Product Description
ASP.NET 2.0 Programming: Problem Design Solution is aimed at describing, designing, and implementing a site much like the ones you’re probably working on or will be soon, while taking the opportunity to introduce and explain many of the new features that the new great ASP.NET 2.0 framework offers. Difficult problems are addressed head-on so you'll be ready for most of the problems you’ll typically face when writing a modern website, and have one or more solutions ready for them.

Unlike many other ASP.NET books that show examples for individual pages or features, the example in this book is an integrated end-to-end site (written in C#). The entire book and site has been written specifically for ASP.NET 2.0, to use the ASP.NET 2.0 features wherever they make sense.

The end-result is a website which features a layout with user-selectable themes, a membership system, a content management system for publishing and syndicating articles and photos, polls, mailing lists, forums, an e-commerce store with support for real-time credit card processing, homepage personalization, and localization. The book leads the reader through development of a site with:

• Account registration, personalization and theming
• News and events, organized into categories
• Opinion polls
• Newsletter
• Forums
• E-commerce store with shopping cart and order management
• Localization

Customer Reviews (68)

Practical to build entreprise level site
With this book, you can build a site with enterprise architecture and design.
Author explains how to solve real world problem clearly step by step. (Problem - Design - Solution). Worth read.
However, in user authentication part, it uses .NET default interface. More should be discussed on how to implement customized interface. It is normal to change the security feature based on business own implementation. It takes me some time to search on implementation of customized security module. Thus, I take out one star for this.

Excellent ASP.NET 2.0 book
This book is remarkable in many aspects, and the approach of studying a commercial website allows to cover a variety of very helpful techniques in ASP.NET 2.0. You'll learn many useful aspects of ASP.NET 2.0, instead of focusing on every domain of the framework. Also, the quality of the studied website exceeds the quality of many popular commercial websites throughout the web...

One of a kind
One of my worst gripes about ASP.NET books is that they routinely go over an extensive tour of every single little component, but dedicate very little time and space to each component and more importantly they do not show how these component fit together in a real application. So you are left with all pieces of the puzzle in your box, but no strategy for putting them together. Granted, most programming book even in the JSP/Strus/JSF area do only show toy examples of applications... but that's better than nothing! Well Marco has accomplished even more in this book, showing how to build and real life application.
The Beer House (a web site for an imaginary pub) has security and role management, themes, profiles,rather sophisticated strategies for data access, and shows you how to build an international site with articles, newsletters, forums, polls and even web parts! And last but not least it's a fun project...who isn't tired of the boring lifeless examples usually found in technical books? Seeing an programmer like Marco who takes joy in what he does and can mix fun and business is always a good sign....
It's clear that he has spent countless hours building various web content management systems on his own.. and he's had a great idea in putting his expertise in this book. I just wonder why more developers don't do the same thing! My only little complaint is that I would have liked to see more space devoted on how to build the UI. Yes, I know, this is not a book for beginners, but I have yet to see a book that covers how to effectively use the ASP.NET data bound controls.. they usually devote just a page or two to each, usually showing just one example of their possible uses.. and I think that there are many developers out there who could benefit from such a study, not even counting those coming from other platforms, who are veterans in OO programming and building business logic but much less versed in the intricacies of Visual Studio Wizards.
I would not buy this book right now anyhow.. because two new books from the same author are upcoming..
ASP.NET MVC 1.0 Website Programming: Problem - Design - Solution
ASP.NET 3.5 Website Programming: Problem - Design - Solution
and I am sure they will be even better than this one!

Excellent ASP.NET 2.0 title.
This book is a must read for any ASP.NET web application developer (Beginner to Intermediate). I have learned and developed quite a few new concepts and ideas in a more practical and example/goal oriented approach. Very helpfull for live application development/Project challenges. Different from other books which just talk about what is there in ASP.NET 2.0 but seldom talk about how to bring all those features together to build a complete solution. The author makes sure to give a breif overview/background of the feature before diving in to make use of it.

A must read for any ASP.NET web developer who is looking to put all the features together to build a solution! Two thumbs up..Can't wait for the 3.5 version. HAPPY CODING!

Kindle Version Feedback
The content in this book deserves better formatting. The code samples are in font so small and embedded as images. The result is that the "Zoom" feature helped little, and the code required being tethered to the laptop. I could not use this book for more than an overview. Disappointing to see that the publisher did not use text for the code. ... Read more

Product Description
A practical guide to securing ASP.NET sites

Beginning ASP.NET Security is for novice to intermediate ASP.NET programmers and provides a step-by-step solution to securing each area of ASP.NET development. Rather than approaching security from a theoretical direction, MVP Barry Dorrans shows you examples of how everyday code can be attacked, and describes the steps necessary for defense. Inside, you'll learn how you can defend your ASP.NET applications using the .NET framework, industry patterns and best practices, code libraries and resources provided by Microsoft and others.

Beginning ASP.NET Security:

• Explores issues with user input including validation, cross-site scripting (XSS) and cross-site request forgery (CSRF)

• Teaches how to securely access your database and defend against SQL injection attacks

• Shares techniques for keeping secrets, including encryption, hashing and preventing information leaks

• Examines methods for authenticating and authorizing users, including ASP.NET membership providers and preventing cookie theft

• Shares tips for securing your web server, including how ASP.NET uses trust levels and locking down IIS

• Unveils ways to securely use WCF web services

• Presents security with the Microsoft ASP.NET Ajax framework and Silverlight

• Includes an overview of security with the Microsoft MVC framework

Wrox Beginning guides are crafted to make learning programming languages and technologies easier than you think, providing a structured, tutorial format that will guide you through all the techniques involved.

wrox.com

Programmer Forums
Join our Programmer to Programmer forums to ask and answer programming questions about this book, join discussions on the hottest topics in the industry, and connect with fellow programmers from around the world.

Code Downloads
Take advantage of free code samples from this book, as well as code samples from hundreds of other books, all ready to use.

Read More
Find articles, ebooks, sample chapters and tables of contents for hundreds of books, and more reference resources on programming topics that matter to you. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Excellent coverage of Security for ASP.NET
Title of Barry Dorrans' book "Beginning ASP.NET Security" is not quite inline with the contents of the book I would think.I would at least make the title 'Intermediate'.Because you may see some eyes roll, when you see "Beginner's..." in the title.However given that securing applications is a journey, rather than the destination, maybe he has a valid point.

Mr. Dorrans does a very thorough job covering many and various aspects of web security. First chapter opens up with a defaced web site and a list "do's", such as never trusting input, failing gracefully (not giving any useful information such as stacktrace), watching and logging actions, and using the least privilege principles while running the applications.Lot of times, I hear "we use SSL, we are secure".Such naive developer should really consider reading this book.

Chapter 2 explains how the web works, and this is totally beginner's chapter, but still a great refresher.Introduces Fiddler2, Tracing in asp.net, the ASP.NET pipeline and web forms.Chapter 3 is about user input.I have read the book "Writing Secure Code" and very glad to see Mr. Dorrans's referencing of this book in the second paragraph. Goes on to introduce cross-site scripting attack and protection of cookies, the out-of-the box Validation controls which classic ASP.NET offers.

Chapter 4 extends the user input validation in forms of query strings, form fields, events and such, and the main take away is the CSRF (Cross-site request forgery) attack.Enjoyed reading the section of writing an HTTP module to protect against CSRF attacks which is a few pages long. Chapter 5 dives into ViewState, validating it, encrypting it.Error handling and logging, exception handling, and WMIare precious gems to take away from this chapter as well.

Chapter 6 is about hashing and encryption.Then goes in depth with salting, storing passwords, types of encyrption which are very inline with the next chapter, about user names and passwords.The authentication and authorization are discussed.Chapter 8 is securing database access, and the well-known SQL-injection attack followed by another chapter on filesystem security.The fileupload control for asp.net is introduced.

Chapter 10 is about XML security, validating, parsing, querying and xpath injection. Really enjoyed the short to the point code snippets in this chapter.Another take away is signing and encrypting an XML document using X509 certificate.

Part III (the remaining chapters) are getting further closer to the metal and relatively new technologies (.NET 3.0 and up).WCF, RIA (Ajax) and CAS are discussed in detail in chapter 11, 12, and 13.I would think in the next release CAS is going to be revised for .NET 4.Chapter 14 is about IIS security, logging etc. Chapter 15, 3rd party authentication was quite welcome these days, really enjoyed the Open-ID introduction and examples around it.The final chapter is about security in the ASP.NET MVC framework, securing controller actions, anti-forgery token for XSS, and using filters to custom authorization which I am actively using in current project.

Really enjoyed reading this book. Covers many aspects of security in various technologies,areas offered by ASP.NET.Highly recommend any developer who is actively developing web pages utilizing the .NET stack.

Excellent beginners guide to ASP.NET security
I was very pleased with the topics covered in this book.Barry Dorrans delivered a very non-interesting subject in a manner that kept your attention throughout.I wish more entry-level developers would read this before getting started.They would certainly have a better understanding of ASP.NET security and how to implement better coding practices up front.

Excellent all round view of ASP.net security
Beginning ASP.net security begins by introducing the reader to security principals such as defence in depth, never trusting user input etc. The author then ensures the reader understands how the web and ASP.net function by providing an overview of HTTP & ASP.net processing of events, form submissions and Viewstate- all essential concepts to understand the security issues surrounding ASP.net applications.

The book is divided into 16 easy to read chapters. Chapters contain small snippets of code and demonstrate various security issues ensuring the reader understands the problem being discussed. Detailed advice is then given and solutions provided to fix the various issues.

Issues are supplemented with real world examples and the author's own experience (I chuckled at the index server example) and help provide some colour to what can be a difficult topic to keep interesting.

The book covers all major web based security issues such as XSS, XSRF, Sql Injection and also related topics such as securing IIS and issues surrounding the file system. Important concepts such as encryption, hashing and certificates are also covered in depth. The final chapters cover advanced topics such as CAS, Securing IIS and third party authentication solutions.

So what could be better? very little the book is clear, easy to read and contains concise examples. I would have perhaps liked to see an example of implementing a custom membership provider and a bit more on client side scripting/ajax related issues but the book does a great job covering the major areas and pointing the reader towards further resources.

I liked that the book provides recipes for dealing with complex problems such as implementing certificate based authentication and implementing Open ID. Several useful tools I wasn't aware of are also referenced.

Before I began reading Barry's book although no security expert I considered that I had a pretty good knowledge of security and was glad to see for the most part the book confirmed my understanding! It always surprises me how many web developers have so little knowledge of basic security concepts and best practice. There is no excuse now and if you have never looked into security this book should be required reading! However don't think that this book has nothing to offer the intermediate/advanced developer as it had many gem's for me (correct implementation of salting passwords, certificates, ViewStateUserKey, WCF security).

This book is a great introduction to security and related concepts and will serve as a useful reference/cook book to more experienced developers.
... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (29)

Bravo
You can find lots of tutorials throughout the net that give you the kind of thing you need - instant coding ideas for the busy developer to complete a task. If you find that you are doing this more than once or twice for a particular discipline, then its time to hunker down with a book and get some background.

