Rating: 
Summary: This book is [not good]
Review: After reading through the first 20 chapters, in which no programming occurred until Session 16, I finally gave up. When I hit the first source code error in a simple form validation program I chalked it up to a simple typo. In Session 20 I couldn't get their program to work at all, to say nothing of the source code not even appearing on the CD-ROM!Whatever you do, DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY ON THIS BOOK!!!... As has been said before, if I could give it zero stars I would.
Rating:
Summary: How bad can a book be written?
Review: Before this I have purchased and enjoyed a few others of the Weekend Crash Course books - never again though!
There are typos, there are bad code examples, there is missing code examples, there are repeated paragraphs, there is lack of flow sometimes, there is lack of information (if you are doing some of this for the first time). I am sure that I have found close to a problem per page - and the book is about 300 pages!
I cannot believe how this book got out to the shelves and worse more I cannot believe an Amazon user like myself bought a book without reading the reviews first. If you are reading this, heed the warning of myself and the other reviewers - don't waste "your weekend" on this book.
Rating: 
Summary: Buyer Beware
Review: Here is a prime example of the great service Amazon provides and what can happen when you do not use it. This book is horrible, and I have downloaded the April 9, 2002 code updates which still do not work. Had I a read the reviews at Amazon I would have saved myself some money and valuable time.
Rating:
Summary: Don't buy this book!
Review: I bought this book with the aspirations of getting a somewhat steady foundation in ASP.Net. As a "classic ASP" developer I wanted to get a jumpstart on ASP.NET with a quick overview. Unfortunately, my hopes were trashed by this book. There are so many typographical errors in this book that it makes me wonder if anyone cared to proof this book. Some of the code samples (including one that involves File Uploading) do not work. On one .HTML file he forgets a double quote which causes the page not to function correctly. If that is not enough, once you debug the author's own work, the file still doesn't work! If you mistakenly bought this book, email me and I'll send you the correct code. If the author is reading this....get a real job. P.S. I'm sorry that Amazon makes you select at least a 1 for the book, because it's lower than that.
Rating:
Summary: Don't buy this book!
Review: I bought this book with the aspirations of getting a somewhat steady foundation in ASP.Net. As a "classic ASP" developer I wanted to get a jumpstart on ASP.NET with a quick overview. Unfortunately, my hopes were trashed by this book. There are so many typographical errors in this book that it makes me wonder if anyone cared to proof this book. Some of the code samples (including one that involves File Uploading) do not work. On one .HTML file he forgets a double quote which causes the page not to function correctly. If that is not enough, once you debug the author's own work, the file still doesn't work! If you mistakenly bought this book, email me and I'll send you the correct code. If the author is reading this....get a real job. P.S. I'm sorry that Amazon makes you select at least a 1 for the book, because it's lower than that.
Rating:
Summary: Micro$oft Hype
Review: I found this book to be more fluff about how Micro$oft technology will deliver us all from the problems with program development today. As the other reviews have stated, skip this book and go for one with more tech content than sales hype.
Rating:
Summary: Painful.
Review: I really didn't have many complaints about the book during the first few chapters. In fact, I appreciated reviewing some of the history of the past technologies, even though I had used those technologies. I also didn't mind that the book doesn't discuss "Visual Studio .Net" since I already know how to use it. I forgave some of the small typos along the way. However, at about Session 20, everything really broke down. Code was missing or just plain wrong from that point on. The listings on the CD were also incorrect or missing (Session 20 did not have a complete listing, instead referring the student to the CD-ROM. This was the first time I used the CD-ROM during the course ... and Session 20 was missing!). And where are the Web-based errata? If you go to [url] you are told to visit [url]. If there are errata there, they are well-hidden. Using online resources and those included with Visual Studio, I was able to come up with my own solutions to the problems presented. However, by the time I had finished the course, it was no longer a "Weekend Crash Course". To add insult to injury, the included testing software also has typos and grades the questions incorrectly. In conclusion: There are a lot of good books out there now that are based upon the released version of ASP.NET. Use those. This book is already miserably, and painfully, out of date.
Rating:
Summary: Painful.
Review: I really didn't have many complaints about the book during the first few chapters. In fact, I appreciated reviewing some of the history of the past technologies, even though I had used those technologies. I also didn't mind that the book doesn't discuss "Visual Studio .Net" since I already know how to use it. I forgave some of the small typos along the way. However, at about Session 20, everything really broke down. Code was missing or just plain wrong from that point on. The listings on the CD were also incorrect or missing (Session 20 did not have a complete listing, instead referring the student to the CD-ROM. This was the first time I used the CD-ROM during the course ... and Session 20 was missing!). And where are the Web-based errata? If you go to [url] you are told to visit [url]. If there are errata there, they are well-hidden. Using online resources and those included with Visual Studio, I was able to come up with my own solutions to the problems presented. However, by the time I had finished the course, it was no longer a "Weekend Crash Course". To add insult to injury, the included testing software also has typos and grades the questions incorrectly. In conclusion: There are a lot of good books out there now that are based upon the released version of ASP.NET. Use those. This book is already miserably, and painfully, out of date.
Rating:
Summary: Poorly written and no examples
Review: I too wish I had spent more time looking at the reviews for this book before I bought it! This book is 98% marketing hype, and 2% useful examples. You don't get into writing a simple program until Chapter 16! Although the basics are in this book for designing an ASP.NET application, the examples waste a lot of time because they don't work and a beginning programmer will have a hard time figuring out why they don't work. The new Visual Studio.NET IDE is not explained at all. Without knowing how it builds projects, are we supposed to only use Notepad to edit the examples? I realize it was written using the Beta version of Visual Studio.NET, but it is definitely is going to make someone believe that Visual Studio.Net is too difficult to use to develop real web applications.
Rating:
Summary: Written and Edited in a Weekend, too??
Review: It seemed to me that the author was basically going through documentation for ASP.NET and re-writing it for the book with a little more fluff. It took literally half of the book before the author got into the topic of "Building Your First ASP.NET Page". I had so many questions while reading the first 145 pages, and many of them could have been answered with this simple example at the very beginning of the book. Furthermore, typos are in abundance as well as erroneous source code examples. I'm the type of person who likes to reinforce what I'm learning by typing in the samples. Many of them worked, but some didn't. These are things a tech editor should have caught by simply cutting/pasting the code to verify it worked as advertised. I am picking up some useful information which is why it got 2 stars instead of just 1. I liked some of the foundation that was layed down to explain things, but for a programmer it's maddening to go fully 1/2 of a book without a lick of code to try out.
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