Rating: 
Summary: Just So-So, More Accurately, 3 & half stars
Review: This book is really for beginners, If you haven't touched ANY windows programming and so abruptly want to jump into visual C++ , try this book. But one of the drawbacks of this books is, the author should realize that even the begineer ( i mean the serious beginner) still really want to know some thing under the hood! Just knowing how-to is far from necessary, Actually, that doesn't prompt our study, but rather hinder it. So frequently, I got to check the code automatically generated by the ApplWizard & ClassWizard. This does help!. Another drawback is this book doesn't touch anything about MFC , which is the must-know for serious user, It doesn't even mention it. The good thing is, the author explain everything in very detailed, Okay, I mean everything on the surface. After you finish this book, it will be much easier to go through more advanced topics, MFC, ActiveX and multithreading stuffs,... Anyway, I should rate it as 3 and Half stars. I think that best book for beginner is " special edition using visual c++ 6.0" . But it is harder to follow.
Rating: 
Summary: This is good for a beginner
Review: I really liked this book as a Beginner since it teaches a lot about the visual studio environment and also takes you step-by-step through applications. Not the greatest in-depth or and by no means advanced. But its super for a beginner.If you know little of VC++ and even less of MFC then START here. Notice I emphasized Start....since you will need to read lots of other books to gain deeper understanding. Take this from someone who struggled with the advanced books and then got a better start with this one.
Rating:
Summary: Probably not for beginners
Review: This was the first book on Visual C++ 6 I ever purchased...well, it's actually still the only one I own. I've been casually reading it and programming from it for - a lot longer than 21 days. In my opinion, this book is not for beginners. It's taken me a long while to begin to pick up some of the concepts that Chapman is constantly throwing into the picture. While I have grasped a great deal about C++ through this book, I am going to buy another one soon, one that more thoroughly covers the details instead of trying to cram the whole picture down at once.
Rating: 
Summary: Not as bad as others make it out to be.
Review: Maybe if people would bother to read a preface they would understand the layout of the book. Most of the "missing" material is in the back of the book in the "C++ Overview" section. You know...the last 600 PAGES!!! The blue ones. Yeah, those. Try reading through some of the material. Maybe get off your duff and install the CD that accompanies the book. I've been a programmer for a good long time now, and I've learned more languages from books than you can count on both hands. This book is EXCELLENT, and I highly recommend it for the beginner, and the advanced (visual or not) C++ programmer. As long as you read the ENTIRE FREAKIN' BOOK. Don't just use the lessons in the front and not refer to the refrence material and additional examples in the rear. The CD has all the code contained in the book. If there's a question about where to put code or a variable...take a look at the author's coding. Nine times out of ten it will solve any and all problems/questions you may have.
Rating:
Summary: Good for VC++, but you may want to have a grasp of...
Review: basic C++ before reading this. When I originally picked up this book, I had no knowledge of the C++ language, and hoped that this may be of some help to me. I soon learned, however, that it would only teach me MFC. After I finished the book and ventured out into the land of writing my own programs, I quickly found myself constantly going back to the book to figure out how to do something. I am an extremely fast learner, so the first few times wouldn't be an issue, but when I was going back five times to be able to set the default settings of a checkbox, I find that outrageous! After my first (unsuccessful) encounter with this book, I went out and got "Teach Yourself C++ in 21 Days". This gave me a very good grasp of the C++ language. After finishing that, I returned to TYVC, zoomed through it, and now not only have a strong understanding of MFC, but rarely must consult a reference for anything other than new material, which I quickly understand. As for learning the VC++ environment and MFC, this is an excellent book. Many of the examples given have some errors, but look at it as a free class in debugging! I think that it went into well enough detail to allow someone with a good understanding of C++ strong foundations in MFC. However, because it is not titled "Teach Yourself MFC in 21 Days", I think it could have gone over the features of the VC++ development environment in more detail, such as using the integrated debugger. Other than the lack of compiler-specific details and some buggy programs, I have no complaints. I would strongly recommend this book to anyone who, as I've stated many times, has a solid understanding of C++. Do not become fooled by the title and think you will learn both VC++ and C++ in the same book, otherwise you will become heavily dependant upon it when writing your own programs in the future.
Rating: 
Summary: The worst programming book i ever saw
Review: If you want to learn to program C++ or even VC++ i think even using some online tutorial would be better. This book is completely useless. I dont own a copy (If i did i would have burnt it up), i dont do window$ stuff (FreeBSD all the way). A friend of my taking some programming course where they used this book as the course text and happened to have some assignments i was helping him with. Why did i give it such a poor rating?? 'Cos it is the most annoying book i ever saw. The author's style of programming is really really poor and inconsistent; like inconsistent use of both camel and hungarian notation. He must have learnt programming from VB(which is notorious for its poor coding practices). The most annoying thing about this book is the uneccessary comments, like: areaOfYard = FindArea(lengthOfYard,widthOfYard); // call to function passing a length and width value return l * w; // in one statement... return l * w ... wow
(like this is sooo amazing) oh and i++ // increment i Really, how dumb does he think readers are?? This should probably have been called VC++ for dumb dummies. Comments should be used to clarify code not just repeat what code sais.
