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The Book of Visual Studio .NET Review by Pierz Newton-John
Poorly written, misleading title, lots of errors
Other reviewers of this book who have suggested that it has the wrong title are correct. It should have been titled 'A Developer's Introduction to .NET'. It touches on a lot but barely skims the surface of anything. I bought it as a web designer wanting to get into ASP.NET, but the chapter on ASP.NET was just a tedious walkthrough of creating a web form, with pages and pages of minute instructions - add this control, then this one etc. - when all that space could have been devoted to explaining the core concepts.
The book is poorly written, haphazardly organised and plagued by small errors. One example:
'Visual Basic, for all intensive purposes, has arrived, and it's just as powerful and flexible as any other .NET language.' (Does he mean 'for all intents and purposes??') Then two paragraphs later: 'Furthermore, because VB lacks flexibility and power...' Where was the editor?
Another perpetually annoying error is the author's continually referring to 'diminishing' a variable in VB, when the correct term is 'dimensioning'. A small point, but one that adds to the perception of a lack of care.
For someone wanting the quick heads-up on .NET, then maybe, otherwise, avoid it.