Rating: 
Summary: Excellent ADO.NET Book
Review: Even though I am a VB/VB.NET developer and this book uses all C# examples, I found it to be extremely informative and packed with useful information. The concepts are explained in detail, but the author has written in such a clear and lucid style, that they are easy to grasp. If only all computer books were writen as well as this one! If you have been trying to get a firm understanding of ADO.NET, this is the book for you.
Rating:
Summary: Well written, easy to understand, many good ideas
Review: Finally a book that does not spend the bulk of its time comparing ADO.NET to ADO. The book is to the point. And not just an excercise in repeating MSDN docs. The book explains ADO.NET and then outlines best practices and other good ideas. Very useful. I finally can get rid of all the other terrible books on the subject I bought (including titles by Vaughn, Chand, and Thomsen).
Rating:
Summary: Easy to understand and use as a reference
Review: I found this book was very easy to read. The examples in the book are very easy to understand and use as a reference. The book explained very good information about ADO.NET concept and all the aspects of it. I have already started to use this book at work for a quick reference. I liked the chapter 9 "ADO.NET and XML" the most.From the beginning of the book in chapter 1 it was easy to understand the ADO.NET concept. This chapter provided a very good understanding of how ADO.NET works and how technology of data access evolved into ADO.NET. Chapters 2 and 3 provided good explanations and examples of getting connected to the database and issuing SQL commands. Chapter 3 also provided good information and examples on how the result of the SQL commands. Chapter 4 gave very good insight on the DataReader and how to use most of its functionality. Chapters 5, 6, and 7 were all about the Datasets, how to construct datasets, worth with datasets, and a new programming model the Typed Datasets. Chapter 8 provided a good explanation with excellent examples on how to update the Database and how to manage concurrency whether the Dataset is connected or disconnected. Chapter 9 explained the relationship between ADO.NET and XML. It described how well XML and ADO.NET are integrated. Chapter 10 discusses DataBinding, something I don't normally do. However, the examples were very good. Lastly chapter 11 gave some very well thought out design suggestions. --Review by Annie W.
Rating:
Summary: Well written, easy to understand, many good ideas
Review: I guess I'm the odd man out here b/c I didn't rate it five stars. I'm an ADO.NET junkie and while the author did a pretty good job on it, I wasn't impressed. His command of the material is excellent but the whole thing was kind of boring. (Not saying I could do any better). Maybe it's just because I've read just about everything I can find on ADO.NET before I read this, but I just didn't get the feeling that there was much new material or that he presented any new ways of looking at things. With that said, it's a thorough discussion of ADO.NET and he doesn't leave anything out. It's definitely a good reference book and even though I 'say' I'm somewhat disappointed, the book is definitely a 4 overall, and as far as technical content goes, it's cleraly a five
Rating: 
Summary: A pretty good ADO.NET book
Review: I guess I'm the odd man out here b/c I didn't rate it five stars. I'm an ADO.NET junkie and while the author did a pretty good job on it, I wasn't impressed. His command of the material is excellent but the whole thing was kind of boring. (Not saying I could do any better). Maybe it's just because I've read just about everything I can find on ADO.NET before I read this, but I just didn't get the feeling that there was much new material or that he presented any new ways of looking at things. With that said, it's a thorough discussion of ADO.NET and he doesn't leave anything out. It's definitely a good reference book and even though I 'say' I'm somewhat disappointed, the book is definitely a 4 overall, and as far as technical content goes, it's cleraly a five
Rating:
Summary: Easily the most useful technical book I've read in years.
Review: I have been a data application developer for over ten years. I've read, on average, two technical books per year on theory or practical application. This book has been my favorite for a number of reasons:
1) It covers the topics that are necessary to develop data applications in a .NET environment.
2) It gets to the point and doesn't waste your time needlessly.
3) It has concrete examples that are applicable to many situations with detailed descriptions.
4) It fully addresses the .NET focus on disconnected data centering around the Dataset. Making the paradigm switch from ADO to ADO.NET can be a daunting task. The sequence and examples of the book put all of the pieces of the puzzle together and allow you to start thinking in terms of disconnected data and not just DataReaders.
Data is the foundation of most every business application and it's essential to have a full understanding of the database/application interaction. Taking ADO.NET for granted is a common mistake, but spending time understanding to movement and manipulation of your data will result in a more stable and successful overall data application.
Mr. Wildermuth has done a great job. Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: True to the title, a must-have for any .NET developer
Review: I have been fortunate enough to read "Pragmatic ADO.NET - Data Access for the Internet World", a truly great book. I've got a decent enough knowledge of data access as used by the .NET Framework, but this book gave me a wake-up call to precisely how things are done, and how I can better optimize my apps. As such, I got a lot out of it.
It's less of a "techie ramming programming concepts down your throat" approach with impractical and illogical examples you'll never wind up using. On the contrary, author Shawn Wildermuth uses iterative examples using a similar coding design that is consistent throughout the book to connect to a database, and extract/update/manipulate or analyze information, so it sticks with the reader more. I've let some members of the user group I run preview the book and they got more out of it than any other book on ADO.NET so far.