This books filled that need for me - it's the perfect introductory text for marrying ajax concepts with those of ASP.NET. They spend just enough time on background information. The examples are plentiful and well explained. This is my first "In Action" book and I am definitely going to become a fan of the series.

Shamefully Priced Useless Textbook
I have no one but myself to blame for buying this horrendous book back in October 2009. You see, had I realized that the book is from August 2007, I would never have wasted my money.

Back in 2007, this book probably was a bit more relevant, as is often the case with *any* programming book. But to still charge over $30 for this useless garbage?

If this doesn't sum up the worthlessness of the book, I don't know what else could:

** There is an ENTIRE CHAPTER dedicated to XMLScript **

Avoid this book at all costs!!

Poor Focus and Continuity
This book has some very good segments and the code examples are very well structured, with clever snippets of code, like 'hooking the key down event in chap 6'.However the presentation in some areas is a more a smattering of technology without a application as a basis.In this regard it is a little frustrating. The authors could have benefited with a good proof reader, if not an idea and continuity reader - assuming that there is such a thing. The book is littered with examples without consideration of how you would implement some of the code, for example on page 12 where there is a comment "The value 4 indicates that the request has completed.Well how about a table of the other values - is this all the user needs to implement this technology?This is a very naive and non methodical approach to a book."Especially the Appendix which is an afterthought I think and leaves the reader hanging during the crucial installation phases of the tools.

I think you should use this book as a I gave up trying to follow it as a coherent narrative, but decided to download the source code and load them up in Visual Studio, and run through the ones that do work and then reference the book.It is unfortunate that where many of the interesting examples around chapter 9, 10, 11 and 12 occur is where things begin to fall apart due to the the need to have compatibility between .NET 2 and 3 even though the book clearly says that they will work with the .NET 2 extensions.It is all a bit of a mess really, with extensions, control kits and so on.One wonders whether you are not just better off grabbing a good book on Ajax Java script implementations and coding your own framework.

Apart from these frustration - buy it for the examples, but make sure you load VS2008 with .NET 3.5 if you are prone to tantrums and outbursts when you come across sample code does not work.

Superb
This is a great learning tool for those in need of a way to quickly coming up to speed with Microsoft's ASP.NET AJAX framework. Although it could benefit those with little JavaScript experience, you will understand things much better and easier by having just a small amount of JavaScript under your belt before starting this book.

The only ASP.NET AJAX book you will need
This book provides excellent coverage of ASP.NET AJAX and is geared towards the expert ASP.NET developer. Readers who are looking for a lighter introduction to AJAX will get plenty of value out of this book, but they may be better off buying a 24 hour reference book or similar title. But if you need to really use AJAX in the real world I highly recommend this book. The book is well organized, and the chapters build logically on the previous ones. The layout is accessible, so I can use this book as a reference or for in-depth review. I greatly appreciated their coverage of advanced topics thus saving me having to go online as I usually need to do once it's time to apply the technology to the real-world. The only chapter I skipped was on XML script, which is a futures technology that may not eventually be adopted. I would give this book 6 stars if I could because it represents everything that is done right in a technology book. Highly recommended. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (15)

good book
It's a good introductory book in [...]. I received a copy of this book 2 months ago and I'm still reading it. Amazon has done a great job delivering it to my home quickly and safely. It could serve as a good starting point for beginners in [...] and a useful reference material for more advanced programmers - you could use it to remind yourself of some aspects of [...] every time you run into something unknown or something you have forgotten over time.

The authors writing style is clear and there are many code examples. This book lives up to its purpose - it will help you prepare for the exam, but it should not be the only learning resource. This book shows you directions, gives you a solid understanding of [...], but it should be used in conjunction with MSDN and other [...] books.

hard to read book but need class
I got this book when I went to CED Solutions MCPD ASP.NET 3.5 Developer last may and that made the book really help understand the material.

Nick
MCPD ASP.Net Developer 3.5

Enough information to pass the exam
I found that this book provided enough information for me to pass the exam but there were several things in the exam that were not covered in the book. This book should not be your only information source. Definitely use MSDN and maybe even another book for additional preparation materials. All-in-all this is a decent book just remember to supplement it. I would probably give it 3 and 1/2 stars if the system allowed that. Also this book includes 2 CDs, 1 of them has a practice exam, the book in digital form, and many other features and extras.

Well written
I am only on the third chapter, but so far so good.It doesn't put me to sleep.I have learned some things, and the practice exams are much better than the last microsoft press book when I studied for the 1.1 framework.

Solid Reference For Passing Exam
The book 'MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-562): Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5-ASP.NET Application Development' is an excellent resource for helping get ready to pass the 70-562 test.Content is broken up over 1000+ pages into the following areas of study:

Server Controls
Input Validation
Site Navigation
State Management
Master Pages
Web Parts
Themes
AJAX
ADO.NET
XML
LINQ
Data-Bound controls
Services
Web Controls

and much, much more!!

Content is laid out in a logical format and the book is easy to follow and learn from.If you can get through all of this book and understand the concepts within, you will have a solid background to pass the necessary exam.

***** RECOMMENDED ... Read more

Product Description
For the current edition of this book, please see Murach's ASP.NET 3.5 Web Programming with VB 2008 (ISBN 9781890774479).

"This book is by far the best computer programming book I have ever bought. You can go into my upstairs closet and find 20-30 books that I have purchased since the days of VB6. All of them have a few useful pages in them, but all together, they could not add up to as much information as you have given me in the first 11 chapters of this book."(A developerÂ’s comment on this book in an email sent to Murach Books)

If you know how to code Windows forms using Visual Basic and want to move to the next level of professional development by mastering web programming, donÂ’t miss out on the practical ASP.NET training thatÂ’s packed into this book.

As its title implies, it teaches all the features that are new in ASP.NET 2.0, including master pages, database access using both SQL and object data sources, the new code-behind model, site navigation features, authentication using the Web Site Administration tool and login controls, profiles, themes, and web parts. And of course, it teaches all the ASP.NET features that are unchanged in this release and that youÂ’re going to use every day.

But a lot of ASP.NET 2.0 books say they do that. So here are just a few of the reasons why professional developers like this book so much:

#1: It gives you a 5-chapter section on database programming
Database handling is crucial in business programming, yet itÂ’s glossed over in just a chapter or two in many books. In contrast, this 5-chapter section teaches you how to use SQL data sources and the GridView, DetailsView, and FormView controlsÂ…all new in ASP.NET 2.0Â…to develop database applications with little or no VB code. Then, it teaches how to use object data sources, also new in ASP.NET 2.0, to create 3-layer applications that let you separate the presentation code from the data access code in an application.

#2: It teaches you ASP.NET 2.0 development the way it should be done, using Visual Studio 2005
Today, no developer should miss out on the productivity features of Visual Studio 2005 by using limited tools like text editors. So section 1 in this book teaches you how to use Visual Studio 2005 to design, code, and test multi-page web applications that get database data and manage session state. Then, later chapters cover time-saving VS tools like the Query Builder and the Web Site Administration Tool.

#3: Complete applications show you how all the pieces interact
The key to mastering ASP.NET 2.0 is to have plenty of real-world applications that guide you in using the new features youÂ’re learningÂ…and that help you avoid the problems that you can run into as you build complex web sites. ThatÂ’s why this book gives you complete applications, including the web forms, the aspx code, and the VB code.

#4: The distinctive "paired-pages" format* makes learningÂ…and referenceÂ…a breeze
A few years ago, a customer used the term "paired pages" to describe our presentation style, and the name has stuck. It means that this book presents each topic in a two-page spread. The right page gives screen shots, code, syntax, bulleted details—whatever is needed to illustrate and summarize the topic; the left page provides extra explanation and perspective as needed. That makes it easy for developers at any level to skim through material they already know and focus on what’s new to them. It means less reading for everyone. And it makes the book a quick and easy-to-use reference guide once you’re done training.

(*To see how paired pages work, you can download free chapters from the Murach web site.)

So if you need to learn ASP.NET 2.0, we hope you'll try this book first. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (23)

Excellent Marketing! But only that...
In general this book will not teach you how to build a professional web site because the book is not designed and written to teach you how to build one. That is because its chapters are too short and disarticulated, containing inconclusive information and incomplete examples. The book at first glance is appealing and it does a good job attracting potential readers. One of the multiple marketing pitches on the book cover claims that within the first 4 chapters, it will show you how to build a multi-page web application that gets database data and manages Session State. The truth is that the first 4 chapters show you how to build a form with a combo box, a text box, and two command buttons and another form with a list control and four command buttons. The book of course covers the infamous GridView control but like most books for the novice it fails to explain how to use it with lots of rows. The very important navigation controls are touched briefly in two very short chapters and again the examples are incomplete. Database access is covered on chapters 12 and 13 but the two chapters are short and not linked to offer a comprehensive example.To end my review I would say that I was deceived by the book's excellent marketing. I was compelled to return it but I did not do it because I bought it used and it is too heavy to pay shipping.

This was a good book on asp.net
This was a good book on asp.net but it could be much better
[...]

Not for beginners
I don't where the other reviews about this book being good for beginners is coming from.

I have solid programming experience in C and Visual Basic 6 and two semesters of Java. I have also 10 years experience with regular HTML.
I have even worked through all the exercises in Build Your Own ASP.NET 2.0 Web Site Using C# & VB by Cristian Darie and Zak Ruvalcaba.

Thank goodness I had that going for me, because I would have been lost otherwise in chapters 2 and 3.

The example in Chapter 2 should have been about the Order.aspx page which is used in the remaining chapters of the book. Instead the authors go off on a tangent using as an example a different webpage which isn't ever used again later on in the book.

The first 2 or 3 chapters are critical, and I strongly believe that the authors need to SHOW how to go about creating the Design views of Orders.aspx and Cart.aspx pages that they discuss extensively in Chapter 3. They basically just throw the screen captures up thinking that the discussion in Chapter 2 would be useful and helpful. Not!
They also put up the code for both Product.vb and CartItem.vb without specifically telling the reader which should go where. A no-no for beginners.

I also agree with a previous review which said that the dual-page approach is a great waste of paper because much of the text was redundant.

I am not saying it's a bad book, but it is not as good as it could be.
It is for people who have some programming and HTML experience.

Good Reference Book
I thought it was a good reference book - not one you could read cover to cover.It seemed to jump around a bit more than I liked.It covered most of the need-to-know topics.

I tend to work in the source code window more than the design window, and this book tends to do the latter.It's not a bad thing, it's just different.

All in all, it's a good book, but some of the topics/concepts seem forced into the application you are creating throughout the book.

The best text on .NET 2.0 development using VB I've found ...
I've spent hours and hours on Amazon, on messageboards, sitting on the floor at Borders reading thru every ASP.NET book available, and it seemed none came close to this book for real-world, comprehensive teaching and practice.I have not been dissapointed, as I am almost finished and the book has helped me get up to speed after a long layoff (I last programmed Classic ASP years ago).Each example builds on the previous one to build a completed application.Awesome. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (2)

One of the better 'Learning' books I've read
This has to be one of the better books that I've used. The verbiage and the method the authors use to engage the reader are great. There are only a few things that I would say might help and that is to elaborate a little more on some of the examples and the differences of entering the code via the Design or Source views. Otherwise the book was both helpful and challenging.

