Rating: 
Summary: For Gurus Only ?
Review: A most well-written book with (for this programmer) some structural problems that do not diminish its technical value as an aid to deeper understanding of the "machinery" behind the "user illusion" of Visual Basic.This book requires a type of deep knowledge about COM and the underlying interface between Visual Basic and the Windows 32 operating system which you will probably not have unless you have been a C/C++ programmer ... or have done extensive work with trying to optimize applications writen in VB using the API interfaces to Windows provided by VB. It offers very complex solutions to very complex problems. Implementing the solutions requires you to depend upon the author's provided bridging-code ... a package called "VBBoost" ... which, for most mortals, will be a set of "black boxes." The problem with that is that as soon as Windows and VB change ... and they soon will undergo a most profound transformation when .Net and VB7 arrive ... how will any real-world solution implemented using the author's bridging-code tools be reliably maintainable ? Or even be usable in the radically different architecture ? Personally, I would not dare use the tools provided by the author ... which he will update and maintain on his web-site as he has time ... for any commercial code. For me there is difficulty with the MS provided controls whose quirks require staying on top of so many Knowledge Base articles, and which often have to be extended through API code to really tap their full functionality. To use the techniques in this book with confidence I would have to spend more time than I wish to going back and learning the depths of COM and Win32 ... and I'd just about have to do that by studying the C/C++ literature ... which I'd then have to mentally translate back to VB. This would undoubtedly make me a better programmer through sleep deprivation, but it is not consistent with my use of VB for rapid prototyping and application development at a fairly high level of abstraction. If you are a VB Guru already ... or are really ready to step out of the "VB Bubble" into the depths of COM and Win32 ... then I think ... as the other reviews attest ... this is THE book for you. The author, imho, has a genius for explaining very complex interactions between the different internal layers of software in Windows. I do not regret buying this book, and I really enjoyed the author's clear, expository, style. To me he writes as cleanly and enjoyably as Francesco Balena, Karl Peterson, and a very few others about such a deeply technical aspect of VB. His web site with updates to the software examples and revisions and corrections for the book shows he is committed to helping people use his work. So, in conclusion, I have to say that while I wish I was at the level where I could understand and use the knowledge presented so well in this book, I am not. I have mixed feelings about writing this review ... as I do about the book; I wouldn't want to discourage anyone from buying this book which is an important contribution to the "distaff" VB literature (a universe until now mainly populated by Appleman and McKinney). What I would love to see would be a book by Francesco Balena, my favorite VB author, that would somehow get me to the point where I could grok Curland's book without spending a year in the C/C+/API gulag. But perhaps Francesco has better uses of his time :) Please do check out this book yourself ! Bill Woodruff, dotScience
Rating:
Summary: For Gurus Only ?
Review: A most well-written book with (for this programmer) some structural problems that do not diminish its technical value as an aid to deeper understanding of the "machinery" behind the "user illusion" of Visual Basic. This book requires a type of deep knowledge about COM and the underlying interface between Visual Basic and the Windows 32 operating system which you will probably not have unless you have been a C/C++ programmer ... or have done extensive work with trying to optimize applications writen in VB using the API interfaces to Windows provided by VB. It offers very complex solutions to very complex problems. Implementing the solutions requires you to depend upon the author's provided bridging-code ... a package called "VBBoost" ... which, for most mortals, will be a set of "black boxes." The problem with that is that as soon as Windows and VB change ... and they soon will undergo a most profound transformation when .Net and VB7 arrive ... how will any real-world solution implemented using the author's bridging-code tools be reliably maintainable ? Or even be usable in the radically different architecture ? Personally, I would not dare use the tools provided by the author ... which he will update and maintain on his web-site as he has time ... for any commercial code. For me there is difficulty with the MS provided controls whose quirks require staying on top of so many Knowledge Base articles, and which often have to be extended through API code to really tap their full functionality. To use the techniques in this book with confidence I would have to spend more time than I wish to going back and learning the depths of COM and Win32 ... and I'd just about have to do that by studying the C/C++ literature ... which I'd then have to mentally translate back to VB. This would undoubtedly make me a better programmer through sleep deprivation, but it is not consistent with my use of VB for rapid prototyping and application development at a fairly high level of abstraction. If you are a VB Guru already ... or are really ready to step out of the "VB Bubble" into the depths of COM and Win32 ... then I think ... as the other reviews attest ... this is THE book for you. The author, imho, has a genius for explaining very complex interactions between the different internal layers of software in Windows. I do not regret buying this book, and I really enjoyed the author's clear, expository, style. To me he writes as cleanly and enjoyably as Francesco Balena, Karl Peterson, and a very few others about such a deeply technical aspect of VB. His web site with updates to the software examples and revisions and corrections for the book shows he is committed to helping people use his work. So, in conclusion, I have to say that while I wish I was at the level where I could understand and use the knowledge presented so well in this book, I am not. I have mixed feelings about writing this review ... as I do about the book; I wouldn't want to discourage anyone from buying this book which is an important contribution to the "distaff" VB literature (a universe until now mainly populated by Appleman and McKinney). What I would love to see would be a book by Francesco Balena, my favorite VB author, that would somehow get me to the point where I could grok Curland's book without spending a year in the C/C+/API gulag. But perhaps Francesco has better uses of his time :) Please do check out this book yourself ! Bill Woodruff, dotScience
Rating: 
Summary: Boost your Visual Basic expertise
Review: A Must Have. The BEST VB ADVANCED book I have read. This book contains hard to find information about VB and help you to mark the difference with classical VB programer. Really useful, help you to create optimized VB application. It go deeper in COM object (VB classes, typelib, ...) manipulation, and explain with clear words the complexity of this architecture, give examples and a lot of REUSABLE code. It is THE ADVANCED VB book !
