) in depth. Having said that, If you are new to IE, then this book has some value - especially if you prefer books over MSDN documentation. The source code is decent as well, and at least doesn't short-change the C++ programmer - another disturbing trend in MS Press books.

I had the opportunity to work closely with Scott Roberts in Developer Support for Internet Explorer technologies while Internet Explorer 5 was in development. Scott was so expert in the use of the new technologies that they hired him to develop future versions. Scott's advice was essential while I was writing samples for the book. Pick up the MS Press book on XML, and along with "Programming Microsoft Internet Explorer 5," you'll have everything you need to develop mission-critical weblications using this incredible platform!

I read this and got the idea for "DHTML Desktop" Dynamic properties: You can have properties update based on push, not pull = less code. I had never heard of this elsewhere.

A brief history of Microsoft Internet Explorer