This book uses Express versions of Visual Studio for both the ASP and SQL - totally free!

The hardcore code junkies may find this book a little light, but for those just getting into ASP and or coding (like me), I feel this is a great start.

~Happy Coding

Very thorough introduction to a big subject
I rarely read technical books cover to cover, but I did with this one.The subject is compelling and the tutorials are excellent introductions.They whet your appetite for more.I will read the author's larger book "Programming ASP.NET" as a result of my satisfaction with this book.A great intro. ... Read more

Product Description

Professional ASP.NET 3.5 SP1 In C# and VB

ASP.NET 3.5 brings the power of Visual Studio® 2008 along with the multitude of language improvements in C# 2008 and Visual Basic® 2008 as well as powerful new technology called LINQ, together with the ASP.NET 2.0 Framework you already know and love. Packed with valuable coverage of ASP.NET 3.5 SP1, this essential resource offers both C# and VB examples throughout the book, and shares new and updated content on the ADO.NET Entity Framework, ADO.NET Dynamic Data, and ADO.NET Data Services.

While ASP.NET 3.5 boasts server controls like the ListView and the incredibly flexible GridView, it also includes advancements in AJAX technology combined with JavaScript® debugging features in Visual Studio 2008. With this book, a stellar author team covers the new controls in the AJAX toolbox, the back button history, and script combining, and they also examine the new capabilities of WCF including changes to DataContractSerializer. In addition, the accompanying CD-ROM features the entire book in PDF format.

What you will learn from this book

• The concepts underlying the server control and its pivotal role in ASP.NET development

• How to create templated ASP.NET pages using the master page feature

• How to work with data from enterprise databases including SQL Server®

• Ways to debug, package, and deploy ASP.NET applications, monitor their health and performance, and handle errors

• How to retrieve, update, and delete data quickly and logically using LINQ with side-by-side examples comparing LINQ to existing techniques

• Ways to localize your web site in multiple languages for a world-wide audience

• Methods for adding AJAX capabilities to your ASP.NET applications

• The many benefits of the new data access additions

• Ways to use and extend the Provider Model for accessing data stores, processes, and more

• What freeware tools you need in Scott Hanselman's ASP.NET Ultimate Developer Tools appendix

Who this book is for

This book is for programmers and developers who are looking to make the transition to ASP.NET 3.5 SP1 with Visual Studio 2008 and either C# 3.0 (2008) or Visual Basic 9 (2008).

CD-ROM includes the full book in PDF format and a selection of 7 Wrox Blox mini e-books including:

1. Internet Explorer 8 and Its Impact on Your ASP.NET Web Sites

2. Jumping from ASP.NET to Silverlight 2

3. Leverage LINQ in ASP.NET 3.5 Projects

Customer Reviews (4)

Unhelpful Code Examples
Although this book covers a myriad of topics many of the code examples are riddled with errors or simply don't work which makes the lesson useless.It would be nice if each chapter built upon a previous chapter and you ended up with something resembling an application.Just slapping together a bunch of hodgepodge code means very little when you are trying to learn how to tie it all together.

Wish I could give 1/2 stars...
I really wish the rating system allowed for 1/2 star increments.I'm still in the process of reading this book, but so far I'd give it 3 1/2 stars (not 3, not 4...3 1/2).

I'm only a short way into the book, but I'm already a bit annoyed with some of the presentation.Having recently read "Beginning ASP.NET 3.5 In C# and VB", I really expected this book to follow a similar format:explanation of concept, hands-on example with detailed explanation of how it all works / fits together.That's not how this book is written.You get a description of the concept, and then you get a code example.In the "Beginning..." book, the code examples built upon each other (for the most part), and by the end of the book, you had built a functional (if somewhat simplistic) website.In this book, there is no building process (so far).Everything is presented independently, with very little information to put it into context, and nothing other than the conceptual explanation for how it actually "works".Furthermore, the authors assume that the reader is already well-versed in many of the nuances of the VB.net and C# programming languages -- no explanation for some of the coding constructs used in the examples are provided.Fortunately for me, I've been programming for 20 years, so I'm not having a problem following the examples so far.I am concerned that by the end of the book I'll have run into some obscure construct that I haven't encountered before.

My biggest pet peeve with the presentation has to do with how the author has chosen to present much of the sample code.After informing the reader that with Visual Studio 2008, there is now very good support for using a "code-behind" model for writing the ASP scripting, and that this is the preferred and superior way to do things (in Chapter 1 or 2 -- I forget which), he proceeds to do almost every example (so far) doing on-page scripting, not using the codebehind model at all!For my money, don't tell me that something is the best way to do things, and then not do it!(Stepping down off soapbox now).

That aside, so far the content itself is excellent -- which is the main reason I'd like to be able to give the book above a 3-star rating.After all, I'm mainly interested in the content in the first place.I'll update my review as I get further into the book (I'm less than 1/5th of the way through the 1715 pages of content contained in this behemoth).I'm hoping to be able to give it a higher rating by the time I'm done.

Great ASP.Net Book
This is a perfect book if you want to extend your knowledge in ASP.NET 3.5 SP1 it covers basically every single detail from server controls to Silverlight. it includes the PDF version of the entire book so if you have a windows mobile device or any other type of mobile device this is a plus because you can read it anywhere.

This book is full of great working examples (also included in the CD) I have tested several of these examples and they all worked for me, plus every single example is explained in a very detailed way in both languages (VB and C#). and if that is not enough, The CD also includes 7 PDF wrox blox (Covering ASP.NET, Silverlight, LINQ, AJAX, ETC..), The most interesting chapter for me is chapter 28, this chapter explains how to work with precompiled Bussiness Objects and how to use the COM within the .Net and also how to access them from ASP.NET code.



[Inland Empire Dot Net Users Group]

Champenois Book Review of Professional ASP.NET 3.5 SP1 in C# and VB-Hardback
I received the hardback version from my user group, Inland Empire .NET User Group, [...] . This is the ASP.NET 3.5 Service Pack 1 Edition, so you know it is up to date for the latest usage in either Visual Web Developer or Visual Studio 2008.

Code samples are shown in both C# and VB, making it easy for any DOT NET Developer to quickly get up to speed with this advanced technology for web development. I started out with "Sams Teach Yourself ASP.NET 3.5 in 24 Hours" as my primer to learn the basics of ASP.NET web development. Once you have grasped the basics in that book, I'd strongly suggest you purchase "Professional ASP.NET 3.5 SP1 In C# and VB", written by Bill Evjen, Scott Hanselman, and Devin Raider, all of whom are expert .NET developers.

There are 37 extensive chapters, and 5 appendices covering topics such as "Working with Master Pages", which is a huge improvement on the old ASP Include files, which laid out headers and footers. A most important topic is how to handle data with ASP.NET web pages, with Chapters titled: "Data Binding in ASP.NET 3.5", or "Data Management with ADO.NET". The new SQLDataSource control makes data connection and access much easier than in previous versions of Visual Studio, allowing access to SQL Server, SQL Server Express, Oracle databases, ODBC and OLE DB data sources, as well as the SQL CE database. The differences between client-side and server-side validations are clearly explained. Validation controls are explained in Chapter 4. I have found it necessary to delve into validation controls in order to more clearly understand how to use them with the GridView.

Everyone's heard about AJAX, even in the Adobe ColdFusion development world. AJAX means - Asynchronous JavaScript and XML. I installed the free AJAX Toolkit Controls recently. I intend to get into them through the use of this book. You can go to: www.asp.net/ajax/ to download the AJAX Control Toolkit for free. You can download the ASP.NET Ajax Library from the Ajax.CodePlex.com website. The Ajax Control Toolkit contains a rich set of controls, such as the AutoComplete, Calendar, MaskedEdit, Accordion, and Watermark controls.

Coming from Visual FoxPro development into .NET has been made much easier by having this reference book available to explain all the many aspects of .NET development. Without doing much coding in either C# or VB, you can have a basic web site up and running in no time. With the help of this book and a little more work, you can develop secure and powerful websites for your customers.

I would suggest this book for the Beginner to Expert level. It's a huge read and will take time to get through it; if you are a beginner, it'd probably be best to get any project to start with, even if you have to do one for free, and just get started. Read the basic parts of the book you will need to get started and then refer to the more complex parts, as needed. You won't be disappointed. This book makes software development fun again!
... Read more

Product Description

Beginning ASP.NET 2.0 Databases: From Novice to Professional is a comprehensive introduction to connecting a website to many different data sources&emdash;not just databases. You'll learn how to build a relational database, use SQL to communicate with it, and leverage both in your web applications.

Customer Reviews (5)

Best book for ASP.Net Databases
I bought a few ASP.Net books (all rated 4+ stars by the reviewers) for my recent ASP.Net project. This one is the best. The book has comprehensive but coherent coverage of ASP.Net. You not only learn different ways to access databases and retrieve data, but also learn how to use controls and different ways to bind them to the data sources. Most importanly, you learn which way to go in different circumstances. I highly appreciate the combination of "Try It Out" and "How It Works", which makes the book easy to read and easy to understand. I enjoyed reading the book and learned much more than I expected. It helped me a lot in my ASP.Net project.

Very Well Structured Book
I bought this book knowing a good bit about regular ASP and how to communicate with databases, hoping to learn how to do the same thing with ASP.NET.I was not disappointed.The book walks you through step-by-step in creating database connections, command objects, stored procedures, etc...It doesn't dwell too long on topics that it shouldn't be covering (like database design, and web site design).The instructions within the book identify software that is free, so there are no unpleasant surprises.This book will be a great reference and has really helped me make the jump from ASP to ASP.NET.

Good database coverage
This book does a good job explaining how to work with databases.The one thing I didn't realize is the only language used for examples is C#.It would be nice if VB examples were also included.

Great book!
I really liked this book because it shows step-by-step how to do things and then has a "How does it work?" section.Great book!Well written and seems quite comprehensive.

Become an ASP.NET Database Guru
Almost every book with ASP.NET 2.0 in the title will tell you something about the Grid View, Detail View, Form View, SQLDatasource and the SQL 'Select' statement; this one will too. While the other books provide a rudimentary overview of these topics then move on, "Begining ASP.NET 2.0 Databases: From Novice to Professional" takes you way beyond the SQLDatasource and the 'Select' statement, delving deep into ADO.NET.

Just as bread & butter go together ASP.NET and databases go together; and there is a lot more to the database side of the equation than is brought out in most ASP.NET books, which tend to limit themselves to the use of the controls, getting into databases only enough to have something to show in the controls. with this book it is the other way around; the reason for the controls is to display and maninpulate data in a database, and there are several ways to access and manipulate databases with ADO.NET besides the SQLDatasource. Along the way you will learn to use the controls with all the different data access formats and how to use the controls and their events to manipulate the data, which is what it's really all about.

If DataReader, Command Object, DataSet, OLEDBDatasource and ODBCDatasource are not familiar terms to you, and you want to develop ASP.NET web sites you need this book. If you don't know when not to use the SQLDatasource (there are some definite situations when it won't work), or don't know how to create a server side data cache and why you would want to, you need this book.

