Programming with Visual Basic 6.0: An Object-Oriented Approach-Comprehensive

Rating:
Summary: Frustratingly Incomplete, Maddenly Precise
Review: Having worked with Microsoft BASIC since "Basica" aka GW-Basic and QuickBASIC, I've had a chance to look at a **lot** of books about the language that's grown into Visual BASIC. Hands-down Ekedahl & Newman is one of the worst I've seen.

It's incomplete! When discussing substring splicing it covers the MID function but completely ignores the complementary RIGHT and LEFT functions. Yes, you can use MID to perform a RIGHT or LEFT slice, but when you're writing self-documenting code it's better to have all three functions available for the sake of clarity. (Update your code six months from now, and you'll be GLAD you used self-documenting techniques!)

It rambles! Information that should be in a sidebar or appendix, or that should be in a list are placed in long drawn-out paragraphs in the main text. Typical paragraph: "The Database object contains a reference to several other collections and objects. For example, each Database object contains a reference to the Recordsets collection. This collection contains a reference to zero or more Recordset objects representing the open Recordsets in the database. One recordset object exists for each open recordset in the database. You can open several Recordsets at the same time." (page 387 paragraph 3). Note the inconsistent capitalization on "Recordsets" and the ongoing repetition of one concept. This information would make just as much sense -- maybe more so! -- as a "bulleted list" in a sidebar. Clarity is not the strong suit for these authors.

Inadequate illustrations! Figure 8-15 on page 416 is the most ambitious illustration in the book, consisting of long horizontal boxes stacked atop each other. These boxes shrink to the right as you read down from the top, and they are all attached with a line. Other illustrations in the text use the same horizontal-box technique only with fewer boxes, which helps drive home the point that the authors may not know HOW to properly show relationships between functions and objects. (A look at the documentation from the Microsoft Developers Network shows the authors lifted the concept from Microsoft -- and sometimes the exact images -- just to have some sort of illustration. And no, they don't acknowledge Microsoft as the source of their images).

There is no succinct "language reference" anywhere in the appendices, a shocking lapse that should be corrected.

In a classroom setting, there was a lot of grumbling and complaints about the shortcomings of the text, followed by a significant dropout rate -- close to 50%. The few who stuck with it began purchasing supplemental books, referring to prior texts, scouring the Internet, and gleaning what they could from the MSDN CD-ROM.

If you're considering teaching a Visual BASIC class, give this book a pass. If you're going to take a Visual BASIC class, make certain you've got a good instructor to overcome the weaknesses of the text. And if you're just looking to improve your programming skills on a self-study basis, this is not the book for you.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent but not a starting point
Review: I am a Programmer/Analyst student and had to buy this book for a course in Visual Basic. My school offers two courses in VB (part 1 & 2). The first course (part 1) is designed for beginners with little or no experience with VB and is a prerequisite to VB 2. The textbook used in that course is 'Programming with Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0' by Diane Zak (ISBN 0-7600-1071-4). I recommend Zak's book for anyone new to Visual Basic.

Programming with Visual Basic 6.0 An Object-Oriented Approach Comprehensive is used in VB 2. Though it is stated in the preface of the book that "no previous experience with visual Basic is required" I have to disagree. This book is not for the beginner. It is designed for those who have an extensive understanding of VB's basic programming concepts such as loops, arrays, and error trapping. From there you can utilize this book to strengthen your previous knowledge of VB and learn more advanced concepts such as SQL, MDI, and class modules.

Rating:
Summary: Well Worth the Money!
Review: I concur with Dr Ratnam's assessment of this book (see his May 2000 review).

I am new to VB programming and took an intro course this summer at a local junior college. This was the assigned text and we got through 11 chapters in 8 weeks. The book does what it advertises and enables you to achieve a respectable level of competency in VB. The authors thoroughly cover the material and provide meaningful explanations, particularly on the more difficult tasks/concepts. Yes, there are a few typos, but nothing that will have an impact on you learning the material and becoming skilled at a given task.

In a future edition, I'd like to see a section that lists out all the answers to the chapter questions. This would help the learning process.

