Diego O'Toole said
The introduction to this book says that knowledge of C# is assumed, but no database knowledge is necessary. What that really means is that she starts at the beginning, but she moves quickly into advanced material.
I like this approach. Too many books skip or gloss over the basics, giving a reader nowhere to look if he doesn't fully understand the code examples (except additional books).
Murach books use a "paired page" layout. On the left page is text, with the right page showing diagrams, bullet points and code samples. The right page is almost like a PowerPoint presentation, and you can quickly get through material you already know by skimming the pages on the right. The paired pages generally help you read at your own appropriate pace, especially if you're familiar with many of the points. In places, I found myself reading both pages and seeing the same material, or reading only one side and missing something. Each chapter ends with a summary and a list of terms, so you can check that you understood all of it. The layout makes it easy to go back and find something later.
These books contain good, complete and realistic code examples, and step-by-step instructions for creating them using Visual Studio tools. However, all of the ADO chapters discuss WinForms, not ASP. Many of the LINQ techniques are applicable to either platform, but the first half of the book is of minimal help to the ASP developer. (The LINQ and EF sections do dedicate their last chapters to ASP.)
LINQ (Language Integrated Query) was added with .NET 3.0 and enhanced in 3.5. Briefly, LINQ allows you to perform SQL-like selection over collections of data, whether in databases, XML, or program Objects. It lets you use a list to return another list, filtered and/or sorted. In the introductory LINQ chapter, she briefly introduces Lambda expressions, which offer a shorter, alternative syntax to many LINQ queries. Lambdas are missing from the rest of the book.
The Entity Framework, added in .NET 3.5 SP1, allows you to program to conceptualized objects instead of a specific database structure. Both LINQ and EF simplify working with data, by adding IntelliSense and a terse, flexible syntax to replace what would formerly have been much more code, tied to a specific implementation.
Murach's website has all the code examples available for free download, and there are exercises at the end of chapters using suggested changes to the examples. To me, this is the best part of the book. The downloaded code saves you from having to type along, but the exercises test your knowledge of both programming concepts and the hidden features of the Visual Studio IDE.
The code samples use SQL Server Express. An appendix explains how to download it from Microsoft if you don't already have it.
I learned a lot from this book. It introduced me to areas of Visual Studio that I had never seen before, as well as LINQ and EF. There's a lot of material here, well presented. It mostly lives up to the Murach claim that their books are "several books in one", replacing what would otherwise be a book on ADO, a book on LINQ and possibly a third book on EF.
SIDE NOTE: Microsoft has hinted that they will deprecate LINQ to SQL Server, in favor of LINQ to Entity Framework. The jury may be out on this, however.
Donald Hsu said
The explanation was clear. There are many screen shots, step-by-step
instructions to take the reader through the whole book.
I recommend this book.
ed said
Very good book for beginner to intermediate. Very good introduction to Entity Framework. I wish the book had more coverage using the ADO.NET programatically than using the data source wizards. I would rather see and use compact, efficient, and controllable code with ADO.NET objects than defining via the data source wizards. Also the book was somewhat lacking on the subject of concurrency, especially with optimistic vs pessimistic concurrency. But overall, still a good book and I still like Murach's format style.
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