Microsoft Silverlight Books

Some good information, but uneven

This text (which I'll refer to as P) is one of the better WCF books, but there's plenty of room for improvement. The other reviews have plugged a lot of the strengths, so I'll keep this brief.

The real way to review this book is to compare it to the other leading title (Resnick's Essentials of WCF, which I'll call E). Since both books are missing a lot of information, but are in some ways complementary, if you read both, you get about 75% of the basics.

Organization: E is uniform and iterative, and provides introductions and summaries for those who read systematically. P is uneven and non-iterative. Some P chapters are strong, but E looks as if someone consciously went through the entire book with a fine-toothed comb (so to speak).

Transactions: E barely treats transactions, but P dedicates (IIRC) a chapter to them and takes a stand on using them in the design guide.

Hosting: The P hosting section is weak, and the coverage of WAS (which the author recommends for W2K8 deployments) is seriously deficient. Properly hosting and tuning a WCF application is half of the battle, and that battle is almost entirely left as an exercise for the reader. E does a much better job of explaining hosting, but, unfortunately, is also deficient in coverage. OTOH, P has an introductory section of using service host factories to gain some programmatic control over hosting from inside the app, something that E ignores. P also includes hosting advice in the nice guidelines section at the end.

Design: The P design standards section is a nice checklist, but it's not argued properly and it's difficult to find the rationale for some of the points made in the text. OTOH, E doesn't have anything like this. Anyone can read the MSDN/P&P literature on creating WFC services; what readers really need is an informed explanation of how to do it correctly. P takes a stab at it, but E doesn't. Neither text covers other important topics like testability, flexibility, and maintainability as they relate to WCF programming. Both books treat SOA and integration very superficially. P takes a basic stand on good contract design, but E doesn't.

Solution structure/VS project templates/etc: Neither book does a good job covering the different templates (WFC app vs. WCF service library), or how WCF layering should take place. P advocates putting "service logic" in a DLL, but that's about it. E ignores the topic.


Until the next version comes out later this year, I can definitely recommend getting P, but would also recommend getting E to fill in some of the gaps. It would be nice to see not only Lowy expand the design principles section, but maybe also make proper design a first-class component of the book (or maybe even publish an "Effect WCF" book).




Honkeywrench
03 July, 2010

Best book to learn WCF in details

I had been programming using WCF for couple of years before I picked up this book. To me, this is not a great beginner book; reading it requires some effort. However, the investment pays off. After reading most of it, I developed a great appreciation for the WCF architecture and its extensibility model. I continue to use this a reference for many advanced WCF items.

FARIAZ KARIM
11 May, 2010

Best In (service) Class

As a senior product architect, I needed to come up to speed on SOA and WCF and, although not a "Hello World" sort of book, this book did it.

I must have read half a dozen books on the topic, including Step-By-Step and Inside WCF, and this was by far the most deep and insightful (although those books are excellent, as well). I find myself rereading chapters to extract all the little jewels that you many not have noticed the first time through.

This is not easy stuff, however, so be prepared to do your homework and go through ALL of the code examples from the website. The download for the ServiceModelEx project contains great out-of-the-box solutions on all aspects of WCF and provides architectural techniques and insights to boot.

Between this book and all of the examples on the website, I have everything I need at my fingertips. No matter what other WCF books you feel would work better for you, this is still a must-have book for any library.

Juval, thanks for the great book and all of your insightful WCF articles on MSDN magazine.


R. Paolucci
19 April, 2010

Not for WCF beginners!

Even the back page of the book mentions "If you choose to learn WCF, you have choosen well...", this is not for learning WCF.
I thought I could learn WCF with this book because of its table of content, but you can't.

This is more or less a reference book. If you already know how to implement WCF and need to know some details regarding some certain
implementation, than it seems to be fine.

Because they mention on the back page one can learn WCF with it, I am disappointed about this book.



