ASP. Net Programmers Reference [Bargain Price] (Paperback)

~ Jason Bell (Author), Mike Clark (Author), Andy Elmhorst (Author), Matt Gibbs (Author), Bruce Lee (Author), Matt Milner (Author), Jan Narkiewicz (Author), Adil Rehan (Author), John Schenken (Author), Alex Homer (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

For any Web developer tackling Microsoft's new .NET platform, ASP.NET Programmer's Reference is the perfect guide to digging into the APIs and programming techniques you need to start writing in real projects.

While billed as a reference, which it surely is, this title is also a strong choice for a tutorial designed to get you working with the powerful .NET Framework in a hurry. Early sections set the stage with a comparison of the older ASP standard and the advantages of the new ASP.NET. The authors then dig right in with essential APIs that will get you started here, like using built-in objects for requests, sessions, and cookies. Short code excerpts in VB .NET and C# illustrate just how to do it.

The new choices for ADO.NET components will surely challenge new .NET programmers. This book excels at describing all of your options, from simpler HTML controls to the new Web Forms options. Standout sections include full coverage of the variety of list components available in ASP.NET, from simple lists to grids and Repeater controls. For wireless development, the authors reprise their coverage of controls with those available for PDAs and handhelds in Microsoft's Mobile Internet Toolkit.

Successful ASP.NET development requires more than using Web controls. A really useful section here tours the "core" .NET system classes for collections, regular expressions, and file I/O, which will let you perform basic tasks in your Web applications.

Later sections turn toward server-side options available in .NET, from caching pages for better performance to configuration options (using new configuration properties files), and a rich tour of the security options for ASP.NET programmers (including the new Microsoft Passport service). Rounding out this book is excellent coverage of the standards and classes you will need to implement Web services and XML, as well as a reference section with complete code examples for common ASP.NET tasks (including building a simple Web service).

The .NET Framework is powerful and complicated enough, but armed with ASP.NET Programmer's Reference, busy developers can master the most important classes and APIs in order to start creating the next round of Windows software on .NET. --Richard Dragan --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Description

ASP.NET is a totally new way of creating dynamic web applications, giving developers more flexibility and functionality than ever before. Its fresh approach of placing commonly-used code into controls, and separating presentation from business logic, makes developing and maintaining applications far easier. It is part of the Microsoft .NET Framework, and as such allows code to be created in any language that the Framework supports (currently C#, VB.NET, and JScript.NET out of the box).

This reference is divided into four sections. The first covers all the important ASP.NET namespaces for User Interface design, while the second looks at "behind the scenes" topics like caching and configuration. The third section looks at the important new arena of Web Services, and finally, the fourth deals with the remaining hot topics, such as data access and XML, as well as containing a chapter of short, fully-working examples relating to all sections of the book, to help you understand the concepts being presented.

This book covers:

All major ASP.NET specific namespaces

Caching

Configuration

Security

Useful .NET Framework namespaces

Web Services
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 950 pages
• ISBN-10: 186100530X
• ASIN: B0000B0SZQ
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.1 x 2.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #3,350,715 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Half-baked intro with a decent namespace reference, November 1, 2001

By	[e-mail] (Nashville, TN USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: ASP. Net Programmers Reference (Paperback)

What this book covers: web controls, HTML controls, mobile internet toolkit, caching, configuration, security, xml, data and quite a few chapters on web services. Add a chapter (intro) on ASP.NET and you have the entire book summed up. Now the review:

I used to love Wrox. From a programmer's standpoint, they used to have the best books, bar none. Unfortuantely, they seem to be more interested in being the first to market these days rather than being the best.

On the plus side, Wrox's books always have plenty of sample code. This book is no exception. The problem I have is the book tries to be both an intro and a namespace reference, and it does neither exceptionally well, although it does better as a namespace reference. For this reason, I will keep this book in my normal reference library until something else comes along, but a more complete reference on the .NET Framework would be a wonderful addition (hint! hint!).

The book starts out as an intro to ASP.NET. Since ASP.NET is more of a technology than a language or product, this is a tough row to hoe. ANd, the book falls a bit flat. In previous ASP books, this was a much easier task, as ASP was thought of more as a language (due to the overwhelming adoption of VBScript for server side code) than a technology.

