Rating: 
Summary: Galvanizing Hair!
Review: I have never read this book, and I don't care about its contents. Just look at the second guy from the left on the cover. I want hair like that! That's why I gave it five stars.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Book Especially for beginners
Review: I have read many Books on the topic of Visual Basic, this one being my first foray into VB.Net. This book contains the best compilation of exercises I have seen in a beginner's book. The explanations are thorough and clearly explained. In addition, the authors appear to go to great lengths to expose the reader to a wide variety of functions throughout the lessons. I will admit that the editing staff for this book might benefit from taking an English class or two, as some of the grammar in the book is painful to read. However, in spite of the ineptitude of the editing staff I think you will be hard pressed to find a better resource for learning VB.Net. This is a how to manual, not a literary work of art. While I have noticed the poor editing, it is not substantial enough to make me want to throw the book across the room (which I have done with some books in the past). I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who needs to get their feet wet with VB.Net.
Rating:
Summary: Simple. Clear. Straightforward.
Review: I have spent a great deal of time browsing through a number of VB.Net books in a couple of my local bookstores. (Both have extensive technical book sections). This book caught my eye and I decided to browse through it. First off, I must say that in the bookstore I was "wowed" by quality of the content. After I got it home and started implementing the examples in the chapters, I can definitively say that this book is excellent.My goal in my book search was to find a book that explained the VB.Net language as it pertained to the VB.Net development environment. I wanted a book that actually "showed" me how to navigate around the IDE while explaining nontrivial VB.Net concepts and examples, and discussing the language so that I would be able to write some programs after finishing it. Some of the earlier chapters are geared to a beginning programmer (somewhat like me and even less so), yet the authors branch off and talk about relevant topics without falling off a limb. For example, in chapter 2 - "Writing Software", the authors discuss data types and give numerous examples of accessing the different properties of each. When they get the the Boolean datatype, they actually go into a juicy amount of detail about binary representations and even discuss binary math. Its just a few pages in length but it is darn appropriate and gives a nice overview into the topic at hand. However, they keep it moving and move on to the next appropriate topic with their usual clarity in writing. I am now focusing on their chapter on "Building Objects" - chapter 4. I have to say that this chapter offers the clearest examples of classes that I have seen. Far too often I have read about classes in other books and have seen weird examples that had little to do with real life...often requiring a "suspension of reality" on behalf of the reader such that the reader was forced to make the leap from theory to reality. This book, on the other hand, shows me how to construct an object that I can actually relate to. So far I have not found any errors, although they do list some (minor) errata in the Wrox website. But the fact that Wrox even *has* a comprehensive website proactively listing potential errata is yet another reason I am glad I bought this book from this publisher. By the way, I found their website and located the section related to this book in about 12 seconds. The quality is in the details, and obviously somebody at Wrox actually cared about the ease of finding information about their published material. Like I said I am only on chapter 4, yet I have done a lot of "skimming" ahead and I eagerly await the topics in later chapters where I will learn how to build little Windows applications, make my own menus, handle errors, connect to a database, etc. Basically *all* the things I want to learn how to do. (Are they mind readers?) Excellent work.
Rating:
Summary: Stop thinking about it and buy this book.
Review: I purchased this book 3 days ago and because of other commitments I have only read as far as Chapter 4. However in that short space of time, I did the right thing by myself and wrote every example out in the book so far (nothing beats learning by doing, at least as far as I am concerned). I must admit, having gone from a flat 0 in VB experience to now writing basic programs by myself without referring to any book or online help. Even if the remainder of the book turns out to be [weak]), the info I have learnt already has made me very happy with the purchase. I have not seen one error yet, everything works as shown and is explained so anyone can understand it. If you are new to VB.Net or programming at all, buy this book. It is without doubt the best book I have ever seen on the subject of programming. This is my first Wrox book and it probably will not be the last if this is the quality of their products. This book Wrox! :)
Rating:
Summary: Best VB.NET book
Review: I was trying to find a book that would extend my VB6 capabilities to VB.NET especially that the language has completely changed. After surfing the net in general and Amazon in particular the title of the book attracted me. I said WoW, now its time to learn VB.NET. Actually going through this book enriched my knowledge a lot, i was not only able to tranfere most of my programs (Civil Engineering) but i extended them a lot. This book gives a very clear view of classes and i consider this the best part of this book. I encourage you to buy it although it is not really made for those who are totally new to programming. It requires a little bit of experience, a good understanding of VB6 will help a lot.