MIZD
14 February, 2010

Helen

I am angry and dissapointed after I purchased this book. You can find now "pure information" by going through MSDN and reading in Internet. What book can do for you is to add conceptual understanding of subject (WCF in this situation), concept of architecture and relation with other popular architecture, comparative review with other architectures that have similar goals (Remoting, Web Services, Windows Services), and you would expect step by step tutorial, related to common development environment VS 2008. Or the best would be all of the above.
This book provides none of above. It is rather boring list of attributes, classes, and termins of WCF with considerable lower level of explaining then in MSDN. I vision this book being written but cutting and pasting from MSDN and a little of renaming and highlighting.
Cheap, fast and makes fat book. I would buy the other book but all time I had before starting archtecture change for the project I wasted on waiting for this book.

Helen
04 February, 2010

Great Resource for Experienced Programmers New to SOA


I am a Microsoft Certified Trainer, a real fan of Microsoft WCF curriculum, MSDN articles and the like, but it was not until I read Juval's book that I began to fully comprehend the importance and benefit of WCF.

I was never a com, Corba, or .NET Remoting programmer--never really understood all the flail about SOA, so I found the Introduction to Service-Orientation appendix exceptionally well written--for the first time I am comfortable that I understand the why-behind-the-how of SOA; Juval's isn't the first write up on SOA I have ever seen, but it was the first couched in terms that made me understand.

I am whipping the point about comprehending SOA because if you don't get SOA, then you don't get WCF; if you feel like a deer in the headlights when someone asks you about it, this appendix will be worth the cost of the book.

Sometime's too many choices leads to confusion, and that's certainly how I find the security options available in WCF; if you're struggling with security choices, you will find Juval's approach in the security chapter a welcome salve to that problem, for example, he offers candid assessments of delegation and impersonation that I have seen nowhere else.

The book did a superb job by way of example in making me understand how to best exploit the base classes that come with System.ServiceModel.

The WCF Coding Standard offered should be given an award for all the fantastic guidance it offers to those of us who are babes in the WCF faith-I refer to it constantly, and have used it as a baseline for my own organization's standard.

I read some of the other reviews before making my purchase decision... I noticed a few that claimed this book was too deep for those not already bathed in distributed computing experience--I disagree. While I have been programming for many years (Assembler, C++, Java, C#, more...), I have almost no distributed computing experience, and thanks to the advice of Juval and Michelle Bustamante (another great O'Reilly WCF book), I have successfully implemented the beginnings of what looks to be a rock-and-roll load-balanced WCF/SOA architecture.

While I have learned a great deal from Microsoft courses and sources, a fair measure of the credit for my present successes in WCF goes to these O'Reilly books.


Jeffrey Schenk
17 October, 2009

Good WCF programming guide but light on IDE and/or compile information.

As a programming guide this covers both the APIs in C# and the XML config file elements that you'll need to know to do intermediate level WCF. It is very thorough and a suitable book for those who want to go beyond the tactical act of creating a simple web service and instead want to understand the full capabilities of the technology and how to apply it. However, as I believe some other reviewers have commented, it glosses over most of the "how to" aspects of WFC as it relates to the Visual Studio, the compiler(s), WAS, IIS etc.. As a result it can be a hurdle to get a first library built and deployed in a real host to test the concepts that are outlined in the book. Ultimately you end up going to other resources or just trying things out in Visual Studio. To be clear there is lots of high level practical guidance on things like the advantages and disadvantages of WAS vs. IIS hosting but little if any how to information. The author could have written one chapter on "how to" type information for Visual Studio, IIS, and WAS and increased the size of the book by say 30 pages (maybe 50 with screen shots) and done everyone a big service. Also on a technology level I think that for a book at this level I would have liked to have seen coverage of the WebHttpBinding binding given the proliferation of REST/POX/JSON based applications today.