The book is easy to read and has numerous small exercises titled "Try It Out", after each exercise is a "How It Works" section where the code in the previous exercise is explained, line by line in most cases. Not only does Damien take you through DataReader, Datasets and Commands he also covers stored procedures, which you will want to use rather than queries in code shown in most of the other books.

While the book primarily uses SQL Server 2005, MYSQL 5.0 is also covered at the same time, everything from installing and configuring to using with stored procedures, parameters and transactions.

If you want to build ASP.NET web sites you will work with databases, if you are not intimately familiar with ADO.NET this book should be on your bookshelf readily available. ... Read more

Product Description
Perfectly suited to the innovative Problem ? Design ? Solution approach, ASP.NET MVC is a new development model that separates code for the data, look, and business processes of a Web site. This nuts-and-bolts guide thoroughly covers creating a Web site with MVC and discusses solving the most common problems that you may encounter when creating your first application or trying to upgrade a current application. The material is based on the highly praised and widely used ?TheBeerHouse? ASP.NET Starter Kit that was developed in the bestselling ASP.NET 2.0 Website Programming: Problem?Design?Solution. Additional coverage includes registration and membership systems and user-selectable themes; content management systems for articles and photos; polls, mailing lists, and forums; e-commerce stores, shopping carts, and order management with real-time credit card processing, and more. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (11)

Building a non-trivial app MVC
This book is not an MVC intro book. This book is building a non-trivial app MVC! In this book Nick Beradi and Al Katawazi is transferring Marco Bellinaso's classic The Beerhouse app to MVC. And they do an okay job. You need this book if you don't know how to build a non-trivial app MVC, at the time of writing there is no other books as extensive as this, building a non-trivial app MVC, around. It is true that some parts of this book has been copied and pasted from the previous edition in a non-intelligent fashion. It's mostly the parts laying out the design of the app. For example on page 260 you get informed about the SPROCs of the app, but this app doesn't use SPROCs, that was previous edition! Anyway as said this copy and paste thing goes on in the design parts and it actually doesn't mean too much in the understanding of the book. It didn't bother me very much. The important thing is about the MVC implementation and in that respect the app and the book has been totally rewritten from scratch, and you get the info you need. One thing I was a little puzzled about is why Nick and Al didn't use the ModelState for validation, it seems to me that that would have been easier, and you can thereby put the actual validation in the objects themselves. Instead Nick and Al writes a custom validation using jQuery. But all in all a fine book. You need this book if you are a newbie and you are heading the MVC way! But pick one of the MVC intro books up before you embark on this book!

Another Big Disappointment from Wrox
Well, yet another big disappointment from Wrox.

The subtitle of this book is "Problem, Design, Solution", of which this book is very little of any of these. The editor of this book shouldn't be editing books. The content is very disorganized, and some of it is just plain missing.

For instance, a lot of people (including myself) have trouble with chapter 5. That's because not once does the book mention that a 3rd party DLL needs to be referenced in the project. Therefore, there are attributes that are used in the code that are not recognized because they are not part of the .NET Framework nor MVC. Instead of describing, step-by-step the design and solution, the authors leave a lot to the imagination and expect you to learn through telepathy. The response to this on the forum for this book is: "download the code from codeplex". Sorry, but that doesn't cut it. I'm the type who has to "do it" to make the connections, not just "look at it" and "read code".

In the design section of the chapters, which explains how the application is being designed, but not necessarily the steps to do it (which one would presume would be in the solution section of the chapters), the opposite sometimes occurs. But, like I said, the steps aren't explicitly stated, nor is it explicitly stated that "Hey, you need to do this to have a working sample application". So often times, I'm left to wonder, do I need to do this, or will this be explained later?

Also, the book doesn't use semantic XHTML markup, which is a big no-no today. In addition, that's what MVC is all about, taking back control of your markup. If you don't take advantage of this power, then what's the point of MVC? Sure, the URLs might be SEO friendly, but you also need the content to be SEO friendly, too.

Another fault is that the book re-creates the AccountController provided by the default MVC 1.0/2.0 application template. Now, to the author's credit, while writing the book, they were working off changing builds (MVC was still in CTP/RC development stage); however, they should've mentioned that--because: the UserController they created did most of what the default AccountController does. However, they missed validating certain fields which could lead to a much less secure (or at least error-prone) site. This is a clear violation of the "don't re-create the wheel" principle, which often leads to square wheels being developed, which are pretty much useless. It also violates a core tenant of the MVC pattern: keep it DRY (Don't Repeat Yourself).

*** [EDIT 2010-07-10] *** Indeed, the author was working off of a very early Customer Technology Preview (CTP) build which did not include an AccountController as part of the default project items that are created. In fact, IIRC, the Membership and profile classes didn't exist at the time, either.

To WROX Publishing House:

How about actually trying to edit your books before printing them? I see a lot of mistakes, omissions, and just poor writing in general. While most books being published in the last 5 years have really not been that great compared to books published +5 years ago, Wrox books are consistently not good. I don't know why I keep buying these things. I do try to stay away from you guys though, and try to stick with APress titles, as theirs are much better, generally speaking. The one thing I like about this book compared to many of the Wrox titles to date, is that "most" of the code is in the book. A lot of times, your books are: go download the code, leaving critical sections of the code omitted from the book and therefore, the samples not working. For people who like typing in the code (because it helps them learn better), this is critical; and I for one, am willing to pay more for a book (because it has more pages) that has all the code in it to make the sample work.

To everyone else:

I passed up Steve Sanderson's Apress title because at the time, it did not have many ratings, and the ones that existed were bad. Since that time, it has received numerous positive ratings. He has a second edition coming out later this month on MVC 2.0. I think I'm going to purchase that title when it gets released.

Not the book to learn MVC
This is not the right book to use to learn MVC. In Marco's ASP.NET 2.0 version of this book he actually teaches the reader ASP.NET 2.0 web forms using what was the current method of building a full functioning web app. This book simply recreates that web app in MVC, but doesn't really teach MVC in the process, it is more of here's how we implemented TheBeerHouse app in MVC. If you want to learn MVC I highly recommend Sanderson's book, or the other Wrox book by Conery, Hansleman, Hack & Gutherie, much better books for getting up to speed on the MVC Framework.

This is also one of the poorest edited books I've read in quite some time, partly because much of it was lifted directly from the 2.0 version (this is why Marco is listed as an Author). As an example there are numerous references to stored procedures, but there are zero stored procedures in this implementation; it exclusively uses LINQ to SQL (could have used Marco's stored procedures and LINQ toSQL), but once again, provides next to zero teaching of LINQ to SQL. There are several copy and paste errors where the same chunk of code is used for similar but different objects. And, the numerous proclamations that the 'Admin' role has access to everything is flat wrong, since every Role authorization is specified for a single role (editor, contributor, etc.), rather than a delimited list including the 'Admin' role. this is easily corrected, if you know MVC, but this isn't mentioned so the reader will have to figure it out with information from somewhere else.

This book could have been so much more. One of the unfortunate holdovers from the previous book is the use of the provider model. In chapter 4 a couple of pages go into the importance of being able to easily switch data providers should the need arise and the value of isolating the DAL from the rest of the app. Well, the Controllers are not part of the DAL, but the DataContext is sprinkled throughout the Controllers, too tightly coupling the DAL and the Controllers. A much better solution would have been to use the Repository pattern and program against an interface (as shown in detail in the Sanderson book). But, if you don't know these things you will assume that what is being provided in this book is the way to go; it isn't, there are better patterns and practices to follow. One other key for switching to MVC is testing (TDD),other than to mention it in passing,this isn't even covered in this book. Another example is Routing, routing is a very big thing in MVC and it isn't mentioned in the book.

If you have gone through some of the other books and have a working knowledge of the MVC framework, then this book can be used to get some ideas and approaches, but you will be armed with the knowledge to know when to follow it and when not to. As I stated, this book could have been so much more, but it isn't, all that it is is a rewrite of TheBeerHouse app in MVC without teaching the reader, in any depth, about MVC, LINQ to SQL, TDD, the repository pattern, IOC or DI. The authors took the easier path producing a book that shows what they can do with MVC, but not teaching the reader how to learn to do it too, and not showing how to use MVC with a better architecture, for these reasons, and all the editing errors, this book only warrants two stars and my recommendation to get Sanderson's book instead.

Practical, clearly written, and a valuable resource
This book is a great resource that I'm currently working my way through. The realistic scenario of setting up an e-comm site with several commonly used tasks (blogging, polls, forums, newsletters, etc...) offers a best practice approach, often given with insights into alternative methods and the reasons for using them. The foundational introduction and architecture of MVC, the code given within the book, and the complete site assets that are provided online are invaluable in giving the reader an understanding of MVC.

Review of Book titled: "ASP.NET MVC 1.0 Website Programming"
Review of Book titled: "ASP.NET MVC 1.0 Website Programming"

MVC, or rather, Model-View-Controller is a programming concept that has been around for a while and isn't easy to understand, in my opinion, without a lot of reading and applying the concepts. I am using the book titled, "ASP.NET MVC 1.0 Website Programming", to assist me in a free 10-week course of instruction I am receiving through my .NET User Group. In my opinion, this book is no easy tool for a programmer who has had no introduction to ASP, ASP.NET or MVC concepts, nor was it intended to be. You need some prior knowledge before using this book. This is not a beginner book to learn ASP.NET, but is intense, containing sufficient knowledge and examples for building dynamic websites, all within its 5oo+ pages. If you are an ASP.NET developer already, it may take you a bit of thinking and re-thinking to get your head around (grasp) this new way of doing website development.

Now, what I like about the book is that you actually walk through a complete website project called the "TheBeerHouse Project" and learn concepts as you go through the book that are intended to teach you about MVC from the Microsoft ASP.NET point of view. If you will persist through this book, you will build a completely functional website, implementing the Model-View-Controller concepts; you can then use this as a foundational model for websites you will create for your clients.

Because this book is not a beginner book, I plan on buying the book titled, "Pro ASP.NET MVC Framework", to use as a companion reference and to get more in-depth information on the MVC framework.

One of the most important things I've wanted to learn using .NET, and which is found in this book in Chapter 10, is how to build an e-commerce store, in which a catalog of products is presented, orders are made, a shopping cart is persisted, and payment using credit cards is implemented. Not only the previous things are implemented, but also product ratings, whether or not the items are in stock , rich formatting of a product's descriptions, setup of shipping methods, order statuses and more is also implemented. This book is worth its list price alone for the valuable information and examples contained within this one chapter.
... Read more

Product Description

ASP.NET 3.5 is the latest version of Microsoft’s revolutionary ASP.NET technology. It is the principal standard for creating dynamic web pages on the Windows platform. Pro ASP.NET 3.5 in C# 2008 raises the bar for high–quality, practical advice on learning and deploying Microsoft’s dynamic web solution.

Seasoned .NET professionals Matthew MacDonald and Mario Szpuszta explain how you can get the most from this groundbreaking new technology. They cover ASP.NET 3.5 as a whole, illustrating both the brand–new features and the functionality carried over from previous versions of ASP. This book will give you the knowledge you need to code real ASP.NET 3.5 applications in the best possible style.