Rating:
Summary: Perfect for beginners - programming experience NOT needed
Review: If you are a beginner to VB.NET or even a beginner to programming and are interested in creating a software application, this book will give you all the information you need to get started on this endeavor. By the time you reach the end of the book, you may have to supplement your knowledge of VB.NET by reading a few other books depending on the nature of the software application you are creating. But otherwise, if you want to buy just ONE book and learn VB.NET in under 10 days (enough to create Version 1 of your software application), this is the book for you. Why is it such a great book for beginners? It explains all the necessary concepts in great detail and in a simple fashion. No prior programming experience is assumed and the authors do a terrific job of explaining all the concepts and use good examples. The sample code can be downloaded from the publisher's website and there is an excellent discussion group led by the authors and other industry experts to answer any questions you may have on VB.NET. The book covers the following main topics - an introduction chapter, VB.NET development tool, basics of writing software, how to control the program flow, intro on objects, the .NET framework, how to build windows desktop applications, how to build web applications, how to access databases, how to access other applications using your custom application, etc. Of course, if the application you are building is a complex one, this book is NOT sufficient. You need to supplement the knowledge gained through this book with the knowledge from a variety of other books. This is the unfortunate thing with the .NET technology as it stands right now. The situation is definitely improving but it's not there yet in terms of easy explanations on how to manage the development of complex software. What struck me most about this book was the ease with which practically anyone with above average reading and computer skills can learn how to use this powerful technology. The explanations were very clear leaving almost no doubts on how to use VB.NET for developing software applications. I believe that you can get through each chapter in 1-3 hours and if you are determined to learn VB.NET in 10 days, I believe you can do it with the help of this book. You would have to spend 10 hours a day but you would get through this book by the end of the 10 days. This might be the reason why the sales rank of this book on Amazon has gone up so rapidly over the last few months. Recommended process for learning VB.NET using this book - read the book cover to cover without skipping any chapters. You can work through all the examples in each chapter or skip them if you feel comfortable that you understood what the authors are trying to convey. These chapters are organized the way they are for a very good reason, to help you learn VB.NET in the shortest amount of time and hence the recommendation NOT to skip any chapters in this book. They all cover very important topics especially for beginners. If you have any amount of programming experience - .NET in particular, you may find it extremely difficult to keep your focus while reading this book as it is too basic and covers too much material that is aimed at teaching how to program. But for beginners, this book is a blessing. Enjoy learning to program in VB.NET and good luck with your software application!
Rating: 
Summary: Why this is not for you
Review: It's really difficult to recommend this book to anyone, regardless of your past programming experience. Most of the material is covered in a superficial, rushed manner. These guys were obviously more interested in getting their faces on the book cover than teaching. If you're coming from VB5 or VB6 you'd expect to see an introductory book to VB.Net to contain at least a list of VB5 functions and their VB.Net equivalents. For example: Substr(strA, 1,3) & strA.substring(1,3)
The treatment of ADO.Net is pathetic. They explain how to bind data to form controls and the datagrid, but nowhere do they cover the basics you were used to in VB5 or VB6. Like, how do you reference individual fields in records, perform seeks or finds. No guidance as to how you do edits (rs.edit), adds (rs.addnew) or updates (rs.update) like you did in DAO. No direction on how to allow for the disconnected data model implemented in ADO.Net versus what it was in DAO. Like hey, how do you determine if the record you're updating was accessed and updated by another user before you completed your update. That seems pretty elementary stuff and its omission gives you an idea how carelessly and hurriedly this book was sent to print.
Setting up the datagrid for data binding is done programmatically in the book instead of showing you how to do it through the IDE which is infinitely simpler and likely the most frequent way you'll do it. No discussion of how to manipulate data in the grid. Simple but essential stuff like how do you determine which cell/row was clicked. How do you get at the Cell's data, edit it and tell the user if there was an error or even simpler: How to set the Cell & Row headers or highlight the entire row if any cell was clicked.
A word about support. Forget it. You're supposed to be able to download the source for the book. I tried multiple times at different times during the day/night. My download request kept timing-out after 100 retires. Gees!
This book is a bad reflection on WROX /Wiley the publisher. Is there no one doing quality control?
Good quality work takes time to craft and a thoughful, empathic approach. If you want a shinning example of how to write a great "how to" book just look at the hunreds of reviews for Elizabeth Castro's book: "Perl & CGI for the world wide web."
What can you expect from 3 juveniles who think they've discovered a path to riches the fast way? Well I have a few words for them: You rip me off once, shame on you. You do it to me twice, shame on me.
Sign me: smarter now on WROX/Wiley books
Rating:
Summary: -5 stars
Review: Really what I have to say has already been said by others and Rosey puts it nicely when she says "Most of the material is covered in a superficial, rushed manner." and "The treatment of ADO.Net is pathetic."
For anything truly substantial on VB.Net do yourself a favor and look elsewhere; what a waste of money this was. If I could give this book a -5 star rating, I would.
Rating:
Summary: Slow starter
Review: The book starts out a little slow for those who program in any other IDE but seems to pick up. It's well worded and easy to take in. I do have to go along with the others who posted on the appearance of the second guy on the cover. Looks like a photo you would find off of a book called "Profiles of a serial killer" Just my opinion of course ;)
Rating: 
Summary: It's good but .....
Review: The examples do not work exactly as shown. Good for a programmer from another language to get a overview but it is frustrating to type in 100 line example of code to not have it work. (I own Visual Basic .net & I think they use visual basic studio which seems to have expanded visual basic capabilites?)
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