Customer Reviews

Visual Basic 5 Interactive Course

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Well, despite the very minimal errors in this book -(Yes, the angry people reviews are just over-reacting)- It is the, by far, best book for VB I have ever read! Anything I need to find in VB, I just look it up, and voila I find it. It's so easy and the examples are easy to read and to unerstand. GREAT BOOK! A Definate 11 on my chart!

This book has way too many errors and it is ridiculous. A beginner would struggle through this book and probally would not want to finish. I recall in one chapter there was at least one error on every single page. (even the programs on the CD have errors on them). If I didnt know C++ and wasnt already familiar with programming then I would not have been able to figure out how to correct the errors. There still were some to this day that I dont know how to correct. As others had said the errata sheet is just pathetic, it doesnt even have a third of the errors that I and many other readers have found. And dont bother trying to report an error, they NEVER acknowledge what you sent them and they NEVER reply. This brings me to another point about the online interactive course. At this point they screwed something up online and now when you take quizes it doesnt update your score, I have finished this book over a week ago, but I still havent completed the "Course" because it wont let me take the quizes. The only reason I gave this book 2 stars instead of 1 is because I did manage to learn Visual Basic although through a lot of frustration and heartache. I definetely would not reccommend this book for anyone who doesnt have any prior programming knowledge because it is not worth the money. I should have followed the other readers' advice about this book, and now I see that I should. If you are thinking about buying this book, I'm telling you do not. This book has clearly not been proofread and was rushed and I am pretty sure that there are many other books on this subject that are much better written and proofread. This is definetely going to be the last book I get from this series, and you shouldn't make it your first.

I used this book to get started with VB after not having been involved in programming since the bad old Fortran days and punch cards in college. I would recommend this book for anyone getting started, as it is a good reference, provides a structured curriculum and has a good companion CD. I also found the Learning Zone web site to be valuable for keeping me going.

That said, I am also in violent agreement with others who have commented on the plethora of errors in the code examples, left over VB4 terminology, wrong quiz answers and disconects here and there. I have gone through several other introductory VB books including Peter Wrights and VB for Dummies. I still found VB 5 Interactive to be a much better learning experience and reference guide. I find that I can quickly find and get up to speed on a subject after a review of the subject at hand. I hope a serious effort was made to clean things up for those who are starting with the VB6 version.

The style and layout of this book is excellent and easy to read. Though I wish I bought the newer book, Visual Basic 6 Interactive Course.

This text was originally started for VB4. This rewrite includes constant references to controls, etc. that no longer exist or have been renamed. Constant references to menus(VB4) that are not found in VB5 are confusing. Illustrations of screen output more often than not do not match what you will see when you run the code. The number of typos alone will slow down an experienced programmer and bring a beginner to a halt. The online errata only contains a fraction of the info needed to correct this text. This is the single worst text I have ever purchased.

This book contains way too many errors! Examples contain variable names that differ from the explanatory text! VERY FRUSTRATING! Some of the example programs build upon each other from lesson to lesson. This would normally be great except for the fact that a lot of the code becomes redundant and SPAGHETTI-ISH (which causes many runtime errors). Although you could learn a lot from this book, it is generally too frustrating to use it. Even the Waite Group's web site is extremely poor. Honestly, buy a book from a different publisher...you'll just be sorry if you buy VISUAL BASIC 5 INTERACTIVE COURSE!

I would have given this book a ZERO but the the lowest you can go is 1.Obviously the comments of the people who give this book 5 stars are the makers of this book or very advanced programmers who just say "oh is just a little mistake". This book should have been called VISUAL BUGS 5 INTERACTIVE COURSE! If you have a high tolerance for erros, plenty of spare time to surf the chat rooms asking endless questions on VB, or Just like trying to figure out what the heck your doing wrong when your following the directons step by step, then you've found the right book.

The on-line "mentors", discussion group archives, and having the book and tests on-line are great. The almost continuous stream of errors are not. I found the book educational and enjoyable, except for the many errors.

Good ideas, good examples, but so filled with mistakes it's almost comical. If you don't take the publisher's sloppiness too seriously, the book works. Even the errata sheet is pathetic. A real underachiever. Perhaps the "Homer Simpson" of programming books.

As I'm new to programming, I thought there was something I wasn't getting when I somehow slogged through the first three chapters, doing the lessons according to the book, and not getting my code to execute properly. As many people have pointed out in previous reviews, I thank God that I am NOT ALONE!

This was the first book I ever bought about introductory programming in Visual Basic. Unfortunately, it was not the last.

The concept is admirable; however, as someone new to programming, I found that the book was hard to follow with all the errors in the text and in the coding, as well as the references to directories which weren't there.

This book could have been great, but it's only so-so. The web site is useful, but not everyone has access to the www, and therefore may not be aware of the revisions/corrections to the text.

I don't think I'd recommend this book as an intro to programming. Que's Visual Basic 5 Night School by Greg Perry was much more helpful and easier to follow.

A good attempt, but not good enough, unfortunately.