Customer Reviews

Roger Jennings' Database Developer's Guide with Visual Basic 6

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Too many typos and problems with sample code! I can't believe Roger Jennings wrote this. Simple SQL code is flawed ie: author's use of "=>" (p.256, 261) rather than ">="; references to the sample code on the CD are incorrect -EVERYTIME! - the installation puts them folders identified as \ch03, etc. but in the book (and sometimes hardcoded in the .frm files) the path is \Ddg_vb6\Chaptr##. All of the .mdb files that have linked tables must be opened and relinked! If you don't know to do this (that is, if you are a newbie which why you are reading this book) you get an error message that is cryptic at best. I haven't opened a project file and executed it without some problem. For $60 I expected more. SAMS publishing should take a lesson in customer service and visit WROX publishing. No errata is available for this book! Why? Anyone who has written a positive thing about this book must not have opened any of the sample apps on the CD. Too bad, RJ is an excellent author but his support staff needs to learn VB because most of the samples are flawed.

Why don't authors test their code before they print it? All throughout the book author does this. For example, client side cursors can only be static type and in chap 3 the author codes .CusorLocation=adUseClient, .CusorType=adOpenKeyset (p.143). Geez. Other samples have adOpenDynamic. You can set the cursor type property to these enums but if you check the property via debug.print or in the locals window you will see the property = static. Something that simple makes me a bit unsure what is wrong with the more complex material in the latter part of the book. Other things that bothered me were the code on CD needed to be hacked to run. They should run right out of the box. Too much emphasis on the data controls. And what was all that about VCR drivers and video picons? what a waste of time and space. If I was married to this book I'd get a divorce!

I had high hopes for this book from its title. I thought, Whao! at last a book that will teach me about database programming like a developer. My joy evaporated faster than you can spell VB.

The book reads like a discussion between the writers and his/her knowledgeable peers with no room for us wannabee developers. I have reasonable proramming background including VB, but this book was all greek to me. Scattered code snippets here and there with no "real" explanations, buzz words like MTS,CORBA, NED ED or whatever without their functions or scope in reference of this book are just tip of this iceberg of problems.

I will keep this book. Someday when I learn to program serious vb database, I will come back to this book and check how many chapters I really understand. I am just sad that this book and my money did little to help me towards that goal.

Overall, a good book. However, Jennings needs to reorganize this thing. While reading the first two chapters, I thought I had wasted my money. The book begins to pick up at the end of chapter two, up to then, it read like a reference chart. He does include plenty of code examples without delving too deep into the obscure of ADO. For VB6 database programming there is not much to choose from. This book defenitly suited my needs.

This book is not for the beginning VB database programmer. It rushes into some advanced topics that a newbie could get lost in.

It has some EXCELLENT presentations and ideas on Decisions Support Systems, and covers MTS very well for a book that does not specialize in it. I think that the most valuable portion of this book were the (brief) examples and ideas on using VB with OLAP and Data Warehousing. It is difficult to find useful information on these topics that you can apply in the real world with VB.

I will be using this book as a reference in some of my future works.

I am not native in English, nor can I understand what was meant with: "the author made little attempt to be clear and ... concise(?)". Jeez, freedom of speech.

Yes, the author could have avoided charts, but in the context of a comparison and the paradigm shift from ADO, RDO to ADO. He decided to thoroughly document what he was talking about.

With so many sh#tty books out there. It is healthy and enchanting that there are people who can do a decent job.

I even found out that somebody with the same name, is that him?, wrote a similar book for VC++ Version 4. In case it was him, I wish He'd write a similar book about DCOM/COM/Database programming in VC++6.

Thank you Roger Jennings

I used this book to teach the VB6 features which are used in connection to database application. Apart from traditional client/server database application, the book also covers further topics of using MTS, DHTML and IIS for database application development. Overall this book covers all the necessary bells and whistles for building enterprise applications using the new features of VB6.

Ver nice to "always find waht you lookin for" when using this book. The text is "floating" straight in to my hard learned 640k brain.

But this is a terrible book. Very disorganized, limited samples, poorly explained source code. Don't waste your money. There are much better books out there.

This book is big and expensive, but well worth the cost and reading effort. It covers literally everything relating to VB6 database development and is well grounded in the traditions, methods and techniques of Visual Basic database development for business generally. ADO is effectively covered and the book demonstrates impressive Front-end design techniques for both "heads-down" data entry and decision-support, online-analytical-processing. Querie and client-server database design issues are explored with an in-depth nontrivial seriousness. MTS, multidimensional data analysis and much more is also well covered. I can't recommend this book highly enough. It is a difficult but immensely rewarding work. Thank-you Roger Jennings!