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Rating: 
Summary: Random collection of topics, not a .NET framework book!
Review: I debated giving this 1* which I have never done before on a review. It really is a totally overpriced incohesive mess of random chapters. But first off just in case you were thinking like I was what it isn't is a detailed discussion of the .NET framework, namespace by namespace (which is what I originally thought it would be). What it is seems to consist of leftover chapters that didn't make it into the other two Wrox books: Professional VB .NET and Professional C# or were already there in other forms. There is yet another chapter on what is .NET?, a chapter on migrating to VB NET that is better done in Professional VB NET and much better done in Appleman's book, there is yet another chapter on ADO .NET, yet another discussion of versioning. To be blunt: everything in here is pretty much done as well or better in the other two Wrox books I mentioned and most of these topics are in fact done so much better in such books as Archer, Liberty, Troelsen, Appleman and Cornell (depending on the topic). I don't know what has gotten into Wrox lately but I wish they would just go back to the days of old when they had single author books and were the best.
Rating: 
Summary: Not bad content but.......
Review: They repeat the same information over and over and over again. How many times can they tell us the Common language runtime can seamlessly integrate with other languages. I feel like they repeat the same information every chapter. Its sort of nice b/c its in my head now, everything the CLR does, but I could have written cue-cards.
Rating:
Summary: Not bad content but.......
Review: They repeat the same information over and over and over again. How many times can they tell us the Common language runtime can seamlessly integrate with other languages. I feel like they repeat the same information every chapter. Its sort of nice b/c its in my head now, everything the CLR does, but I could have written cue-cards.
Rating: 
Summary: Not enough information for Intermediate or Advanced Develope
Review: This book doesn't have information for expert level. Some of the information are repeated within few chapters. I guess Wrox should reduce the number of authers for a book or atleast the authers should review others chapters before publish.
Rating: 
Summary: My best reference for the .NET framework
Review: Too many programmers jump into new environments without adequately learning the new capabilities and limitations involved. This book has a great intro explaining what Microsoft is trying to do for developers with the .NET framework as well as how and where they suggest it should be used. After the first three chapters, I recommend treating this as a reference book and not trying to read straight through the rest. For example there are chapters on migrating to dot net in general, migrating from VB 6 to VB.net, web services, and .NET remoting to name a few. As far as a reference book, it focuses on explaining the bigger picture of how to handle common chores. This is not a detailed reference for the classes in the .NET framework, but the ultimate reference for that is in the .NET SDK or VS.NET help.
Rating:
Summary: My best reference for the .NET framework
Review: Too many programmers jump into new environments without adequately learning the new capabilities and limitations involved. This book has a great intro explaining what Microsoft is trying to do for developers with the .NET framework as well as how and where they suggest it should be used. After the first three chapters, I recommend treating this as a reference book and not trying to read straight through the rest. For example there are chapters on migrating to dot net in general, migrating from VB 6 to VB.net, web services, and .NET remoting to name a few. As far as a reference book, it focuses on explaining the bigger picture of how to handle common chores. This is not a detailed reference for the classes in the .NET framework, but the ultimate reference for that is in the .NET SDK or VS.NET help.
Rating: 
Summary: Good collection of material over a broad subject
Review: What is .NET? How can you work with .NET? Why would you switch to .NET? There are a lot of questions that we could ask about .NET that aren't easy to ask. .NET is very broad, and thus, Wrox brought together some of their best authors together so that they share what they knew best about .NET. This book WILL provide the information you need to learn about the new things in .NET. Remember the old time with the XML series of books? Most books had at least a few similar chapter. This is Wrox's response to counter that. This book is a foundation to learn a lot about the .NET Framework. It will be covering what most developers want to know, for both C# & VB.NET. This is a book that you use in conjunction with other current or upcoming .NET books that will be more focused on their subject. Having multiple authors on this title, I believe, is a good thing. Simply because it's impossible to have one person know all about the .NET Framework as well as it's good to see multiple opinions. There are over 25 technical reviewers that read through this book to make sure that the flow was as easy as possible from an author to another. For the rating, it was a debate between 4 & 5. Sure, I'm always looking for more so I guess that's where the 4 would be coming from. However, since I will be using this book as a reference for any other .NET books that will refer to this one for .NET Framework content, it's worth a 5-star. I will be more than delighted to have other books skip the usual "CLR" chapters and point at this book instead.
Rating:
Summary: Not a Professional book
Review: Wrox has a long standing policy of dividing their books into Professional, Beginner, etc. categories. The Professional books are generally a series of books that deal with topics on a level that requires an experienced developer to traverse. While this book might require experience, it does not fit the mold of the normal Professional book. One of my biggest beef with this book is the same beef I had with Microsoft's MSDN series of .NET books. It feels more like a mismash of articles that have been published before (in Microsoft's case, they had been). There is no real cohesion in the book, and, while the content is not bad, the lack of cohesion makes you feel more like you are sitting through a conference than reading a book on the .NET Framework. One last downside: The appendices in this book are largely useless. Having knocked the book, there is good material here. While this book is not the best to learn to code .NET, there is ample information on how the Framework works. If C# is your language of choice, and you are an Internet developer, the chapter on Engineering web services may well become the most useful in the book. I will this book as an addition to your library, although I but not as your first purchase. If you want a book to understand the .NET Framework, I believe .NET Framework Essentials is a much better tome (at a much better price).
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