The book will teach you ASP.NET 3.5 starting with core concepts to more advanced topics. You will learn

• Core concepts of ASP.NET 3.5. Why it’s special. What it’s fundamental principals are. The basics of Visual Studio. How ASP.NET 3.5 controls are created, and how they fit into ASP.NET 3.5 pages, ultimately creating full applications
• Data access details. The intricacies of ADO.NET and how to perform data binding to many sources from databases to file streams to XML.We include LINQ coverage so you’re on the bleeding edge
• Security. Once considered the Achilles heel of all Windows web applications, security has vastly improved and is a cornerstone of ASP.NET 3.5. This section explains the various forms of available security, and how to best apply them
• Taking things further using advanced user interface techniques. This includes user controls, customer server controls, client–side JavaScript, and GDI+.
• Web services. In an increasingly connected world, working with web services grows in importance. This book will show you how to work with them.
• ASP.NET AJAX, with an emphasis on comtemporary web development techniques
• Development using Internet Information Services 7, Microsoft’s premier web hosting platform.
• And much more.

Customer Reviews (28)

nice book to learn from
I bought this book to learn ASP.NET 3.5 and i believe it covers all topics. It is really nice book, explained all topics with example. Highly recommended for learning APS.NET 3.5.

One word: Comprehensive
I will agree with some other reviewers and say that this book might be a little too long... but I can't take any stars away for that, it is truly comprehensive.

What I enjoyed most were some of the beginning chapters concerning the Global.asax, web.config, HttpHandlers and HttpModules, and how to configure and use these tools. I do wish there was a little more info on HttpHandlers and HttpModules, as there is a definite lack of info anywhere (can't find books or particularly useful online info).

Otherwise, there are plenty of applicable examples, it is extremely well written (like almost all 'Apress' books i read), and definitely took me from playing around with web-forms to truly beginning to leverage the power of .NET. This will not collect dust any time soon.

Highly recommend.

Best ASP.NET book
Check out the beginner ASP.NET 3.5 in C#2008 by Matthew MacDonald
before reading this book if you are new to .NET.
Both books by Matthew MacDonald are awesome.
If only the Java industry has books like Matthew MacDonald's standard.

If you know this stuff, you don't need it, if you don't, it doesn't help
The book assumes you are already a VB or other higher-level language programmer just being retooled.I have 10 years' experience in ColdFusion, so the concepts are similar, but if you don't already know the stuff or are not at all interested in writing console programs, you will spend a lot of time spinning your wheels.Forget looking anything up.I am online right now to find a better book.I also have the ASP.NET in C# book from this series.Same thing.

Must Have
Apress books are usually must have books for me when it comes to .NET programming, and this book is no suprise the same. I read Matthew MacDonald's other books too, and they are usually in great details. It is not definately one of those learn asp.net in 24 hour book.

It starts with the basics of ASP.Net such as what? why? and then 1 chapter about Visual studio.
The next chapters are all in very much in detail, sometimes more detail then you may need in your web programming tasks such as file managements, but i think it is great to know.

The advanced section (Chapter 27+) might scare you, if you just started asp.net programming, however give yourself 6 months and you will find those chapters very valuable.

One more time: Highy recommended. ... Read more

Product Description

You will learn how to build a complete e-commerce web site, following the entire design and build process. The website will be constructed following industry best practices in a modular manner&emdash;with a new module introduced and completed in each chapter.

Topics include an online catalogue and shopping cart, product searching and recommendation, and checkout/payment functionality. A distinguishing feature of this book is that it explains handling payments via PayPal, DataCash, and VeriSign Payflow Pro. By the end of the book, you will have created a fully-functioning e-commerce site, allowing you to sell merchandise and accept money from customers, at low cost to you.

Customer Reviews (20)

Great book
I am into this book halfway as a part of my personal training program having completed a couple of other books first. This book seems to give the whole package. I consider it superior to a Wrox book I have, but I wish it split apart the coding more like a Wrox book. Lot's of typing! Anyway, this book's a keeper!

Great Book - Arrived In a Timely Fashion
Great book. Taking me through all the ins and outs of E-Commerce. It's not perfect with some documented errata on the website. But more than adequate for any coder with a pulse.

Estou muito satisfeito de ter este livro !!!
Dos ultimos livros que tenho comprado, assim como os da serie Head First da O'Really este livro superou muito as minhas espectativas.

Como um livro de tutorial foi maravilhoso e me trouxe muito conteudo !!!

Realmente vale a pena !!!

Excellent book
It's an excellent book, the book teaches you how to develop a site in three layers (presentation, business and data) in my ishe goal of this book.

Essential Book for ANY E-Commerce .NET 2.0 Developers!!!
'Beginning ASP .NET 2.0 E-Commerce in C# 2005: From Novice to Professional' by Cristian Darie and Karli Watson is one of the most unique and important books out there for anyone that is developing an E-Commerce site with ASP.NET 2.0.Starting from scratch, the authors step by step show you how to get a site running and WORKING well and efficient.Packed with 650+ pages of material, the authors break the steps down in logical parts, show how they go about the work to be done, and then provide the code which does the dirty work.Not only is it helpful, but it's a joy to follow the steps as so much of the curtain is pulled away to show the developer how to get the job done.This is easily one of my favorite Apress books that I have seen.One of the nicest things about the Apress line of books is the fact that they write and publish books that no one else seems to and this is a perfect example of this.I'll close with a chapter overview for your inspection:

01. Starting off
02. Laying Out the Foundation
03. Creating the Product Catalog: Part I
04. Creating the Product Catalog: Part II
05. Searching the Catalog
06. Improving Performance
07. Receiving Payments Using PayPal
08. Catalog Administration
09. Creating a Custom Shopping Cart
10. Custom Orders
11. Making Product Recommendations
12. Adding Customer Accounts
13. Advanced Customer Orders
14. Order Pipeline
15. Implementing the Pipeline
16. Credit Card Transactions
17. Integrating with Amazon

Tack on 2 appendixes to the end and you have a MUST-HAVE book for anyone that is looking to achieve the same goals that this books does!!

***** HIGHLY RECOMMENDED ... Read more

Product Description
As the only book to address ASP.NET 3.5, AJAX, and IIS 7 security from the developer’s point of view, this book begins with a look at the new features of IIS 7.0 and then goes on to focus on IIS 7.0 and ASP.NET 3.5 integration. You’ll walk through a detailed explanation of the request life cycle for an ASP.NET application running on IIS 7.0 under the classic mode, from the moment it enters IIS 7.0 until ASP.NET generates a corresponding response. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Dense
The author clearly understands this technology space, I have no complaints with his expertise. And I gained some useful information here and there.

However I found that book to be very dense and overall the book did not feel well edited. Each chapter does a deep dive into the technology, but the information is hard to parse through. The author embeds a lot of reference assembly names and configuration references within the written paragraphs, making it harder to absorb the information.

Perhaps my expectations were wrong. I was hoping for a book that made me feel like a practical expert who could jump straight into a project after reading the book. Instead I felt that the book was more academic treatise than practical manual. I felt like I had been imparted a lot of deep technical information. But I was left with little practical to show for it.

I am giving this book 3 starts because of the author's clear and obvious expertise with the subject matter, and the fact that I did get some useful information here that I could not find elsewhere. But I felt I had to work very hard to get to it.

Everything you ever wanted to know about ASP.NET 3.5 security but were afraid to ask
"Professional ASP.NET 3.5 Security, Membership, and Role Management with C# and VB" is, other than a heck of a long title, probably one of the most useful books I've read through in recent memory.

You know when you're working on an in-depth item related to, say, ASP.NET membership and you search the web only to find 100 tiny articles that almost cover what you're looking for? You know how you wish someone would make a book that would just aggregate all of that knowledge and maybe take it just a little deeper?

This is that book.

The high level table of contents is as follows:

* Chapter 1: Introducing IIS 7.0
* Chapter 2: IIS 7.0 and ASP.NET Integrated Mode
* Chapter 3: HTTP Request Processing in IIS 7.0 Integrated Model
* Chapter 4: A Matter of Trust
* Chapter 5: Configuration System Security
* Chapter 6: Forms Authentication
* Chapter 7: Integrating ASP.NET Security with Classic ASP
* Chapter 8: Session State
* Chapter 9: Security for Pages and Compilation
* Chapter 10: The Provider Model
* Chapter 11: Membership
* Chapter 12: SqlMembershipProvider
* Chapter 13: ActiveDirectoryMembershipProvider
* Chapter 14: Role Manager
* Chapter 15: SqlRoleProvider
* Chapter 16: AuthorizationStoreRoleProvider
* Chapter 17: Membership and Role Management in ASP.NET AJAX 3.5
* Chapter 18: Best Practices for Securing ASP.NET Web Applications

The introductory chapters on IIS 7 were particularly interesting to me, since I still maintain a lot of legacy code on IIS 6 and haven't had the opportunity to get in-depth with IIS 7 quite yet. These really gave a great overview not only of the general request process for IIS 7, but also differences between IIS 6 and IIS 7 with a focus on places where security-related events happen (e.g., where a request gets authorized, when the thread principal gets set, how these things get set in different scenarios).

Chapter 4 had a great discussion on the different ASP.NET trust levels that your application can run under and what each means. It also explained how the permissions for your application get determined and how to customize the permissions in your application to give it only what it needs. Code access security is such a tricky thing, it was nice to see this laid out in a clear fashion.

Chapter 5 talked about the way configuration (web.config) gets read and what permissions you need in order to access it. It also discussed ways to encrypt the sensitive sections of configuration (settings that might contain passwords, for example) and ways you can create your own encrypted settings provider - even allowing the settings to be read from a location other than the config file.

Chapter 6 on forms authentication started out like every other ASP.NET book with a forms auth discussion, but this chapter actually got into details like how secure encrypted forms auth tickets are and ways to influence the forms auth process that you might not have originally considered.

Chapter 7 might also have been called "How to get ASP.NET and classic ASP to coexist in IIS 7." While the focus on it is getting the ASP.NET authentication mechanisms to work with classic ASP (using IIS 7), the discussion went a bit deeper than that, even talking about topics like passing data between ASP and ASP.NET.

Chapter 8 is basically everything you ever wanted to know about session state but were afraid to ask. It's not just what session state is and how it works, it goes into what exactly is stored in a SQL session database, how that data gets generated, how to secure it, and how to stop session-related DoS attacks.

Chapter 9 was a short chapter that talked about a few odds and ends that didn't get covered elsewhere. This chapter was the one that felt a little disorganized and mishmash, but it was still useful information. Topics here included request validation, viewstate protection, the permissions needed for page compilation, and securing your site map.

Chapters 10 - 16 were about the role and membership providers. The overall system gets introduced in a chapter, then each out-of-the-box provider gets explained in super detail. For example, the SqlMembershipProvider chapter goes so far as to explain how the schema for the membership database gets versioned. Chapter 17 ties the role and membership stuff into ASP.NET AJAX so you can see how to work with it all from the client side.