The book then begins to go through various .NET Framework namespaces that you will use with ASP.NET. While I believe a more full reference is in order, the namespaces covered are those you are more likely to use in your web work. The book tools along for awhile and then takes a sudden break with mobile controls. While I believe these are useful for web work, the placement of this chapter in the middle of the book is a bit confusing (must be the multiple author problem). The other confusing chapter is called Useful .NET namespaces - since almost every chapter deals with a namespace, why stop in the middle to generically single some out?

The book is not bad, and it is certainly worth the (price). I guess I have just come to expect so much more from a Wrox Reference. As they become heftier, they are less useful as a book to carry to a client site. And, as they become more a teaching book (which they are not doing well at here) and less a reference, it becomes harder to justify the expenditure.

In Summary: If you need a reference to learn a bit more about the .NET Framework namespaces, as they relate to ASP.NET, this is a good addition to your library. If you want to learn ASP.NET, look elsewhere.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great dog-eared, coffee-stained reference, October 4, 2002

By	Southern California .NET User Group (SoCalNETug.org) - See all my reviews

This review is from: ASP. Net Programmers Reference (Paperback)

This book is ideal for intermediate programmers developing web applications with Microsoft's Visual Studio .NET. It works best as a reference for those simply looking for ways to "make stuff work" who don't need the hand-holding of step-by-step instructions, but aren't ready for simple, austere object definitions. Using an appropriate number of examples in both C# and VB.NET, the authors have successfully put together a book that has helped my shop overcome several hurdles in the month we've been using it.
In the new .NET paradigm, ASP exists only as a descriptive name applied to collections of objects that "make stuff work" on the web. Powered by C#, VB.NET, or almost any language you chose, the .NET framework Intermediate Language and Just-In-Time compilation has made an understanding of how "classic" Active Server Pages work obsolete.

However, the name ASP seems to be maintained to provide familiarity to those of us making the transition from ASP 3.0 to "any-web-application-built-with-.NET." This book fulfils that calling by giving the right mix of definitions, examples, and background information without using excess space or time.

The majority of the chapters cover most of the collections of objects (namespaces) that give an application functionality on the web. Without question, we used these sections the most. For those of us making the transition to C# at the same time we're getting used to .NET web development, these chapters were a life-saver. They gave all the answers we couldn't find in any C# reference manual tailored specifically for the types of web applications we were creating. Since we adopted .NET a few months ago, for the first time we were able to concetrate on functionality instead of C# as a frustrating language. I'm not sure how VB 6.0 programmers will look at it, but they seem to be getting the better reference books in the marketplace so far, so it was a relief to find every example done in both C# and VB.NET.

While this book would be key for beginning .NET developers ready for more robust applications or intermediate programmers moving from another language, I suspect that advanced programmers will be disappointed. For example, XML and Mobile Devices get chapters, but they don't conatain enough information for real development. You would need to have a much better background in either subject to actually develop. However, if you had that background, these sections wouldn't tell you anything you didn't already know.

The strength of this book is not as a "front-to-back" read, but as the dog-eared, coffee-stained reference that allows an intermediate level programmer to produce web applications that work--and work well. While not an expert, I've used ASP.NET Programmer's Reference to give myself a solid base of knowledge. By the time I master the material, I'll be well-prepared to tackle some of the more obscure .NET namespaces and cutting edge web technologies. ---Reviewed By Jay L.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great reference with examples, February 3, 2003

By	Cameron L. Wolff (Delaware, OH USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: ASP.NET 1.0 Namespace Reference with C# (Paperback)

Finally, a book I have been looking for; a readable reference with solid examples. Does a great job on the namespaces it covers. Looking forward to similiar books to cover additional namespaces. This is not a tutorial. Gets straight to the point and provides you with the information you need to use a class and its associated methods and properties. Provides just enough background to provide context for the namespaces referenced. If you are interested in a reference that show you what namespace to use for a particular purpose and concisely shows you how to use the namespace, then this book is for you.