Except you're a complete newbie to C++ or any other programming language you'll find this book completely frustrating and annoying and even if you're a newbie it'll teach you very bad programming practices.
Rating:
Summary: At least gets you productive but you will need other books!
Review: I have just finish the entire book including all appendices and Exercises (some of them done twice). Although I was proficient in C++ I had little experience of MFC before I started. Having read all the other reviewers comments I agree with the general consensus that this is by no means the best book on VC++. There are too many inexcusable mistakes. The catchy title has unjustly earned it the claim as one of the highest selling books on VC++ 6 in the UK or US. In a nutshell: the book has a lot of merit but I suggest that it is used to complement other titles and once you are happy with its limitations it's probably worth considering. Also, as the entire book and source code are free on the web ...I seriously suggest you try before you buy: THE BAD POINTS
1. The book's lack colours, poor layout, cheap paper, inconsistency in the use of Hungarian notation and annoying phrases such as "well done! you have learned a lot today", only serve to irritate the reader. 2. The amount coding mistakes are inexcusable even though there are some errata on the SAMS web site but this is not a full list. 3. The author often switches from a top-down to a bottom-up approach of writing code. You start writing classes, functions, declaring variables etc without any explanation as to why. A review of the chapter is ultimately necessary. 4. There are several cases of macros, call back functions etc just appearing in the code without any description yet some of the simplest concepts are over described. 5. Some key concepts which are at the very foundation of MFC are unclear or not are discussed well. 6. The 37 page chapter on C++ is far too small to be of any use and should be left out as it's a book on VC++. Every VC programmer would have their own books on C++. 7. The 'Quiz' and 'Exercises' are too simple to test yourself on your ability to absorb the chapter. 8. The 21 day style of the book is over ambitious as the author must assume that you will absorb 100% of every chapter. Also some days contain more than twice the number of pages as others. 9. The format is more 'click this', 'type that' and so on thus the reader simply ends up copying the code into the editor. 10. The appendix follows a different style than the rest of the book and the some sections appear to be included as the author has used up his 21 day allocation. 11. Many variables are declared as public thus not employing good OO style approach. THE GOOD POINTS
1. The book does provide good complete introductory examples which allow the user to see real workings of a project. I have always found that there are too many books, although excellent references provide no working examples thus making difficult in integrate the topics into your own code. 2. Most of the introductory topics are introduced, albeit lightly, but they do at least provide you with working examples to start your own projects. 3. Some of the chapters in the appendices are quite good and have a different writing style and flow that the rest of the book. However, I just realised that these are taken directly from Jon Bates's far superior book 'Using Visual C++ 6'. 4. The near 800 odd pages mislead you into believing that you cover a lot more than you actually do. 'Using Visual C++ 6' or 'Practical Visual C++' covers a lot more and has perfectly good examples to match in a similar number of pages. 5. The entire book including text and examples (which all appear to work!) are available for download on [website] which make it easy for searching and give the user the option of trying the book before he/she buys it. 6. You do get productive quickly which makes it a great companion to other VC++ books.
Rating:
Summary: Really bad book that confuses the reader
Review: The author of this book assumes you have had some kind of Visual C++ experience. You know what happens when you assume!!! In the second day, the author wants you to create a class, but does not tell you how to do it. Maybe my book was missing these important instructions but I don't so. This book is filled with errors and assumptions. I got about 1/2 way through it and decided to use it as a paperweight. How can you learn any thing from a book when the author has made so many mistakes and assumptions? Your money is better spent elsewhere.
Rating:
Summary: Worth a little less than useless
Review: This Book will teach you nothing about VC++. If you do read this book then you will have to get another one to be able to program windows, like "Programming Windows by Charles Petzold". The most you can get from this book is how to create diolog boxes, Not with programming , but by using the helpful utils that come with VC++. It explanes nothing and god forbid that you might have to code some of it by hand. If you have this book. Do what I did. Throw it away. It is a little too big for a paperweight. Unfortuntly, This title is just not as good as some of the others by sams. Also.... You get a tryal version of VC++ which displays the licence agreement pryor to the start of every program that you create. So you either have to buy the product to use it for real or Dload Borlands product for free, but then everything that you learn in this book will not work with the commandline compiler frm Borland.
Rating:
Summary: Absolute waste
Review: You won't learn any VC++ here. The entire book is about "do this, ok now do that" with no explanation at all. Its as if all the author wanted you learn is how to do the examples in the book. Even the examples [are poor]. My rating? 1/10.
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