Microsoft ASP.NET Step by Step

by G. Andrew Duthie

Paperback: 550 pages
Publisher: Microsoft Press
ISBN: 0735612870; Bk&Cd-Rom edition (December 19, 2001)

This title is the ideal step-by-step introduction for developers who want to learn Active Server Pages+ (ASP+) scripting technology, which offers powerful new possibilities for writing clean, reusable, scalable code for Web pages. It offers a solid, practical introduction to ASP+ and related technologies, including the Common Language Runtime (CLR), Microsoft Visual Basic, Microsoft Visual C#(tm), and the Microsoft .NET Framework. It also provides real-world examples and code samples to help developers solve daily Web challenges.

About the Author: G. Andrew Duthie is the founder and Principal of Graymad Enterprises, Inc., providing training and consulting in Microsoft Web development technologies. Andrew has been developing multitier Web applications since the introduction of Active Server Pages. He wrote about developing scalable n-tier applications in Microsoft Developer's Workshop, also from Microsoft Press.

Andrew is a frequent speaker at events including Software Development, the Dev-Connections family of conferences, Microsoft Developer Days, and most recently, VSLive!

In addition to his writing, consulting, training, and speaking, ANdrew enjoys spending time with his wife Jennifer, playing music, and smoking fine cigars.

Customer Reviews
Well written, great overview, April 8, 2002
Reviewer: _digory from South Australia
In a nutshell, I thoroughly enjoyed reading ASPNETSbS. This was not the first .NET book that I've read, but it was the first book that left me feeling as though I had a strong grasp of the ASP.NET technology as a whole, and how I could apply many aspects of it to delivering commercial-grade applications. As the title suggests, this book is designed to appeal to readers with varying levels ( steps ) of understanding regarding the .NET technologies; this does not mean, however, that the book is either too light or too heavy. I would rather suggest that it offers an extremely balanced overview of the various pieces that, together, form ASP.NET.

At a personal level, I especially enjoyed the exhaustive journey toward understanding the relationships that exist between the Machine.config, the Web.config and the actual web application itself; from my point-of-view, this was the first book to deliver a *full* overview of those parts of an ASP.NET application. Of course, all of the regular ASP.NET goodies make an appearance, including: authentication, validation, web controls and ADO.NET. The section on creating custom controls and using inheritance to extend existing controls was very clear and concise. Good attention was given to explaining the structure of the major classes such as the Control and Page classes. The book more than adequately explains the event model of the Page class, along with its properties, methods and the objects that it contains.

The book mostly uses VB.NET for code samples although C# is shown where there are significant differences between the two. Having said that, this is not a book that is language heavy, because there is a much greater emphasis on the actual Framework components themselves. There are two fairly light sections on WebServices and debugging, which, while not providing a thoroughly detailed examination of the two, certainly explained enough to make it clear where to head for further inspection. All-in-all, if - like me - you make your living delivering web applications, I think that you should take a read of this book, if for no other reason than to confirm that you *DO* have an thorough grasp of all the topics that it has to offer. I feel confident in saying that, if you do choose to read this book, then you won't regret the excercise!

Feature points:
- covered many aspects
- organised in logical steps
- spoke about surrounding tools such as VS.NET
- book has its own newsgroup...

Asp Net Review By Brad, April 22, 2002
Reviewer: ceramicbrad from Tennessee
This book is well written and supported by the author at the books site (see CD that comes with book for details) on various web sites (eg. ASPGNVS). It has a fairly even mix of code and explanation. Used in conjunction with "Visual Studio.Net ASP Quick Start Tutorial" (assuming you have them) you will be pleasantly surprised at how they compliment each other. This also assumes you prefer to use a methodical approach to learning ASP.NET. I can see why this is a Microsoft Press Book as they are generally better at getting the important details out. If you come away disappointed with this book then it could mean that you did not work hard enough to see what points the author was trying to convey in each chapter or you tried to consume the book in one or three days.

My recommendation is to go with this book if you are new to ASP.NET (or the net framework) and you want to get up to speed on ASP.NET without getting overwhelmed. The reason why I did not rate it 5 Stars is because of a few typo's(corrections are available at the web site) and the example in chapter 11 regarding accessing and binding data with SQL could have had more information on using the UPDATE command by including it in code(perhaps as a scrolling text bar) rather than adding it in as a comment(Page 309 of the book). But perhaps the intention was to get the reader to apply their own skills at it and get them motivated to code rather than be led by the hand and remain oblivious to how it really works...

Very Well Done, April 15, 2002
Reviewer: Troy Dedmon
This book is very well written,easy to understand and packed full of explanation. The security chapters are worth the price of the book because most ASP books dont really mention it. The reference in chapter 7 of all the different ways to set up you .NET application for different accesability is also very well done..I really like the explanations given then the code shown..If you wanna learn ASP.NET I'd start with this book

Good overview, March 24, 2002
Reviewer: A reader from De Pere, WI USA
This book may be the best 500 page overview of all the technologies that you need to understand to build ASP.Net applications. Because of it's breadth, it doesn't make it very deep into any one topic. However, it's an excellent book if you want to start learning about all the areas that make up ASP.Net web applications. My recommendation would be to read this book first, then read other books based on where you think your knowledge gaps are. Very well written and easy to understand.

Back to ASP.NET Book Index

Books Subjects

Learning ASP.NET

ASP.NET Reference Manual

.NET Application & Database

ASP.NET Training Course