Larry Marvin Wall
14 October, 2009

Great WCF book for all levels

I was trying to learn WCF for a few months. I was looking for a book that could provides me the detail of WCF framework from ground up, then I would move to WCF advance later - well might be from other book. I picked this book based on recommendation from my co-workers. I also owned "Pro WCF" from Apress publisher. This book has turned into great resource for me. It covered every detail of WCF from the basic concept of service contracts, hosting, addresses, and binding to higher level such as concurrency, or security. The author provided a lots of examples in depth explanations. It was great guide for WCF starter and good resource for advance programmer. It was much better than "Pro WCF"

Vu Tran
29 September, 2009

Superb Information and Fun to Read

It gives comprehensive coverage of the WCF technology written with a touch that makes it a delightful book to read.

R. D. Mical
26 September, 2009

Very theoretical. Good for refreshing your memory


I was a fan of Juval Lowys book .net components so when I wanted to learn WCF I got this book straight away. I found it very difficulty to understand in the beginning as I had no hands on experience on WCF. So I got the book WCF Step by Step by John Sharp and did the exercises in his book. After this when I read Juval Luvys book it makes perfect sense. So in short if you are a beginner to WCF this is not the book for you. Get hands on experience by coding some example, struggle through the configuration and errors and then if you want something to refresh your memory or add more theoretical depth to your knowledge read this book.




Ravi
18 August, 2009

Best WCF book out there

This is the best WCF book I have read, it has everything you need to know about WCF, in fact I would say that this must be the book with the most in dept content I have ever read.


Tejo
28 July, 2009

.NET Developer Group Coban

Los ejemplos estan bastante claros y las ilustraciones son muy buenas. Me gusta mucho la organizacion del libro. Como sugerencia me gustaria tener este libro en espanol.

By: Kristian Garcia Bardales

Jose Rolando Guay Paz
18 July, 2009

Excellent WCF resource!

I bought this book after attending a TechEd session Juval led. I must say, I am as impressed with this book as I was with his presentation. As a WCF beginner, this book is an excellent resource - it explains things in a way that is simple and easy to understand, yet covers a broad range of beginner to advanced topics. The book is hard to put down!

If you're learning WCF or just need a good reference, this book is THE must-have WCF resource!

Kevin Babcock
27 June, 2009

Achieved its Goals

This book achieved its goal precisely by providing a comprehensive coverage for the WCF architecture and how to make use of it.
I read some comments complaining about not providing examples and no actual working application is provided to demonstrate functionality. As the author declared at the beginning of his book: "I assume you, the reader, are an experienced developer[...] You should ideally have a fare understanding of .NET" so don't expect this book to teach you .NET. And if you are a developer that fits the description then you wouldn't have much trouble getting along with this book.


Mohamed Elkammar
29 May, 2009

on behalf of Arul Arokia Sagayaraj

Programming WCF Services by Juval Lowy is a good book for people who would like to migrate from conventional web service / windows service to the new paradigm. It is also good handbook for programmers who are well versed with the technology. The book covers everything from Design, Development to maintaining. The book is structured well. It starts with explanation on configuration and explains how to handle configuration programmatically. Even though I find it too detailed at some point, the good thing about the author/book is in a nutshell flow diagrams and tables have been effectively used.

Starting from the basics of Address, Contract, Bindings and End Points the book has everything in it for a SOA based implementations. Have details about various hosting methods, in depth details on Service and Data contracts. Instance Management is another good example of meaningful explanation. I liked the topic throttling under Instance management pretty much. The next chapter is my all time favorite. Then the author goes on to explain exception handling and transaction management for various kinds of calls, very important aspect of programming. A separate chapter for concurrency management is the need of the time, in this chapter handling threads and managing asynchronous calls in particular is real good one.

All the most important in a heterogeneous based SOA architecture are queuing and security. Talking about a send and forget (one-way calls), it becomes important to best understand where to use; Queued service is the chapter which is for it. Whether intranet / internet based, any service is open for malicious attacks and the author has explained various scenarios of attack and goes on to explain the various suggested security implementation, to make the book complete. Last but not the least the very good thing about this book is it explains beyond what to do? How to do? It details about where to do? And what not to do? In chapter 5 Configuring One-Way operations is one good example for it. This book has taught me the integrities of WCF and would remain my handbook whenever I write a WCF service.

