Sams Teach Yourself Visual C++ 6 in 24 Hours

Rating:
Summary: don't buy this one...
Review: There are almost no pictures, and no screen results of the sample programs it uses in examples. This book is poorly written, and isn't very useful, especialy if you are trying to learn Visual C++. I found "Teach Yourself C++ in 21 Days", the old non-visual C++ 5.0, to be a good book (by a different author)...so there's proof that this format works for learning a C++ style language, but this author failed to teach anything. If you can make a program after reading this book, it won't be easy.

Rating:
Summary: This is not how people learn
Review: As someone who is reasonably familiar with C++, but not with MFC and Visual Studio, I figured I could use this book to get me going with VC++ development. What a waste of time and money. The author decides against explaining what things do, and why things work the way they do. Instead, the examples consist of "type these cryptic symbols into this place in the code and voila--it works! Now--on to the next chapter." It is frustrating to find yourself wandering through chapter after chapter hoping that he'll explain what he's been doing. No such luck.

Buy a different book.

Rating:
Summary: YOU WILL NOT LEARN VISUAL C++ BY READING THIS BOOK
Review: Disaster! Bad! If you are learning Visual C++, DON'T BUY THIS BOOK. You WILL NOT learn Visual C++ in 24 hours and you will be tired from this book. You will NOT learn visual c++ by reading this book. That means that you won't read this book to the end... Read another book.

Rating:
Summary: Should not have been published in the first place!
Review: This book is intended for beginners, or so it seems - but it doesn't explain things with sufficient clarity. Examples are given sparingly. When they are offered, they are not explained thoroughly. So this book fails miserably as a beginners' text. By chapter 3 or 4, you'd be screaming for help.

If this book is intended for more advanced users, it covers too much of beginners' stuff. It won't appeal to this group of users either.

So for whom is this book written? I don't know. Don't waste your money on this one.

Rating:
Summary: If you're looking for a book on the nuts and bolts...
Review: of Visual C++, then this book probably isn't for you. If, however, you wish to learn to use Microsoft's MFC App Wizard and Development Studio to quickly make useful applications, then you've probably come to the right place. This book gives you step by step instructions on how to create the most common dialogs, messages boxes, and menus, as well as creating and managing documents.

One thing to note is this book pretty much assumes you've already got basic knowlege of C++, although it does briefly review basic programming techniques: that you already know how classes and pointers work.

What kept this book from getting 5 stars is that at times (like in chapter 10-menus), the instructions aren't as clear as they should be, so you should also be familiar with debugging and looking things up in MSDN Library Visual Studio.

This book doesn't explain how to make a wheel, only how to use one. But what do you expect in 24 hours?

Rating:
Summary: This book sucks
Review: I've read the 1st 2 chapters of this book and I'm am totally lost. The author uses words without explaining what they mean. I am also lost when the author tries to walk me through something. I have a good understanding of Visual Basic 5.0 and C++, and I was still lost. I am ditching this book and buying another one.

Rating:
Summary: Nice book if you allready know some C++
Review: I used this book when I needed to start programming in Visual C++ and MFC, but already knew some C++ from Borland and the C++ language from school.

It was usefull to me and at a good start level for me at that moment. One thing I did not like was the description off for example how to edit a menu resource. You read a story of two pages you do not understand, if you do it yourself in Visual Studio all the steps are the ones you would logicly try to edit such a resource. Another big drawback off this book is that
it is really MFC (Microsoft Foundation Classes) oriented and
MFC is obsolete and old.

If you are in the same position as I was, it's usefull, if you do not know any C++ yet buy the famous Stroustrup book. If you already have a lot of programming experience and want to know some Visual C++, just play with Visual Studio and do some tutors

Rating:
Summary: This book fails
Review: This book fails to accurately guide the reader at page 81. There, Listing 5.2 will not compile. The author should review step by step the creation of m_btnVolume and m_btnAmp. The author must remember he is writing a 24 hours step by step book. The author assumes you will remember too much in order to get that listing done. It is very easy to get lost at that listing.

Rating:
Summary: Sams Teach Yourself Visual C++ 6 in 24 Hours
Review: This book is absolutely not for beginers. You must have basic understanding of object oriented programming to be able to follow the material covered in this book. This book fails to provide detailed explanation for most of the chapters. I bought this book based on good experience with the "Teach Yourself C in 24 Hours" but found this book to be very confusing. I am quite disappointed, lost, and confused after reading the first few chapters.

Rating:
Summary: Don't confuse by the title!
Review: First of all, you have to forget the "24 hours" tale. Do you really expect to learn Visual C++ in 24 hours? No one can. To be honest, this is not a bad book, but it does require at least begin-intermediate C++ level.

The first several chapters are just to help frersh your memory quickly, so you may want to skip it if you are really confident with C++. In the rest of the book, the author chooses a App-wizard approach, which can really help readers pick up Visual C++ within a relatively short period. The thing is you may also want to have another book for reference, like "Programming windows with MFC" by Jeff Prosise.