Rating:
Summary: He's not kidding about Advanced!
Review: All too often books are labeled as "Advanced" yet don't offer much that someone moderately skilled in the language would know. This book truly does some groundbreaking, explaining what's really going on under the hood. If you like a challenge and like pushing VB beyond the typical limits, this is the book for you.
Rating:
Summary: He's not kidding about Advanced!
Review: All too often books are labeled as "Advanced" yet don't offer much that someone moderately skilled in the language would know. This book truly does some groundbreaking, explaining what's really going on under the hood. If you like a challenge and like pushing VB beyond the typical limits, this is the book for you.
Rating:
Summary: Requires Discipline
Review: I found this book to be absolutely amazing in terms of the type of power it exposes to the Visual Basic developer. Having said that I want to encourage anyone thinking of buying this book. It is not a book for beginners not by a long shot...if you have been programming in Visual Basic long enough to be frustrated by what cannot be done in VB compared to C++ then it is time to purchase this book...I wanted to point out a few things. First and foremost. The author provides the C++ code for the DLL. You can recompile against the Visual Studio.NET framework and you should be good to go. Second, the changes to VB exposed by .NET will require that more than the authors bridge code be tweaked. In fact Visual Basic and Visual Basic .NET have little in common at all. So if you ditch this book and it's code for .NET reasons then ditch VB 6 while you are at it. Last thing. The topics and the examples in this book will give you tremendous insight into Windows Programming. The concepts can easily be abstracted. The author shows you so much about COM, Interfaces, Pointers and memory. If you thoroughly understood the content of this book (which is realistic). You could walk away from Visual Basic 6.0 to a totally different programming language and immediately apply the information this book provides. So if you are ready to study WITH DISCIPLINE. If you are ready to take your Visual Basic Applications to the next level WITH POWER & STABILITY. Then you are ready to buy this book. My hat goes off to Matt Curland for finally providing a book that explains how to use Visual Basic to it's full potential.
Rating:
Summary: By far the best advanced book I've seen for VB6
Review: I simply can't accept people give below 5 stars for this book - have they read it correctly / reviewed the same book??? It's BY FAR the best I've seen for the advanced user. Everything that you always wanted to do in VB - and it's here! It's an ABSOLUTE must for any serious programmer. This book is on the same level of every VB programmers bible - Dan Appleman's Guide to the Win32 API - if that gives you an idea of how good it is. I can't believe I haven't heard about this book before.
Rating:
Summary: I used to think I knew what VB could do
Review: I used to think I knew what VB could do. It turns out that I knew about as much as my four year old knows about driving from playing with his toy cars. This is a great book, with information that I have never seen anywhere else. But what I like best about the book is that it does not talk down to you or make you feel dumb as it teaches you things that no one else can. It would be too easy to fall into that mode, many authors do it. But there are a few for VB - Randell, Balena, Kaplan, McManus, and now Curland - who make you feel like you are just hanging out with another developer. Kudos to Matt for producing this book. Worth the price if it cost twice as much or more!
Rating:
Summary: And on the sixth day, Curland wrote AVB 6
Review: I will keep this short. Curland's book shows you how to make VB6 do things you've always wanted it to and do things you've never thought of. His understanding of COM and the under workings of VB enable binary inheritance, overriding functions, creating lightweight COM objects and others. This is a must read. The book make clear that VB6 is really COM programming language and is a must ready for any serious VB programmer. If you've ever read Don Box's COM book then you know what I mean when I say Curland on COM & VB6 is to what Box is on c++ and COM. -Enjoy
Rating:
Summary: And on the sixth day, Curland wrote AVB 6
Review: I will keep this short. Curland's book shows you how to make VB6 do things you've always wanted it to and do things you've never thought of. His understanding of COM and the under workings of VB enable binary inheritance, overriding functions, creating lightweight COM objects and others. This is a must read. The book make clear that VB6 is really COM programming language and is a must ready for any serious VB programmer. If you've ever read Don Box's COM book then you know what I mean when I say Curland on COM & VB6 is to what Box is on c++ and COM. -Enjoy
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