Richard Trinh
29 May, 2009

Very solid WCF reference book

It's rare that you find technical books this well written. It helps that the author of the book directly worked on the design of WCF in the first place, no stone/detail is left unturned. All the important issues are covered: transactions, security, sessions etc. Very clear writing, great use of graphs for explaining complicated issues.
Makes for a great study guide for the 70-503 exam, and also as a WCF reference book.

Wiktor Szoltysek
18 May, 2009

Great overview of WCF

This is a fantastic overview of WCF with just enough details to really understand all of the covered topics. This is probably above an 'intro' book. I've been programming with WCF for two years now, so I've got a good understanding of the technology. This book definitely took my understanding to the next level. He provides really useful code samples, plus explains the 'why' of the technology in terms of why things are broken up the way they are. This is also the first WCF book I've encountered that provides a thorough overview of the MSMQ bindings and transactions.

Jon Dokulil
03 May, 2009

Excellent WCF Book

I have read WCF concepts from other books and from MSDN before, but they all seemed more like documentation rather than well knit set of concepts. This book nicely dwells into the philosophy of Service Oriented Applications, from the standpoint of WCF.

I started reading the book by first reading the Appendix about "Introduction to Service Orientation". The Appendix really built foundation for everything that was to come by starting with assembly programming and leading up to component oriented programming using COM, and laying the foundation for the need for SOA. This was followed by explanation of how WCF is a great platform for building SOA.

Book starts with good introduction to the basic concepts like Service Execution Boundaries, Addresses, Contracts, Hosting, Bindings, Endpoints and WCF Architecture. The following chapters cover Contracts and Instance Management in a great detail.

The chapters I think really made fall in love with this book are chapter 7 and chapter 8, Transactions and Concurrency management. I was never really able to get well beyond basic understanding of WCF and grasp these complex concepts from other sources the way this book helped me grasp them. The book starts with some simple scenarios of Transactions and Concurrency and leads up to some very complicated scenarios and it's not hard to follow, although sometimes you may have read concepts more than once.


Naveen Razdhan
28 April, 2009

Good writing style and very complete

One of the better technical books I have read. The writing style is very clear and complete. While some of the topics get really deep and complicated, author does an excellent job of keeping the writing simple.

A. Solorzano
16 April, 2009

only if you're serious about WCF

Okay, I have read a few other reviews and read couple of other WCF books prior (certainly not a beginner), this is the book to own if you are serious about WCF and create production level services and applications. Very thorough, many examples of do's and dont's. Big fan of the final "WCF coding Standard", read it several times already.

I have attended Juval's .NET RoadShow back in Fall of 2007, his description of how computing evolved (also discussed in his book) was well received. If it walks like a duck, it talks like a duck, then it's a duck ;-)

Yes, his book is a reference WCF book as I code/configure WCF applications. Highly recommend this book to anyone who is serious about WCF, but you have to read a few WCF books prior to grasp this one. Thanks, Juval.

Baskin I. Tapkan
29 March, 2009

List of Recipes - No instructions to mix ingredients


Having now read both Michelle's book "Learning WCF" and Juval's book "Programming WCF", I can state that you need to start with Michelle's book.

Learning WCF will go through various scenarios (labs) on binding, behaviours, contracts, hosting, etc. and you will have a solid understanding and working knowledge of WCF.

Juval's book reads like a list of recipes without the instructions on how to mix the ingredients.

Juval covers the various topics (Services, Contracts, etc.), and lists the various settings, but there are no labs, there is no reference to the sample code, and no way you are going to learn WCF from this book.


V. Small
18 March, 2009

Seems To Be Missing a Chapter

I struggled between purchasing this book or Michelle's 'Learning WCF', being a developer for going on 20 years now I didn't want to get another beginners 101 book. Having read many articles and a few books by Juval and knowing I like theory not wizardry I went with Juval's.