Rating:
Summary: Not for people who already have an idea
Review: I've been a fan of the Deitels' How to Program books. Since this book is our school's text on VB, I was forced to go through the chapters, even after stubbornly purchasing and doing some advanced reading on the Deitel VB6 book. As a beginning VB programmer, I'm happy to say that this book has helped me systematically learn so many concepts in a short span of time & in an organized and digestible manner. Mastering the concepts simply requires going through the detailed step-by-step examples provided in each chapter, and then simply comleting the provided exercises at the end of each chapter. This book is a gem!!!My poor Deitel book now gathers dust in a corner.

Rating:
Summary: Frustratingly Incomplete, Maddenly Precise
Review: I've been lecturing VB for a while and I've been through various different books and I must say this is probably the best I've ever come accross. Dietel is excellent for reference but useless for "studying from", while most of the other books are "filling in the blanks" and students don't actually get to understand what an object is and what data driven is concepts are.

Sure this book has it's downside but untill I find something better it's "Tops" with me.

Rating:
Summary: Requires a lot of effort to grasp a basic concept
Review: I've programmed with Fortran and C, work with HTML, ASP (VBScript) and COM (Visual FoxPro), and have read a couple of programming books. This one is the first book that made it to my "Do Not Recommend" list.

I grew very tired of reading from the book. The reasons being:

1. To understand something I had to read a chapter right from the beginning to the very end, because it's using a very specific case to work its way throughout an entire chapter each time. I flipped back 5-15 pages at a time once I lost track of my reading.

2. This book does not give a good break point to let me pause and let a concept sink in my memory before proceeding with the next.

3. This book cannot, at any rate, be used as a handy reference book.

Writing style aside, the format is also terrible. It's probably fine to see black (font) and blue (boxes) in a book. However, this book prints the font so that it looks almost bolded. The paper it's using feels like cheap inkjet printer paper.

This book does have VBs intermediate-advanced stuffs such as class programming, MDI, and programming with databases (no ADO, though). If you have some VB experience, proceed with extreme care if you still want to use this book. If you're an absolute VB beginner, this book is not for you! Use David Schneider's book instead.

Rating:
Summary: Requires a lot of effort to grasp a basic concept
Review: I've programmed with Fortran and C, work with HTML, ASP (VBScript) and COM (Visual FoxPro), and have read a couple of programming books. This one is the first book that made it to my "Do Not Recommend" list.

I grew very tired of reading from the book. The reasons being:

1. To understand something I had to read a chapter right from the beginning to the very end, because it's using a very specific case to work its way throughout an entire chapter each time. I flipped back 5-15 pages at a time once I lost track of my reading.

2. This book does not give a good break point to let me pause and let a concept sink in my memory before proceeding with the next.

3. This book cannot, at any rate, be used as a handy reference book.

Writing style aside, the format is also terrible. It's probably fine to see black (font) and blue (boxes) in a book. However, this book prints the font so that it looks almost bolded. The paper it's using feels like cheap inkjet printer paper.

This book does have VBs intermediate-advanced stuffs such as class programming, MDI, and programming with databases (no ADO, though). If you have some VB experience, proceed with extreme care if you still want to use this book. If you're an absolute VB beginner, this book is not for you! Use David Schneider's book instead.

Rating:
Summary: A good advanced VB book
Review: It also teach you a lot of design technique.

Rating:
Summary: Too Much Hand-Holding
Review: This book describes, step-by-step, how to write a few specific programs, but does not adequately generalize the concepts it presents.

Each chapter guides the reader through creating a particular program, detailing each step that must be taken. ("Name this control x," then, "Make the width of this control 123," and so forth). Even the "homework problems" assigned at the end of each chapter list each step the reader should take toward finishing the program.

Of course, readers can certainly ignore these details and focus on the text's conceptual explanations, but since the whole book is organized around the examples, these explanations are not designed to be read alone. The information is organized according to where it's needed in the example program, not necessarily according to where it's easiest to understand.

In sum, beginners should look elsewhere for a good introduction that helps build an understanding of the language conceptually, and experts would prefer a more organized reference.