Dimitri Shvorob said
I was surprised that, instead of the good old Northwind or AdventureWorks, the authors opted for a sample database of their own to use in examples - yet never made it available to the reader. A characteristic problem with a book that (poorly) presents 60% of the material, and leaves it up to you to get the rest. I am constantly turning to Google to fill the gaps in the book's story; and now, I am writing a stored procedure - because Wildermuth et al. did not bother to provide one when discussing SqlCommand. I cannot yet judge the book's scope, but the quality is low, low, low.
Michael J. Mcmahon Jr. said
This book is sufficient for passing the exam. This was the only resource I used (aside from MSDN), and I passed the exam. However, I must say that this book will only be sufficient if you have experience with some ADO.NET functionality already - preferably database connections and structuring principles. If you are completely new to ADO.NET and database use in general, this will only provide a good starting point and more reading will be required to fully understand the topics well enough for the exam.
Compared to other Microsoft training kits, this one was disappointing for many reasons (hence the lower review than I've given other books). Firstly, the grammatical errors are plentiful. They are present not only in the text but in the example code as well. For example, more than one LINQ query suddenly has a reference to a new variable that should not be there. Look through the examples carefully and do not accept them if they don't make sense. Similar errors exist in the lesson review questions.
The content itself is left at a high level, for the most part. While some areas like connection strings are described with a great deal of verbiage, most areas that need it such as LINQ and Entity Framework are left quite short. For example, useful topics related to those two sections include lambda expressions and better descriptions of WHERE clause syntax - none of which is present. The coverage is broad, yet shallow. While I understand that DataSet use is a deep topic, additional examples and use cases would be helpful for the exam.
The practice tests were typical for the MCTS training kits. The questions helped to illuminate the areas missed by the book, though there are still some errors - e.g. questions that are marked as incorrect when the explanation states it should be correct. The book itself acts more as a supplement to the training exam.
In all, the book was useful as a preparation guide, but only barely. It was far more helpful to me to have a solid understanding of databases and relational structures than it would have been to have only used the book. With some extra content on EF, LINQ, and DataSets, this book could be much better and a more well-rounded preparation guide. As it stands, though, it is merely mediocre - however, mediocre enough to help me pass the exam... If the quality of the material dropped below this level, the value of the study guide would be insufficient to merit using it as preparation for the exam.
Xangis said
This book needs to be about 200 pages longer to properly cover all of the topics on the exam.
For the most part I agree with Mark Price's review, which is pretty much spot-on. This book is sorely lacking when it comes to Entity Framework, Sync, SQL dependencies and notifications. However, the LINQ to XML lesson was useful (a question on it did turn up on my exam).
Even though the topic coverage in the book is pretty sparse, the practice tests are pretty helpful and cover a range of topics closer to the exam. I passed the 70-561 on the first try, but only because the practice tests were a wake-up call that told me I needed to find another source of information to study the EF, SQL dependencies, and Sync.
T. Cummings said
In preparation for the MCTS: 70-561 exam, I have read this book cover to cover (twice). As stated by others, while it does cover the basics, such as connection, command, readers, adapters, quite well, it simply glosses over other areas that are a large percentage of the exam. For example, the material on sync services and entity framework is nearly non-existent (however these topics cover nearly 25% of the exam). I was really hoping that this book would deliver, considering other texts in the MCTS series are excellent study guides, but unfortunately, I cannot recommend this book.
R. B. Davidson said
I am about 80 pages into this book and have found numerous mistakes, unclear answers to review questions, and examples that don't demonstrate what they purport to. I'm plowing ahead with the book out of sheer stubbornness and the hope it will get better in later chapters. Right now I cannot recommend it.
Comments