I must say I am disappointed so far, in Juval's style of great theory he just jumps right in and you are pretty much in over your head off the bat. Not that you can't understand what he is saying but the way it is explained just doesn't help understand WCF in general. While I am only on chapter 3 I had to look forward and see that it only gets deeper, it seems to explain the pieces but not how they fit together.

I had to go back and look at the intended audience for the book. It says nothing about prior WCF experience just an experienced .NET, OO developer. I have been messing with WCF for a few weeks, played with WSSF, I have built a number of production web and windows service applications as well as worked with remoting quite a bit.

I bought the book to get more detail/theory but must say it has not helped me a bit thru chapter 3. The book hasn't provided any direction on putting this stuff together into a working example and I think that is what it is missing.

I have little doubt when I get over the initial WCF learning curve this book will be a great asset but for now I'm going to shelve it and look elsewhere.



Michael W. Schellenberger
26 January, 2009

Excellent WCF Book

Overall this is an excellent book on WCF. It starts with the basics and works you through some of the more advanced books. It goes into great detail in each case. The examples are straightforward and the explanatory text is concise. I began reading this book with only a basic familiarity with the subject and no commerical experience with WCF. I left with a very good understanding of WCF and how I can now use it.

The sheer size of this book makes it impossible to read in a couple of days. This might scare away potential buyers. I'd like to think of this book as a WCF reference guide as much as a tutorial. Thus you don't really need to read the book cover to cover unless you want to.

The only real downside I found to this book was the fact that it jumped straight into the architecture and justifications for WCF without providing a simple Hello World example from which to get our feet wet. Within the very first chapter I was reading about service and data contracts and how they work and yet I hadn't even written one yet. I believe the book could have started off a little better if a simple Hello World was given so that I could at least compare that to the text as I read along.

Another minor complaint I had is with the chapter lengths. Each chapter is approximately 70-80 pages long. If there were a lot of pictures or sidebars then this would be fine but this is bulk reading. I like to read on chapter boundaries so 70 pages is a huge time sink. I think many of the topics in the book could have been broken up into several related chapters rather than stuffing them all into one. It would have made reading the book a little easier.

Overall this is a must have book for anyone wanting to learn and use WCF. It should have the answers to most questions that might come up.

Michael Taylor
01 January, 2009

The Merilvingian of WCF

This book provides a thorough understanding of WCF and its many parts. I learned a ton in the first chapter alone. The subsequent chapters go into detail about the different pieces mentioned in the first chapter. If you have to know this technology (WCF) get this book. Don't wait just get it. It will take you forever to finish it (700+ pages), so get started ASAP before MS comes out with the next version of it. I met the author at Dev connections is Vegas. The guy thinks (and talks) so quickly after hearing him talk you want to steal his brain. Juval Lowy is the Merilvingian of WCF.

S. J. Moore
24 December, 2008

A great read for developers with a basic understanding of wcf

This book is pretty comprehensive. I started learning WCF with the 15-part web series provided by Mrs. Bustamante that accompanies her book. Learning WCF: A Hands-on Guide

I highly recommend her read if you are getting started. However, if you have some familiarity with WCF - this one will take you further. It has plenty of easy-to-understand code samples and a wonderful best practice section near the index. I have been able to incorporate things in this book with business - and that is what really counts.


Kurtis A. Mcvay
16 September, 2008

Dont expect much

Writing is art like programming or painting, not every one can be a writer, I cant be a writer, but i know that about myself.
Being technically competent and knowlagable about something does not
nesserarily means you can now go and write a book about it.
The author is a failure when it comes to writing specially technical
books.

a good book writer is for example "Jon Skeet" other writers should take
a look at his style.



Angel Rapallo
25 August, 2008

Another great one from Juval

I've been a fan of Juval ever since I took an al-day seminar with him at DevConnections a few years ago. He's a great teach and a great writer. However, he is not for beginners.

Ex Republican
10 April, 2008

Very good book about WCF.

I have previously read Juval Lowy's Programming .NET Components and it was one of few excellent books which gave deeper explanation about .NET. This book is as great as that one and only one of the few books giving a good explanation about WCF and its internals.