Chapter 18, though, is where you'll want to flip right to. This is where it all comes together - all the stuff you'll have learned from the previous chapters, put together in a near-checklist form, so you can take a step back from the application you're working on, look through this, and ask yourself, "Am I doing this in a secure fashion?" Common gotchas and attacks are discussed here as well as ways to protect yourself.

It's definitely not for folks new to ASP.NET - if you haven't written an ASP.NET app before or you're just starting out, this isn't for you. This book gives you in-depth information that, in some cases, you'd only otherwise get by using .NET Reflector to delve into the actual .NET assemblies and follow the code. It's heavy, detailed information. For mid-level to experienced ASP.NET developers, you definitely need to pick this up.

In all, this is one of those books I'm really glad to have on my shelf, right alongside Professional ASP.NET 3.5: In C# and VB.

teriffic book
I bought this book soon after it came out and loved it.The outline of the book is such that it breaks apart membership, roles, etc into small chapters and then goes into detail on that topic.

All asp.net programmers should have this by their side when they tackle that new project for the Inet or IntraNet.

business's if you want to see how good your asp.net programmer is, just pull something out of the book asn question then in a very general way about the topic.

programming asp.net is not that hard, programming asp.net so it can used in a sercure way so people dont make do-do out of your web site, now that is hard to do, this books helps.

only thing I thought was missing was a) chapter or 2 on https & certificates and b) well implemented final code example.
... Read more

Product Description
This book begins with you working along as Scott Guthrie builds a complete ASP.NET MVC reference application. He begins NerdDinner by using the File->New Project menu command within Visual Studio to create a new ASP.NET MVC Application. You'll then incrementally add functionality and features. Along the way you’ll cover how to create a database, build a model layer with business rule validations, implement listing/details data browsing, provide CRUD (Create, Update, Delete) data form entry support, implement efficient data paging, reuse UI using master pages and partials, secure the application using authentication and authorization, use AJAX to deliver dynamic updates and interactive map support, and implement automated unit testing.

From there, the bulk of the rest of the book begins with the basic concepts around the model view controller pattern, including the little history and the state of the MVC on the web today. We'll then go into the ways that MVC is different from ASP.NET Web Forms. We'll explore the structure of a standard MVC application and see what you get out of the box. Next we dig deep into routing and see the role URLs play in your application. We'll deep dive into controllers and views and see what role the Ajax plays in your applications. The last third of the book focuses entirely on advanced techniques and extending the framework.

In some places, we assume that you're somewhat familiar with ASP.NET WebForms, at least peripherally. There are a lot of ASP.NET WebForms developers out there who are interested in ASP.NET MVC so there are a number of places in this book where we contrast the two technologies. Even if you're not already an ASP.NET developer, you might still find these sections interesting for context, as well as for your own edification as ASP.NET MVC may not be the web technology that you're looking for.

It’s worth noting, that ASP.NET MVC is not a replacement for ASP.NET Web Forms (aka just "ASP.NET"). Many web developers have been giving a lot of attention to other web frameworks out there (Ruby on Rails, Django) which have embraced the MVC (Model-View-Controller) application pattern, and if you’re one of those developers, or even if you’re just curious, this book is for you.

MVC allows for (buzzword alert!) a "greater separation of concerns" between components in your application. The book goes into the ramifications of this, but if it had to be said it in a quick sentence: ASP.NET MVC is ASP.NET Unplugged. ASP.NET MVC is a tinkerer’s framework that gives you very fine-grained control over your HTML and Javascript, as well as complete control over the programmatic flow of your application. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (60)

A good book for beginners to MVC design
This book is a pretty good primer for getting into programming using a web framework.For anyone who has never used a framework I can recommend this product, though I am wondering if developers who already have several frameworks under their belts would derive as much benefit from this title.

The first chapter walks the user through the completion of a complete application in ASP.NET MVC.I was really surprised at this since most books don't address complete projects until much farther into a book.I wish the first chapter would have been more forthcoming with detailed explanations of what was going on with each step, but I think the authors wanted to quickly demonstrate what MVC is capable of.Once you see what MVC is capable the rest of the book continues to explain how and why MVC does what it does.This isn't good or bad, but it is different and may come as a surprise to some readers.

Throughout the book the concept of Model/View/Control and the philosophy is frequently discussed, both in the context of ASP.NET MVC and also in other frameworks, such as Ruby on Rails.In fact, most of the book discusses concepts more than demonstrates examples.I personally like my programming instruction books to have a much higher example vs philosophy ratio, but I can understand why the authors focused so much on philosophy of design.Programmers new to the MVC concept are pretty much going to have to wrap their minds around a new way of thinking.I think this is good, but it wasn't for me.

One part of the book that I particularly enjoyed was Chapter 3, which compared both ASP.NET WebForms against ASP.NET MVC.For the record, I really hate using WebForms and this chapter immediately got my brain thinking about ways I could use MVC to avoid the many gotchas that have plagued me when using ASP.NET WebForms.For many developers like myself that have been forced into an ASP.NET environment with minimal training and are struggling to cope with the fact that ASP.NET's WebForms have wrestled control of your precious HTML code away from you, this chapter is for you.Some of us like to be completely wrapped up in the details of our code, something ASP.NET kind of takes away through layers of abstraction and the reliance on Microsoft's Visual Studio development environment.In many ways, I feel that ASP.NET MVC gives back much of that nitty-gritty control and this book does a good job of showing the developer how to work at that level.

Probably the only portions of the book that I really avoided are in Chapters 10 & 11, which focuses on Unit Testing.New developers may not be aware that there is a great deal of controversy concerning the value and need for unit testing.Without taking one side or the other on the topic, I suggest that readers do their own additional research and reading regarding code testing philosophies.To the book's credit, at the beginning of Chapter 10 the authors point out that their approach is not the one and only, end-all-be-all approach to testing.

Overall, I found this book to be a quality read.It almost never goes as deep as I want it to go, but it does cover a broad spectrum of material.Because of that, its value as a reference feels limited but its true strength is in demonstrating the value of MVC designs and how to implement them.Experienced programmers that have experience with MVC design will probably not find as much value with this title.

I really liked the practical exercise
I am not normally a .NET developer, but I have significant experience with other MVC frameworks - such as Roby on Rails. Quite obviously, Microsoft has copied many of the paradigms from Rails into their MVC framework, which is nice for .NET people who want the Rails application development experience without switching technology.

A good portion of the book is a nice tutorial which will walk you through all the basics of the framework. Even for a non .NET guy, I found the tutorial easy, well written, and informative. I find walking through a step by step tutorial like this to give real sense of a technology. it's the same way I picked up Flex and Rails.

Later chapters cover important topics such as security and testing. Let's be clear, this is a intermediate/beginners book, which is perfect for me, but for seasoned ASP.NET guys - it may not be enough. If you're trying to learn the framework from scratch, this is a good place to start

Good introduction, but lacks details
I tend to find Wrox books to be very well written and while Professional ASP.NET MVC 1.0 is easily to follow I found it to lack details that would make this title a great resource for its readers.This book will give a good overview and definitely be help for beginners.I feel that if additional attempts to extend the information and samples were taken, this would be a great title for programmers.Now, I was able to extract some great information from the book, but it left me wanting and needing more.Maybe the intent was to only get you started, but I felt it could have gone farther.Otherwise, the writing and explanations are easy to follow.

Excellent, well written
This is a good book for someone already familiar with coding in C#. There are 420 pages made up of 12 chapters. The first 164 pages of the book is a complete step-by-step walkthrough of an ASP.NET MVC application called Nerd Dinner. It is an introduction to the concepts that the MVC framework 1.0 covers with most of the details are shown in the remaining chapters.The best thing about this book is that it was written by people who worked on the product team at Microsoft.This results in the reader being given the inside scoop on the technology and some great first person insights.

This is one of the better tech books and is recommended.

Great book, but not exactly a reference
A great book straight from the proverbial horse's mouth. The authors of the book were all major players in the creation of ASP.NET MVC, which comes in handy for a book about a new technology.

I'd say the highlight of the book is the NerdDinner example that takes up nearly 40% of the contents. It is a complete end-to-end sample app with just about every line of code explained. I find this type of sample to be invaluable when learning any new technology. The rest of the book does just as good of a job explaining every nook and cranny of ASP.NET MVC.

The only criticism I have is that, for a book titled "Professional ASP.NET MVC", this book comes up a little short. As mentioned above the book touches on just about everything in ASP.NET MVC, which leads to a lot of breadth, buy not much depth on the various topics. I haven't looked at "Beginning ASP.NET MVC", but I would think that this book should slot somewhere between that and a more advanced book. ... Read more

Product Description
Delve into the core topics for ASP.NET 2.0 programming, mastering the essential skills and capabilities needed to build high-performance Web applications successfully. Well-known ASP.NET author Dino Esposito deftly builds your expertise with Web forms, Microsoft Visual Studio®, core controls, master pages, data access, data binding, state management, security services, and other must-know topics—combining definitive reference with practical, hands-on programming instruction. Packed with expert guidance and pragmatic examples, this CORE REFERENCE delivers the key resources you need to develop professional-level Web programming skills. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (16)

Fluff
I'm not sure what to say about this book other than "look elsewhere for knowledge". The author really wanted the reader to know how great the new ASP.NET 2.0 platform is but there weren't any details in his explanations. It's like reading a really long advertisement for ASP.NET 2.0 that never pays off. Dino seemed very infatuated with his understanding of the platform and it's capabilities but somehow failed to curtail his ego long enough to do any real technical writing. I've read terse and boring tech stuff and this is the complete opposite, just fluff. It's just one long promise with no follow through.

I'm sticking with O'Reilly publications.

Not a good book
I am really unhappy with this book.As stated in other reviews, there are no examples anywhere, just discussion of different topics.For example, there is a chapter on the various controls that are available to add to a page, but no example.Yet, I didn't see that what he said about the control was so earth shattering, that it could not be known elsewhere.

Dino does preface his book, that it is not for beginners.But then, he goes on to "introduce" VS 2005.He "introduces" many of the controls, and what they do.But then, no examples.Excuse me?In a book that **is** for beginners,a control is introduced, its behaviour is described, and then there is usually an example.You get everything Dino gives you, PLUS an example that you can see the control in action.

In my opinion, he talked alot and said a little.Fluff, pure and simple.

I would *not* recommend this book, for anyone.

Terrible Book - Don't Waste Your Money
WAY TOO MUCH FLUFF.Buried in all of this filler text are obfuscated details of the language. There are no real examples that can be followed. I wish I could get a refund because I really feel like I wasted my money.

Great!!
Even though I haven't finished this book (not enough time in the year), it's a very well written book.Not too hard to read, but complete and covers a ton of information.Highly recommended.

Disappointing
Learning to program is a hands-on activity. The best teaching texts are those that provide example programs which the student can reproduce, tinker with, and observe, to learn the concepts illustrated thereby.

Unfortunately this book does not take that pedagogical approach. The textual descriptions are high-level, supplemented by abstract and simplified diagrams, as well as tables that list in exhaustive (and exhausting) detail the various classes, their methods, properties, &c. One looks in vain however for a good program to illustrate how an actual ASP.Net website might work (I gave up looking after Part I).

