Reviews for The Ultimate VB.NET & ASP.NET Code Book (Books for Professionals by Professionals)

1. Not too sure

   Rated 2 out of 5 stars, April 12th, 2005

   I have read the first few chapters and am disappointed. The book reckons that it is for intermediate users which is me all over, but I find the book is just telling me what I already know. It goes over the basics, and waffles, and waffles. I feel like screaming at the book to tell it to get to the point and when it finally does, I already knew it!!

   Having said that, I am only part way through, so perhaps the meat is in the middle, but I'm not sure I have the faith to keep on going.

2. Very useful bordering on invaluable

   Rated 4 out of 5 stars, February 12th, 2005

   I'd have to say that this book isn't as good as it makes itself out to be, but that does not a bad book make. I'm a fairly experienced VB6/VBA/VB.NET developer but the .NET Framework is a big piece of kit so it never hurts to have a few good tricks up one's sleeve. This book provides that, but probably not to the extent that author would have you believe (not a Yorkshireman of the Harry Enfield ilk I hasten to add).

   That said, I would thoroughly recommend this as an essential addition to a developer's bookshelf for a number of reasons. For one, there's bound to be at least something in here that's useful and/or interesting, no matter how experienced you are. There were a number of tips in this book which in themselves were of little use to me but had the side effect of making me aware of a whole new branch of .net functionality, or simply a better way to solve a problem than the one I'd thought of. I have to admit that I only found about 20-25% of the book useful but quality not quantity is what matters.

   Second this book considers VB.NET for what it was designed to be: a rapid development tool. So the tips are geared towards productivity gains rather than architectural considerations (I say this as one of the increasing band of the anally retentive who considers architecture supreme). Admittedly that does lead to one of its failings; encouraging poor architectural practices - but then a lot of Microsoft provided features go against their best advice. But if you need answers or suggestions that will help you get that app out the door faster then this is the tome to peruse.

   Finally, Karl Moore does have an appreciation that converting between languages is often made more difficult than it needs to be. The VB6 transition is (fairly) well handled and the VB.NET to C# converter is excellent (in tandem with Juval Lowy's advice I have now taken to coding my business server components in C#).

   So unless you really do know all there is to know about VB.NET (you memorised all the inheritance hierarchies? You need to get out more!!) then there's bound to be something in here that will be useful in one way or another.

3. Well worth the price

   Rated 4 out of 5 stars, January 12th, 2004

   My mum always said that if you buy a cookbook and get just one great recipe from it, it was worth the price. The same applies to this book, which is crammed with hints, tips, and information. Some of the ideas will be useful to you and some not, but even an experienced VB.NET developer will probably get useful information from this book that s/he didn't already know.

   If you're learning VB.NET or ASP.NET, this will not be the only book you buy. But once you start writing live code it's a handy book to have on the desk, and it contains useful information that I haven't found in other much larger books. I have applied several of Moore's code samples to my own code and saved hours of time in the process. To get the best from this book you need to read through it quickly to get an idea of the areas covered, and then keep it handy while coding to go back and get the detail.

   My only criticism is that the index and chapter layouts aren't as logical as they could be. Several times I've had to wade through many pages looking for information that I knew was in there, but I couldn't find in the index.

4. Best-seller!!!

   Rated 5 out of 5 stars, October 12th, 2003

   I heard this book was a best-seller and i see why after buying it. When so many books have such poor information on REAL developers, this is the one shining light. i bought Mr Moore's "Tutorials", but this is his ultimate piece of work.. if you ues VB .NET or ASP.NET you have to BUY THIS, you will be amazed!!

5. Great time-saving purchase!

   Rated 5 out of 5 stars, September 12th, 2003

   This book offers literally thousands of refreshing new tips, tricks and techniques that I haven't seen covered anywhere else. Each would take me hours to find out on my own... and even though this is more a reference book, reading it is a real adventure. Every page gives you one or two entirely new and refreshing pieces of ready-to-run code that do stuff you just wouldn't believe. Two words: buy it!!