Kiran K. Challa
29 March, 2008

The WCF Bible

Absolutely the best book I've read on Windows Communication Foundation. A must have book. Juwal explain every single WCF detail in a very well simple form but this don't break the value of this excellent book. A book written for beginners, intermediate and professional WCF developers.

Well done, Juwal.

Fabio Cozzolino
21 March, 2008

Well done Juval!

This book was actually my first exposure to WCF. Many people describe it as a more advanced WCF book than the other more basic ones out there. Although I tend to agree that it is more advanced than other books, I disagree with the implicit suggestion that you shouldn't start with this book if your a beginner. I generally gain better command over a subject by going deep enough to understand what's going on, and what capabilities I have at my disposal.

"Programming WCF Services" does just that. It starts with the simple basics which is important for the novice. But as soon as you understand the basics, you yearn for much more deeper content, which follows in the chapters to come. Although I wish the book would have had a chapter devoted completely to Channels, the overall depth of the book is enough for most use cases that WCF developers will encounter.

Something i really like about Juval Lowy's writing specifically is that he walks you through the thought process of the underlying problem. He shows you the different options that are possible, and then gives his final opinion, thus leaving you satisfied as to why a particular methodology is better than another.

If Juval would consider a 2nd edition, I would recommend a chapter on custom Channel development, and RESTful web services.

All in all, a great book for beginning and intermediate WCF service developers.

HS
17 March, 2008

Very Thorough Reference On WCF

WCF is one of the four major application programming interfaces introduced as part of .NET Framework 3.0. With its enormous power and flexibility, WCF has a very complex and multilayered architecture. After reading some nice overviews on WCF and even writing some simple code with out-of-box facilities provided by WCF, one may get a misleading impression of it being simple and straightforward. Once to delve into real world programming, you would be exposed to huge number of issues and complexities that in most cases may not be overcome without thorough understanding of the subject.
Juval Lowy's book does an outstanding job ob systematically and thoroughly uncovering practically all aspects of WCF programming. Not only it presents a simple to understand architectural picture of WCF in general and various architectural and functional subsystems, but also abandons with practical and thorough explanations of the details of virtually all aspects of WCF.
This book is not a beginner book. For starting with WCF I would recommend Michele Bustamante's book "Learning WCF". Lowy's book is a thorough reference on WCF that soon becomes your primary source of information.
I would like also to note that it does not seem to be the intent of the book to reflect on all internal plumbing of WCF, which realistically needs lot of experimentation. You may find Justin Smith's book as a good supplement to Lowy's book on custom channels and behaviors.


Armen Jamkotchian
29 February, 2008

An exhaustive study

This is THE book to get if you want to master WCF. Author's remarkable ability to jam enormous information in terse paragraphs without making it boring is astonishing, to say the least. If you have read "Programming .net Components" by Juval, you'd know what I mean.

However, here is a warning to the clueless; this book demands a keen and experienced mind. It is not for the faint of heart. For the initiated, "Learning WCF: A Hands-on Guide" is probably a better choice.

A. Parvez
28 February, 2008

Great in-depth coverage of WCF

This is an excellent book that I would recommend getting after you already have a basic idea of what WCF is. Obviously you can start with this book, but it is drinking from the fire hose. Once you have a basic idea of what WCF is and how it works - get this book to really understand it.

Gary Hanson
15 February, 2008

The essential text on WCF

This is reading material of the highest quality. Juval Lowy has the true master's ability to make potentially complicated material seem simple and obvious and easy to understand. He does this by combining deep knowledge of the subject matter with extremely clear writing. This is a book I read on the train in the morning, and refer to constantly while I am working on services during the day.

Throughout the book Mr. Lowy develops helper classes that plug some gaps in WCF and make the whole process of working with it easier. This is a plus, but if you don't want to use them, you don't have to.

Stable mate Michele Leroux Bustamante's book takes a more hands-on approach via the inclusion of labs, and quite frankly I think you need both.