The book is perfectly suited for the intermediate-level, professional developer, as it's not intended to be an introductory book on ADO.NET programming (or database technology, for that matter), so most of the code examples are presented in a way that assumes the reader is familiar with writing data-driven apps. As such, the book doesn't waste time going through 5 meaningless chapters on "What is .NET?", "What is ADO.NET?","What is the CLR?", and other things that drive people just in search of good., useful information crazy. You hit the ground running.
Wildermuth's writing style is great - he uses a tone that is learned, yet not domineering; knowledgeable, but not unfamiliar. Reading his book is like sitting down with a friend and chatting about data access principles. (It's also more than obvious very early on the in the book's code examples that Shawn is an avid fan of the Atlanta Braves). :)
The numerous code examples are easy to follow and are presented in C#. He also runs ... for Web-based support. I also liked the fact that Wildermuth made reference to and cited examples using Visual Studio .NET, but did not explicitly marry the book to Microsoft's IDE, and include all of the proprietary code that is generated because of it, which in my opinion, tends to confuse a reader not using VS .NET, making the book counterproductive. The code is laid out raw, so a developer using some other IDE (or NotePad) can just as much out of it as the VS .NET jock.
At 330 pages (with an excellent appendix on migration) it's a quick read, but nonetheless contains healthy chapters on the DataSet, uses of XML, designing middle-tier business objects, and schema. The book's physical properties are great....the cover is strong and bound tight, with thick paper, so it won't have a broken spine or fall to pieces after 4 nights in your lap while you code. To me at least, this is important.
The book also includes an excellent chapter on implementing a best practice approach to managing your migration to ADO.NET, and appreciating the nature of an the scalability of an application. Wildermuth preaches that ADO.NET, like any technology should be planned and implemented wisely, rather than just deploying next-generation technology merely for the sake of doing so, or in doing so, creating inefficiency.
For criticism, I felt that Chapter 10, "Data Binding with ADO.NET" was a little light, only briefly previewing the use of data in Windows Forms for desktop clients and in WebForms with ASP.NET, and I was surprised to not see more time spent discussing the importance of understanding .NET's data caching facilities. However, it still doesn't take away the fact that this is an excellent book...and one that any .NET developer should definitely get for her library.
Rating:
Summary: A technical book with a story to tell
Review: I read technical books by the armful, and I am used to the generally dry and meandering nature in which they tend to present material. This book truly has a mission to tell a story. If you have to get up to speed on ADO.NET quickly, and prefer not to be lulled to sleep by the SDK, this book is lively (well, considering the subject matter) and will truly convey an understanding that going over the class library won't do until you have written a lot of code.
Rating: 
Summary: Everything about ADO.NET but...
Review: May be it is just me. This book is every thing about ADO.NET but not much about Internet or atleast not what I expected to find. There are thorough examples and topics covering every aspect of ADO.NET, so if you are beginner and wants to get up and running with ADO.NET - then this book is definitely for you. But if you intermediate to expert and have been using ADO.NET or and looking for something more to see what you might be missing then you may be disappointed. The author could have done much better by covering some more advanced topics and may even show a way to build a killer application using ADO.NET techniques.
Rating:
Summary: A true "pragmatic" book
Review: Most technical books use fairly limited vocabulary in their titles. The title of the book usually has an adjective (Advanced, Essential, Professional) and a name of some technology. Experienced reader come to expect certain level of content based on the book's title. When I've picked "Pragmatic ADO.NET" as my first ADO.NET book, I've relied mostly on the fact that it was written by Shawn Wildermuth (had good Amazon reviews, published in AW .NET Dev Series and endorsed by Chris Sells). I wasn't sure what to expect from that "pragmatic" adjective. Now that I've read the book I wish other authors would consider sharing their expertise by writing "Pragmatic" books. As any sophisticated technology, ADO.NET offers many options to get the job done. Shawn shows which options are the most practical based on his extensive experience. Shawn's book doesn't teach you basics of .NET. It doesn't teach you internals of ADO.NET or SQL syntax. Shawn refers the reader to other excellent books for details. What "Pragmatic ADO.NET" does well is to teach you about what's important in ADO.NET from practical standpoint. One of the last chapters of the book includes a great list of "best practices" that summarize the recommendations explained though out the text. Very valuable. "Pragmatic ADO.NET" is a quick read for someone who has the background with .NET and general idea of database programming. The book will not make you an expert in ADO.NET so if you're looking for in-depth information this book isn't for you. After finishing this book, expect to be referring to MSDN documentation and sample code when you work on your data access layer. But you'll know exactly what details you'll need to explore further and what parts you can safely ignore. A few "to-improve" comments: 1) The book has too much long code listings for my taste. 2) Sometimes I felt I needed a bit more information about the reasons why Shawn recommends a particular solution or a best practice.
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