Rating: 
Summary: Makes creative use of the software
Review: I was hoping for a JSP-related text (yeah, like that'll happen!) - but this got me through the 21 days and gave me a great bit of insight into UltraDev. Like some of the other reviewers said, UltraDev doesn't appear to actually DO anything. It doesn't matter what sort of reference you have, it just makes lists and displays details about items in lists. This book includes instructions on using UltraDev to make websites that adjust their graphics according to season, have advanced searches (something UltraDev *definitely* doesn't do on it's own), and build interesting dynamic sites.This book is unusual in that it uses the database server to provide additional functionality to the product. Suddenly I have some idea of what I can actually use UltraDev for. I would have hoped for a better included CD, but considering I think it's the first CD I've ever really bothered to look at on computer book, I'm not too broken up about it.
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing and Incomplete
Review: I was hoping that this book (so far the only one I have found on UltraDev 4) would guide me thru the front end, Dereamweaver 4, interface. Was I surprised. Instructions were either inaccurate or incomplete. The author refers to menu choices but does not tell you where they are. He also does not tell you, for example, that in order to use a feature in the "behavior palette" you must change the Browser version to be tested. In Chapter 4, the author describes how to drag and drop items on a web page using a web page he designed. He does not tell you how to create that web page and the explanation is useless without it. The CD included with the book was supposed to contain "All the code and examples from the book." In fact the CD contained only the examples in Chapters 15 thru 20. I have not gotten to the portion of the book dealing with ServerSide functionality so you may consider this a partial review. This is really disappointing. I have other "SAMS" books that are well worth the money. Unfortunately, this book is not one of them
Rating: 
Summary: Good book overall.
Review: First of all if you are a total beginner, take a DreamWeaver book first, then take this one (Ultradev). The book is fine giving you examples about how to do almost anything with databases with Ultradev using minimal hand-written code. The product is impressive, i think DreamWeaver Ultradev is the best piece of software ever created to create any kind of web site. To this book I gave it 4 because the author examples only covered asp in VBScript, when jsp is more widely used today and more standard. Also he used MySQL, that it's pretty nice, but there are stuff like the password(fieldname) function that is not available in other databases like: ORACLE (the one I'm using) to do stuff like banner rotators, when ASP has it's own adrotator object. Anyway, this one will get you up and running fast. There are some minor errors at the book, but you can figure them out easily. The CD-ROM included sucks!! no images, source example where only from chapter 15 to the end. WHere are the graphics and examples for the first 14 days? However the content is good and the narrative is informal, so it's easy to understand.
Rating: 
Summary: I'm never buying another SAMS book again!
Review: I didn't realize that I was going to have a lesson in MySQL. I think that this book should have been written based on what you are likely to have in a production environment (i.e., Access or SQL server). I think Access would have been a better database for this book not only because it is more popular but the data could already be created instead of generating the table and all the data from scratch. Maybe it's just me but I'm very dissapointed with the Teach Yourself books. I will never buy a book online without physically reviewing it again. I was just anxious to get more information on Ultradev and this book was one of the first that came out on this applicaiton.
Rating:
Summary: Not a tutorial?
Review: As an above beginner level for web design and development and as a new user of Dreamweaver UltraDev, I was looking for a book that would walk me through the various aspects of the product, with a well supported 'script' for the tutorial. What I have found is that there are mistakes such as incorrect references within the book, e.g. to supporting pictures, and the CD-ROM doesn't include 'walk-through' tutorial support files, other than some lame general graphic files. As my first 'Sams' book, this was a major disappointment and certainly not worth the $ I paid for it. User-centered design and usability doesn't seem to have made it into this product (book and CD-ROM), at least not from my perspective. Perhaps as another user suggested, the book was published really quickly and this may have impacted on the quality of the product. I think I'll stick to the Osborne Complete Reference series in the future, as these are significantly more practically oriented and therefore useful, in my view.
Rating:
Summary: Good enough to keep.
Review: If you're planning on developing a database for UltraDev with Microsoft Access, then this book isn't going to help. All of the examples use MySQL which is probably a good thing to learn, but if you're not interested in learning another programming language then steer clear. The book does cover seem pretty interesting things that you can do with UltraDev and MySQL like: creating login pages, testing and educating online, and building e-commerce applications. One thing I would like to see, however in an UltraDev book, is how to publish database files to a remote server. This book and many others assume you're working on your own server. Testing your site out on PWS is okay but that doesn't do me much good when I want the site to go live. (Maybe I just missed something and it's covered but I haven't found it.) Overall the book is worth having around, I'm sure it will come in handy one of these days - just not yet!
Rating: 
Summary: Book Covers New Version But Includes Old Trial Software
Review: Although I like the book so far, I was quite disappointed to find that it does not include the 4.0 trial version of UltraDev. Since we are considering adding this tool to our office, we bought the book thinking we would get information plus the demo software of the same version as the book! The book cover was vague about what software was included and an email to Sams that asked this question, "Does this book include a working trial version of Dreamweaver Ultradev 4.0?" yielded this response, "Yes, it will include a trial version of UltraDev." However, when we opened the book's CD (now non-returnable!) we found that it is UltraDev 1.0 instead. We were able to download the 30M demo of course but wasted time there because we have a slow net connection. In summary, I would not have purchased this book if I had known the old demo was packaged with it, instead I would have selected another 4.0 book. I suspect Sams knew this and therefore their vagueness about the version!
Rating:
Summary: A second opinion
Review: I bought this book for myself to round out a holiday order, and I feel someone obliged to comment on the "Not for Beginners" review. I think you'll find that the other reviews say that this is "*not* for someone who doesn't know HTML". I do agree that if you've never seen HTML, you should probably order a DreamWeaver 4 book as a "starter" companion. However, if you've never seen HTML, I don't think UltraDev is necessarily a wise investment at this point. Nonetheless, in no way are you expected to use MySQL. I was pleased to see the MySQL information (for Windows or Unix) because it lets you get up and running on Windows without needing to have Microsoft Access installed. If you are using Access, you'll still need to know the basics of SQL in order to effectively use the software in anything but "basic" mode. Overall, I'm pleased with my purchase. I guess that if you're planning on doing serious dynamic development you should have an understanding of HTML and at least an inkling of how databases work before reading - but assuming you do, you should be happy with this book.
Rating:
Summary: This book is not for biginners.
Review: This book said about what Dreamwaver UltraDev can do. It doesn't say "How to do". It seems like written orally. This book has more than 700 pages but most of them describe it's general ideas. I decided to return this book in one day after I receive it. Someone said in the review "I would recommend it to someone who'd never even seen HTML". Do you think if you have never seen HTML, you can understand Unix based database system(MySQL) which just this book explains in this book with a hundred of pages?
Rating:
Summary: Finally...
Review: Like one of the other reviewers, I purchased UltraDev 1.0 with high hopes, only to be completely confused by the manual it came with. This book has rejuvenated my interest in the product and given me a better idea of what I can do with the software besides listing the contents of a database.
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