WCF is both a deep and a wide technology, and you need a collection of top-quality resources in order to really 'get' it. "Programming WCF Services" is my favourite. Be sure to check out Appendix C, the WCF Coding Standard; he kept the best 'til last!


A Reader
23 January, 2008

Not Good for beginer

This book is not for someone who knows a little WCF concept. Also it's not for the person who wants to find quick solution. After I brought this book, I was trying to understand how to build a WCF webservice, how to host it and how to call it, from the index I got the related sections, after I read them many times, I still don't know how to do it. I have to read other training material to understand it. It has no step by step instruction. It missed lot of steps. I'm dispointed with this book.

J.C.
07 January, 2008

Esta bueno

Tiene buenas explicaciones de las cosas nuevas de WCF.
Se puede entender bien las funcionalidades y tiene ejemplos programaticos y declarativos (con xml config) para realizar casi todas las operaciones.
Conviene comparlo conjuntamente con "Learning WCF" que tiene ejemplos practicos de los casos mas comunes.
Me gusto.

Concepto Almeida
31 December, 2007

This is my WCF book.

I have purchased almost every book on the subject but I always come back to Programming WCF Services. This book is technically excellent but terse enough not to be boring. Lowy masterfully strikes a great line between a reference manual and a how to book.

If you get a chance, I would suggest his WCF Master Class.


Adam J. Wolf
18 November, 2007

Beware

It's hard to be expert in one area and also get it right in other areas.

Juval writes:

"In the 1960s, higher-level languages such as COBOL and FORTRAN introduced the notion of a compiler. ... . The problem with those first-generation languages was that the code resulted in nonstructured programming, where the code was internally coupled to its own structure, via the use of jump or go-to statements. Minute changes to the code structure had devastating effects in multiple places in the program."

Cobol and Fortran are structured languages (as are (also) C# and Java). The "problem" (or what could be so) was in the IT culture and the way they were used.

Juval continues and writes:
"The 1970s saw the eminence of structured programming via languages such as C and Pascal, which decoupled the code from its internal layout and structure, using functions and structures."

Thus C and Pascal are contrasted with Cobol and Fortran. Functions and structures are though as characteristic of Cobol and Fortran.

The flexibilities of C (and partially Fortran) together with programming idioms that didnt foster good self-documentation or programmer communication (from "the 60's" :-) ) did pose an inspiration for object-orientation and thinking in patterns (or idioms).

Juval continues to talk about the history of OO and component thinking ... also equally misleading in important ways.

But it's otherwise a catchy story -- though misleading.

But does it have to do with WCF? Well, yes and no.
Technically, no.
In applying it to the real world, perhaps yes.

Is Juval unique in this way? No.
Is this WCF book otherwise OK. Yes, probably.

But i'd beware.

Paul Schwartzberg
03 November, 2007

I would not have expected anything less

This is the third Juval book that I've purchased. I consider them must-read for serious .Net developers. I did take the WCF master class with Juval, and buying this book afterwards provided a good refresher. It's a very good resource. However, this is not a hand-holding book -- for that, look elsewhere.

Ivor Fergus
30 October, 2007

Know what you are buying before you ding the author

For those of you who follow this industry, you know that Juval Lowy is truly a legend and not just because Microsoft says so. Don't rip this man's work simply because you were not aware of what you were buying. Do a little research first. Juval almost always takes a deeper dive into the technology. This book is definitely the book of choice if you're wanting to look under the hood of WCF. If you desire a more hands on approach, I highly recommend Learning WCF by Michele Leroux Bustamante.

B. Keller
22 October, 2007

Very Good WCF Book

I had only written a couple of WCF services before purchasing this book, and had survived by relying on samples found online. After purchasing this book, I no longer find myself looking for samples online. This book starts with the basics of WPF and makes them easy to understand. Then it proceeds into advanced topics such as message security, which had me puzzled until I read the chapter in this book.