The author advises that this book should not be the first to be read on the subject of ASP.Net 2.0. Accordingly, I read a more basic text on the subject, which, through well-constructed sample programs, gave me a firm grasp of the basics and whetted my appetite to learn more advanced techniques I could use to build practical websites. I hoped this book would supply those techniques, but I was disappointed.

This book might be of use to a developer who already knows the essentials of ASP.Net 2.0, and needs a desk reference for use in day-to-day programming tasks. As a learning tool, it is about as useful as trying to learn a foreign language by reading a dictionary. ... Read more

Product Description
A revision of the highly successful second edition, Introduction to ASP.NET, Third Edition offers even more ASP.NET development knowledge. It will familiarize the user with ways to create dynamic web applications using server-side programming technologies. A well-rounded Internet programmer needs to be able to integrate server technologies to produce web applications that not only interact with visitors, but also integrate other computer applications. Students will design and maintain interactive and dynamic Web applications within the Visual Studio 2005 environment. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (11)

Work tech book ever!
I couldn't agree more with the other comments.I think I knew more ASP.NET before I ever went through this book, which was none at all.Had to end up buying other asp.net books just to see what the author was talking about.Please instructors, review the books before you want to use them in your classes.

Worst tech book I've ever read.
I had to buy this book for an online class.It is literally THE worst tech book I've ever read.I have a knack and penchant for breezing through technical material and soaking it up like a sponge.I've taught myself, out of books, everything from C++ to XML, PHP to TCP/IP, Final Cut Pro to Dreamweaver in no time flat.I have yet to earn anything less than an A in any of my computer science courses.

But now I've met my match.

This book fails on a number of levels.First, if you are not already well familiar with the .NET framework, its purpose, organization and implementation, then be prepared to read some other book before you start this one.This book almost seems to be written as a quick reminder for someone who already knew ASP.NET, but needs a refresher on what controls and methods are available.The book is full of long paragraphs with chains of terms that mean nothing to the novice and are not illustrated well enough with examples or diagrams.There is no thorough discussion about the power and functions of the various classes and where they fit into the grand design of .NET.There is also basically NO discussion about classic ASP, its syntax, and how to recognize it within the .NET code.

To make matters worse, this book is full of mistakes and unspecified details.On the project assignments at the end of chapters, this leads to many wasted hours trying to infer the meaning of the instructions, or trying to figure out what step is missing or just plain incorrect.The projects seem to be designed to take around 10 minutes each.In my class, we have to do 2-3 of these each week.I usually end up spending at least a couple hours, sometimes more like 8 hours, solely because the directions are too murky and the text is terrible to begin with.One guy in my class said that he had spent 20 hours on that week's homework.20 HOURS for what should have taken maybe 15-30 minutes.I have to write numerous e-mails to the professor each week so he can explain what the author failed to explain in the book.I think if I compiled those e-mails and printed them out, it might make a better ASP.NET book than this piece of garbage.

The real tragedy here is that, now, half-way through the class, I've just started to glean what ASP.NET is all about, and it seems EXCITING!But, at the end of this class, I'm certain I'll have no idea how to do anything but the simplest little data grid and a calendar widget.Luckily, I subscribe to SafariBooksOnline, and have been reading other sources.I'm looking forward to when this class ends so that I'll have some free time to read a decent book on ASP.NET and learn how to use it for real.

AVOID THIS BOOK LIKE THE PLAGUE.

Dear Instructor, Do Not Use This Text
This is a horrible text.

The book needs to be bigger and should be ring bound to lay flat.Additionally, the numerous, inconsistent font sizes make the text irritating to read.

I would not recommend this book for use as a text or reference.It is lacking in several subject areas such as control validation as an example.

Introduction to ASP.NET 2.0
I found this book informative, but very hard to follow for the beginners. This book will be great for programmers with more experiences. Hard to follow instructions.

Introduction you sure or Advanced?
As one of the reviewers specified, if you do not have experience in programming DO NOT I repeat DO NOT buy this book. It is very confusing and there are a lot of typos and mistakes in the book. In fact in the [...] website one of the student downloads is a word document which has corrections from the author. I guess she realized she did have mistakes on her book making it even more confusing. I sure hope the 4th edition is completely rearranged and worded in beginner's term and not intermediate or advanced. ... Read more

Product Description
Search engine optimization (SEO) is not only the job of the marketing department. It must be considered from a web site's inception and throughout its lifetime by you, the web site developer. Making changes to the architecture of a web site and modifying presentation techniques can dramatically increase search engine rankings and traffic levels.

Written for the ASP.NET developer or tech-savvy marketer, this unique reference provides techniques for creating and maintaining web sites optimized for search engines. You'll discover how to facilitate the indexing of your site, as well as how to leverage specific technologies and services for site promotion. You will understand the role of web site architecture in search engine optimization and explore various topics therein. Knowing this will help you to develop a site that achieves great search engine rankings.

What you will learn from this book

• Understand the criteria that influence search engine rankings

• Create keyword-rich URLs using ASP.NET, ISAPI_Rewrite, and UrlRewriter.NET

• Use HTTP Headers to properly indicate the status of web documents

• Create optimized content and cope with duplicate content effectively

• Avoid being the victim of black hat SEO techniques

• Understand and implement geo-targeting and cloaking

• Use site maps effectively—for users as well as search engines

• SEO enhancements that can easily be applied to an existing web site

• Build a search engine–friendly e-commerce catalog

Who this book is for

This book is for ASP.NET developers who need to incorporate search engine optimization principles into their web applications, as well as marketers who want to gain a better understanding of the technologies involved in search engine marketing.

Enhance Your Knowledge
Advance Your Career

Wrox Professional guides are planned and written by working programmers to meet the real-world needs of programmers, developers, and IT professionals. Focused and relevant, they address the issues technology professionals face every day. They provide examples, practical solutions, and expert education in new technologies, all designed to help programmers do a better job. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

consider Search Engine Optimization in the design phase
this book is great. it was easy to understand and read. it's practical, teh techniques are described and explained in ways which can be adopted easily.
I am very glad I read it while in the design phase rather than after the site would have been implemented without any Search Engine Optimization.

SEO - Wild West of cyberspace
Every professional web developer at some point of time has to confront the ruthless reality - SEO. There are variety of reasons of why it is happening but the most common one is that customers don't just need greatly functional websites; they need greatly findable ("spiderable" is industry term) websites along with great functionality.

So whoever hoped to stick to cozy world of coding are pushed out from zone of comfort. SEO can be interesting, even exciting sometimes, but never cozy. It is like Wild West of the olden days with sheriffs (Google, Bing etc), bandits (spammers, phishers etc) and constant gold rush to get your site at the very top of the very first search results page.

To navigate well and, most importantly, satisfy your customers with sensible SEO results a web developer have to peruse astronomical amount of information, chaotically scattered across endless cyberspace. This book is a good, if not perfect, starting point to begin SEO experience.

Although sample code is in C#, it is simple enough to be understood by VB.NET developers. There is a good coverage on URL Rewriters, topic is not widely known but relatively easy to manage for anybody who worked a little bit with Regular Expressions. Chapter on Black Hat SEO is also quite useful, especially for those who involved in development of blogs. Pretty much all major parameters for proper SEO can be found in the books but they could be structured better - I had to develop my own checklist. Importance of 301 Redirection is stressed out quite well.

Something can be highlighted better, namely issues related to shared hosting. It is a topic on its own and there are some problems with that that can not be solved easily.

By the way authors are quite helpful and willing to assist if something is not entirely transparent with the code supplied with the book. Code can be downloaded from WROX website; it is OK for most part, with occasional not too severe flaws.

SEO can be pretty scary at the very beginning. That should be seen in positive light though. It may sound ridiculous but SEOing does improve mental resilience in dealing with vast quantities of loosely related data. Having this book in your arsenal can make that trait even better.

Great book. Good strategies!
Offers a great overview of SEO strategies for the professional .NET programmer. Very happy with the purchase.

Better Resources Out There
Do not buy this book.It not only contains many invalid web references (gee, anyone can write a book that references URLs on a topic) but is severely dated in terms of the Helicon ISAPI_Rewrite section.You're better off performing web research on the topic.Save your money!!!

interesting book on SEO
[...]
Ok, so this is the second bookI've got from Wrox for reviewing (and yes, I did enjoy it much more than the first). SEO is one of those things that most developers end up forgetting when building ASP.NET pages Unfortunately, that might cost you a lot. This books presents several principles and ideas that will help you improve your site's indexing. The structure is clean and the content is good.

Now, the bad things: I didn't really liked the C# code style presented throughout the book and I think that some of the ideas were "duplicated" in several chapters. The text gives lots of emphasis on Google (which one can understand, since it rules the search engine market). I'm not against it but I'd like to see more about the other search engines too. Overall, I'm going to give it a 7.5/10. ... Read more

Product Description
With coverage not found in other titles and endorsed by the architects of ASP.NET, this book is essential for any serious ASP.NET developer. Softcover.Amazon.com Review
The Microsoft .NET Framework is exactly what its name implies: A general system onto which a lot of application-specific technologies are stuck. Essential ASP.NET With Examples in C# assumes you know something about the .NET way of doing things, and want to know more about how you can use its ASP.NET facet to implement robust and stylish Web applications. Fritz Onion, in a manner typical of this series, introduces key ASP.NET concepts logically, and with lots of code listings that make it clear how the concepts should be translated into reality. The truth be told, Onion excels at combining conceptual information with practical examples. This is unusual among writers of technical books, who tend to be good at (at best) one or the other.

Typically, the author approaches a capability of ASP.NET--validation of submitted form data, say--by presenting a quick summary of the problem and then attacking it (or components of it) with code. The code segments (which tend not to be too long, and so relatively easy to trace and comprehend) are then dissected, and special attention called to details of particular interest to the local problem. It's a great way to learn if you already have a grasp of the basics, as you can either go hands-on with your own system or absorb the author's wisdom through the book alone. --David Wall

Topics covered: How ASP.NET works, and how to write effective software with it. Detailed coverage goes to HtmlControls, WebControls, the web.config file, form-data validation, custom controls, and state management. There's also excellent coverage of the often confusing HTTP Pipeline. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (45)

great book with a problem...
I enjoyed this book. It is definitely not for beginners - the high-level treatment suited my style very well. His initial exposition is especially clear and precise. Mr. Onion did not go into too great detail about aspects that I could look up on my own, choosing to focus more on theoretical details/implementation recommendations which are hard to figure out if you are a beginning ASP.NET programmer such as myself.

The snag: He refers to original ASP programming all the time. Why? This is clearly horrible style. I don't know ASP, so I have to skip over the sections which he begins with "Traditional ASP only supported blah blah blah." Then, I become confused because he said something pertinent to the rest of his explanation, so I have to go back, think about Traditional ASP (which is a clear waste of time), figure out his point, and go on.

A great book if you are already an experienced programmer with knowledge of .NET, web programming, etc.

Great book
This is a good book, easy to understand and covers a lot of material.

A great text type book for ASP.NET
Clearly this is the best ASP.NET book I have ever read.

