Amazon.com Review
Once in a while, Visual Basic goes through a paradigm shift. The recent jump to .NET was one, and
The Visual Basic .NET Programming Language succeeds very well in explaining to programmers--and not just experienced VB programmers, either--what the changes mean to software architecture and implementation. If you need to figure out how VB.NET works, this book, more than any other, will help you make fast initial progress. This guide is clear; it's practical; it focuses on the parts of the VB.NET programming language and its runtime environment that every developer has to understand. You'll probably want to supplement this book with more specialized ones that deal with databases, networking, user interfaces or whatever specific capabilities you need to work with, but this book is probably the best place to start. The author's attention to coding style and software design is a bonus that will help you write code that not only runs, but is more self-documenting and easier to debug.
The educational value of this book is inversely proportional to its mass. It's a thinnish volume, but Paul Vick--who works for Microsoft and helped design VB.NET--makes such clever use of examples that it's likely you'll find answers to many of your questions (for example, "How do you write class constructors in VB.NET?" and "What does the VB.NET inheritance model look like?") in the form of executable code. Read Vick's explanations, examine and run his code, and you'll be well down the road to VB.NET proficiency. --David Wall
Topics covered: How to program in VB.NET, with emphasis on the core language itself rather than on any development environment or specialized API. Sections address basic and complex data types, operators, and exception handling. About half the book is a clear, example-driven explanation of object-orientation under VB.NET. An appendix deals with difference between the old Component Object Model (COM) and the new Common Language Runtime (CLR).
Product Description
This book describes the Visual Basic .NET programming language, starting with the simplest concepts first and gradually working up to the most advanced concepts. In this way it can be used both as a guide to the language for people new to VB .NET, as well as a reference for experienced VB .NET developers. While there are many books on the market on Visual Basic .NET, there are very few references, and no others from any core member of the Visual Basic development team. The tech reviewers have praised the clear writing style, the concise yet thorough coverage, the usefulness of the examples, and the effectiveness of the organization. Reviewers have also noted many topics not covered in other books, or not covered nearly as well, including events, delegates, versioning, obsoleting code, and using shadowing. Data collected by Microsoft indicate that the long-awaited move from Visual Basic 6 to Visual Basic .NET should be in full swing as this book releases. A June 2003 survey conducte by Readex for SD Times shows usage of Visual Basic .NET among professional developers moving from 32% currently to 46% by June of 2004, a huge jump. The Visual Basic .N ET Programming Language is the one book that all VB professionals will need to have on their desk.
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