One of the things I really appreciate as a C# developer is the fact that almost every example in the book shows how to accomplish the given task in the .config file using the XML configuration elements, and also in pure C# code. Many examples I have seen in the MSDN or other documentation only deal with how to set up a client or server using the .config file which is not always practical.

Jason Jackson
16 October, 2007

I'm buying a second copy....

So that I can have a copy on my desk at home. :)

I'm a developer by trade and read technical books quite a bit to stay up to speed with our evolving industry. Rarely do you find a one that`s hard to put down, typically they're just too dry and uneventful. Juvals Programming WCF Services is an exception to this rule, period. At first, I thought it was my hunger to figure out the new programming model coming out of Redmond that kept me glued to this book, but after a few chapters I realized it was the author's vast knowledge of WCF and his style of delivery that was keeping the pages turning. I had to actually stop working the examples because it was keeping me from reading and bookmarking the pages.

I have recommended this book to a number of my colleagues, and feel that if you're going to do enterprise-level design then this book needs to be within arms reach at all times.


Stephen Patten
09 October, 2007

A Must Have!

Excellent book, it covers every thing you need to know about WCF. Have in mid that this book is not for begginers

Luis Rojas Mendez
01 October, 2007

Great book on a big subject

Arguably, WCF is the most revolutionary development in current software trends. It may change completely technological landscape developers live and work in since the appearance of .NET platform.
Juval Lowy (once again!) has written an extraordinary book. Seemingly he has an absolute and complete knowledge on the subject.
What strikes me even more, is how carefull and lovingly Juval leads the reader through the forest of technical details to the deep and solid understanding of both underlying technology and practical implementation of WCF.
If after hours of reading you suddenly feel lost, all you have to do is go back half a page and you are on track again.
I just wish I had such a wonderfull teacher every time I have to learn something new.

Boris Pesetskiy
05 September, 2007

Easy to understand

Juval writes like a real educator. Where other books fails to explain in simple terms, Juval Löwy is very easy to understand. His book has a wonderful layout, which makes it easy to find what your are looking for.
Thanks Juval Löwy.

Arne Garvander
03 September, 2007

A "Must-Have" Book for Programming WCF

If you are going to use WCF in your enterprise applications, then this is the book you want to buy. We are converting our .NET 1.1 web services over to WCF and find this book to be absolutely essential. This is the stuff you can't glean from Internet posts. A truly irreplaceable knowledge builder and reference tool.

R Arney
30 August, 2007

Learn WCF the right way instead of piecmealing sub-standard techniques from bloggers.

I'm part of a middleware group and we are migrating to WCF. This book was just technical enough, concise and it has been very helpful in several cases. It's gotten me started and helped fill in the details where I needed it. Probably my favorite part, was the astute and very well reasoned description of Service-Orientation in Appendix A.

You're not going to waste your time reading fluff like so many other books.

Micah S. Burnett
28 August, 2007

Practical Enterprise WFC

I found the book to cover the basics and move on to advanced topics, and true to IDesign form, with a firm practice of coding to an interface and not Implimentation, Juval's book will take you to the next level and make Architects happy. Juval Lowy book is for practical and scaleable WFC enterprise Services with much detail that I haven't found easily online.

I have a few WCF books on my shelf at home, but I have Lowy's book at work where I need it! If you are a professional programmer, buy the book! Even if don't know what an interface is, buy a c# programming book, then, come back and buy this book if you really want to learn WCF.

The code examples are clean and professional, I love it.

Davidb Naas
14 August, 2007

deep into WCF

The book is very detailed. I personally didn't like that much the writting style of the author. He begins talking the WCF lingo from start. Also, the introduction where the basics of the concepts are presented is too short.

Gustavo Frederico
13 August, 2007

Excellent book

This is an excellent book. If you really want to master WCF this the book that you need to study. After reading many books written by Juval Lowy I think that this one is his best. Just a small advice before you buy it: this is not a beginner's book. It assumes a certain level of experience and knowledge and for sure it is not a "Learn how to use WCF" book. In any case, I would recommend this book 100%!! [...].

SPYRIDON PRANTALOS
09 August, 2007