An absolute must-read for ASP.NET developers!
Essential ASP.NET is 100% to-the-point containing very useful information with no fluff included. I particularly enjoyed the HTTP pipeline chapter. The entire book contains info that every ASP.NET developer should know.

The best ASP.NET book!
I just finished reading this book, I'd say it's the best ASP.NET book! I highly recommend it!
... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (10)

Useful and Quick
The great thing about the book is that it gets you going on Web Parts by chapter 4 and everything beyond that is good information. Its a good way to start using web Parts.

.NET Developer Group Coban
En particular me gusta mucho el diseño web pero también la programación, me llamó mucho la atención el libro debido a que fusiona las dos partes permitiéndome crear sitios mucho mas interactivos, debido a que los sitios estáticos están pasando de moda y debido a esto nos brinda la oportunidad de crear sitios web con funciones interesantes tanto al diseñador como a los usuarios.

Haendel Jose Morales E.

Incomplete instructions to run example project
I was unable to get the AdventureWorks Web Portal running. The code was downloaded from the publisher's website.

It would not execute. The following exception was thrown,

"SQLExpress database file auto-creation error:
The connection string specifies a local SQL Server Express instance using a database location within the applications App_Data directory. The provider attempted to automatically create the application services database because the provider determined that the database does not exist."

The instructions provided in the Appendix for creating & running this application did not mention how this problem was to be handled.

My Go-To Reference Time and Time Again
When I began to work on a web portal using .NET 2.0 in mid-2006, I found out about this book and anxiously awaited it's publishing.I wasn't disappointed.The material covered in this book goes into such great detail and is so full of great ideas that I recommended the re-writing of our portal using Darren's book as a basis of our new design.This was money well spent.

Really helpful
When I first started looking at Web Parts I couldn't quite grasp how they were different from other web technology. Darren was able to clearly describe how individual parts are created, and how to integrate them into a cohesive whole and helped me enormously in building modern websites. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (5)

Not a HOW-TO but theory
If you are looking for a AJAX how-to book then this is not the book for you. You have to go through a lot of text to find the development material. Its all theory. Not a single program in its entirety but small functions in lot of text.

This book detail about the history, need and architecture. That might interest some manager but even then, no one has a lot of time to get this information. At least I dont.

Its title should be "AJAX for IT managers who are living in cave and dont know about AJAX"

Microsoft ASP.NET and AJAX: Architecting Web Applications (PRO-Developer)CRAP!
I am a Senior .NET Developer for SSN and I think this book is total ****! I am sorry, some ideas from it are cool, but I buy books to see useful examples of all the why's and how to's, and if you are like me, you will find this book useless. I read the book in a weekend and I didn't learn anything worthwhile.

Good Content, Blah Design Hurts Overall Product
'Microsoft ASP.NET and AJAX: Architecting Web Applications' is a good book for the current .NET AJAX developer looking to get their feet wet and ready to swim.The content is written well, and the author knows his stuff, but whoever made the decision to go with such a blah design swung and missed on this one.AJAX has been one of the 'hot' terms in computers for a half decade now, and the market has lots of material on the subject.People hear 'AJAX' and not only do they expect to get the steak, they want some sizzle to go along with it.This book provides no sizzle.Lack of color and design sex appeal hurt the overall product.Many people will say "who cares what it looks like" but for this type of subject matter, I don't want the layout that comes with an Assembly or C book, I want that web design PIZAZZ and it's just not there.

Pick this up if you are an AJAX developer who is looking to grow your skillset.If you are just a casual developer looking for AJAX references in the store, no doubt you might walk right by this title.Good enough, but it could be better.

**** RECOMMENDED

Good current book, about to be outdated quickly
Dino is a well respected author and developer.I have read at least five of his books.They range from old school ADO.NET to architecting web applications for the enterprise (highly recommend that read).This book is well written and organized.The content is heavy on the front end as the title suggests.You will explore the kludgy innards of JavaScript.jQuery and many Ajax approaches are also considered.In addition, Dino puts his own personal spin on patterns and processes.

The book starts very well with a background in the Ajax surge.It then jumps into the client side, patterns, binding to the client and ends with RIA's.Overall this is solid and I recommend the read if not quick skimming after the fifth chapter.

However, .NET 4.0 is right around the corner.The client side bindings, more jQuery integration and updated Microsoft Ajax JavaScript libraries will change a lot of how this book approaches Ajax.Therefore, its an interim book for those not looking to move to 4.0 and live in at least the 3.5 world for the foreseeable future.

It delves into Silverlight a bit and.But has no mention of the ground swell of popularity that is ASP.NET MVC and its fairly elegant Ajax approach.One of the highlights is Dino's insight into the pros and cons of partial rendering vs. full scale asynchronous approaches.I have been on an enterprise application where we had to implement the former.He nailed the reasons why.

Read this book if you want a good background in current technologies that are changing at the speed of light.It won't be a gold source for later pick up and review though.

Another great book from a prolific author
Most of the Ajax and JavaScript books focus on implementation and that's a good thing. However those books do not describe how Ajax fits within an architecture of an application. This books captures it succinctly. I also recommend author's other book "Microsoft .NET: Architecting Applications for the Enterprise" ... Read more

Product Description
Master advanced topics in ASP.NET 2.0 programming—gaining the essential insights and in-depth understanding you need to build sophisticated, highly functional Web applications successfully. Topics include Web forms, Microsoft Visual Studio® 2005, core controls, master pages, data access, data binding, state management, and security considerations. Developers often discover that the more they use ASP.NET, the more they need to know. With expert guidance from ASP.NET authority Dino Esposito, you get the in-depth, comprehensive information that leads to full mastery of the technology. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (11)

Worst book ever buy
I have read this author's [..] book ed 2003. It is good, since it contains a lot of useful examples. But his current two books for 2005 are very bad. There is a few of very short useless examples in the books. He just talks about "theory" and lists the spec and a few of web snapshots which are useless for any level readers.

I have read almost all [..] books in libraries. His two books are worst. I do not think that he wrote those books with care. The core book is not core; the advanced is useless.

his two books are totally garbage for me. I never say anything like that in anytime and anywhere else.

Dino - Best ASP.NET Advanced Topics Book on the Market
I own Dino's last book (Programming ASP.NET 2.0 Applications Advanced Topics) and this book continues his excellence in writing about advanced topics in ASP.NET.There are many things that he covers that you come across on a day-to-day basis and he explains those topics well.

The topics in this book are not simple.That's why sometimes I think people who have reviewed this says it can be a hard read.Well, again that's because the topics are NOT SIMPLE.When you are diving into creating your own custom controls, Virtual Path Providers, Asynchronous Commands & Callbacks, Http Handlers and the rest, of course the language is going to have to be pretty verbose...there's not really a good way around this unless you're going to write a 1000 page Head First type of book that explains it in more simple terms.

You will search the internet for a while trying to find this kind of information.I don't know how many times I have opened Dino's book to find what I'm looking for especially when we need to create custom providers, controls and to just really understand the processing of asp.net and all the low-level details that can really become overwelming.Dino does a nice job by not overly explaining things (since you could to way into depth on many of these advanced topics) but also does not leave you short in most of his sections.

His examples are more real-world also as well as his explaination and solutions while talking about a topic.I have been at 3 .coms and all of us used his book to figure out how to do a lot of advanced tasks quite literally by him explaining (examples Virtual Path Provider, custom Http Handlers, etc.).

He also takes the time to show you diagrams more than any book I've ready on the processes.I appreciate this time he has put in to the books he writes.He doesn't just write, he diagrams a ton in his book and this is important because the concepts here are very dry and you can get lost very quickly in all the things that happen behind the scenes in ASP.NET at a very low level.

Anyway, not sure why people are complaining about the expectation of perfection when this book provides a better review of advanced topics than you'll find in any other book as well as the internet itself in a lot of cases.

It's pretty much the Bible for our team in terms of advanced topics for ASP.NET.When in doubt open Dino's book.

ASP.NET 3.5 Applications: Advanced Topics
So whilst you are waiting for the 3.5 version you can get this one second hand.

It covers loads of usefull day-to-day tasks that most web devs have to search google for. Not sure that "Advanced" is the correct choice here, but its tasks that all my senior devs are capable of.
This said, it's a must have for any web developers desk. All of the 2.0 stuff still applies to 3.5 cant wait till the new version that would be more complete.
However, just using his examples expressed in Listview/Datapager controls using LINQ will yeild plenty till his new book comes out.
I can understand why the 3.5 version is delayed (seeing 4.0 is due in December), there is plenty of 'advanced' issues in using MVC to content with, then add microsofts version of Spring/NHibernate to the mix (not stable yet where as the open source Spring/NHibernate is) then you can see why there is a delay.

"ASP.NET 3.5 Applications: Advanced Topics" is a moving target and will be for 6 months(conjecture) or more(features in consenus use a >12months away?).

So why get "ASP.NET 2.0 Applications: Advanced Topics"?
It will make your life easier and get projects out the door faster.
All that you learn in this book can be applied to your 3.5 projects (we just use VS2008 and VS2003 for legacy - VS2005 has no further use).
Likewise if your are a commerical C# developer you would use the VSTS version of 2008 due to the productivity gains unless you work in a sweat shop where labour is cheap.

Related:

Using ReSharper4 Power Programming with ReSharper: Optimize .NET Development with the ReSharper Add-In to Visual Studio 2008 (Wrox Briefs) offer substantial benefits for C# 3.5 users this too will have you get quality code out the door faster.

Programming Microsoft ASP.NET 3.5 is a welcome addition as Dino really knows his stuff (ASP.NET/AJAX/UI)

Excellent material
This book rocks! I cant find anymore words to say this :D

I keep this book by my computer all the time. Dino has once again provided us with some great information.

Not the best for custom controls
I bought this book specifically for the 100+ pages on creating custom web controls.That is the only portion of the book that I have used.

The book does not come with a CD for the source code examples, and I have been unable to find them online.

That means I have to type in the examples.I normally don't mind, as it helps me learn.But his sample control, SimpleGaugeBar, has code scattered across two chapters (#13 and 14), all in bits and pieces.The code is intermingled with alternate code examples that (I think) he isn't using in the class, plus code from other classes apparently unrelated to SimpleGaugeBar.

The sample control is also buggy.Of course, it's my guess as to the code that is supposed to be contained in the control, because there is no single definitive listing of the code in the book.I suspect the sample code is simply buggy because the event sequencing the control responds to does not match the way the control was coded.

He separated the creation of the internal list of control objects and the styling code into two routines.That's probably a good idea.But, and this is a killer, if you programmatically change the properties of the control, the internal list of control objects is created *before* thenew property value is set, and applies styling after the property is set.This will cause the control to fail, because the styling code will refer to objects that were not created based upon the prior property settings.

The styling code also refers to objects in the internal list of controls by array index number instead of by their id.That's bad form and very prone to error.

I'm not a happy customer.

That said, there is a lot of material on custom controls, and I learned a lot going through it.There are not a lot of resources out there that cover this topic in any depth, and this is one of the few.So, muddled, buggy and disorganized as it is on this topic, I would recommend it (until I found something better). ... Read more