Microsoft Silverlight Books

One of the best VB.NET books I've read

As someone with over a decade of experience in VBVBAVBS I was looking for a good text that would be help me port my brain --and the code I support --to VB.NET. This is the best reference book I have come across.

If you are looking for a book that will get you up and going from the git go with the GUI functionality of VB.NET, your patience will be sorely tried. The author spends 26 chapters introducing and explaining VB.NET concepts with console based examples and exercises. But as I wanted to be able to build console applications which was never directly possible in VB, the author's m.o. was greatly appreciated. I preferred to learn the basics first without the distraction of the GUI. Your preference and mileage may differ.

Ars Gratia Artis
01 September, 2010

Author has a Knack for Teaching

As a fresh beginner I have bought several VB.NET and ASP.NET books, in addition to plenty of internet reading, during my pursuit of learning .NET. I have found that the most difficult task for .NET and OOP authors is structuring how and when to introduce all the layered and interwoven concepts. Some authors, hoping to not intimidate or confuse the reader, will settle for an outline where the interwoven nature of the topic is rigidly separated. These type of books produced more questions for me than they answer and they tend to repeat themselves a lot. The opposite side are books that are written like resources. They can speak only to more advanced readers who already have a grasp of concepts and definitions.

I am convinced this author is a natural teacher. His general outline is excellent, when necessary he speaks to more advanced concepts but always with reassurance that better explanations will come later, his tone is conversational and simple, his examples are relevant and enjoyable, and he does a great job keeping the 1300 page book from feeling like a resource. Thanks for giving me the confidence to keep going!

Sean B. Baker
16 May, 2010

Microsoft platform beginners, its to you !

I bought this item to make a review of VB NET language , after stay away from that more than 1 year, and to know the new features of NET 3.5 Framework. The book has a good detail level and well illustrated with a lot of meaningful examples. It's really a good choice to professional developers what wants to learn more about the Microsoft development environment and to acquire expertise in VB 2008

Fabio Venuto Soares
09 May, 2010

Great reference book.

I am a beginning programmer to VB.net. This book was not written for a beginner but it still was a big help. I bought it to solve a database issue for a class project and it helped point the way. Very good sections on different topics and the index made finding what I needed easy. This is the reference book to have as it does go into some depth on each topic and has example code.

K. Karsko
25 December, 2009

excellent

As a vb6 programmer who is lomg overdur on an ide upgrade I found this book to be very relevant nd an excellent read on the kindle. I highly recommend this to both of the other two remaining vb6 programmers out there.

P. Smith
01 November, 2009

A good resource, a little wordy

I will start by simply stating what *should* be obvious to the writers of this kind of work: If your title contains the word Pro, then why do you keep assuring the reader with phrases like "if you are not familiar with , its covered in chapter ". As a professional programmer who routinely writes in the language, I am not looking for a primer, an introduction, or survey of the language. I want to be introduced to the blood and guts of the language and the platform. This book gets there, but most programmers will probably want to skip the first dozen chapters or so unless the really need a refresher on structured error handling.

Other than that, its been a handy resource for filling in the occasional gap in your understanding of the .NET framework's various idiosyncrocies. The author is capable at explaining fairly advanced concepts, so you can usually get up to speed on somthing by just skimming through. 4 stars (could have been 5 but for the tedious re-intros).

C. Scallion
03 September, 2009

vb book review

I am 4 chapters into the book. So far every chapter is well written, has good examples and informative.

jaw
03 September, 2009

A very good read for improving your core VB.NET knowledge

For a VB.NET Book, this is fantastic read...here's why: The book reads like your are listening to one of your favorite and respected intstructors. Easy to read. The author does a great job presenting examples and bringing harmony in teaching the principles of Object Oriented Programming. I program VB.NET on a by-project basis and can be many months between coding -- so this book has been a great way to build up my disciplined programming skills.

N. Linder
02 September, 2009

Masterful

A wealth of detailed info, presented in an eminently readable narrative form -- what's not to like?

Jeffrey Carver
19 April, 2009

Awesome

Awesome. I'm a VB6 (I mean WAS a VB6) programmer and was thrust into a project that had to be done with dot net. I told the client "No Problem" and promptly dug into this book. Normally, I abhor lenghty technical manuals where the author pads the actual substance (the stuff you want to learn) with personal comments,anecdotes, etc. (the stuff that wastes your time). This is NOT that kind of book. Just the opposite. And the writting style is great. Conversational yet to the point with little wasted space. Happy ending: I completed the application on time and the clent likes it. Only one bug (not unhandled) was found with the Beta test. AND I understand (emphasis) what I'm coding.

Troy Zene
26 March, 2009

Learn VB.NET with something a little less advanced

I suspect that most users are interested in VB.NET in order to create GUI's to run under windows. Yet he doesn't get to that part until Chapter 27. All of his examples prior to that are building console applications. When reading this book you need to think about what you will actually be using as a developer. If you believe that you will need a tremendous amount of detail, including building windows forms by hand rather than using Visual Studio, then this is the book for you. If you don't think you will need all that detail, then this book is overkill.

Having said that, the first 8 chapters do give you an excellent introduction to using VB.NET with object oriented programming (OOP) concepts.

I would recommend this book for experienced programmers who want to understand VB.NET and how to use it with OOP. I think this will be an excellent reference book, once I get into VB.NET programming, but I think it would've been better to start with something a little less advanced.

A. Negin
26 March, 2009

Excellent for VB6 programmers

This book does a fantastic job getting you up to speed on Object Oriented Programming (OOP). I'm going through this book now with a team of 3 other veteran VB6 programmers, and they are being introduced to many OOP concepts for the first time. Though the concepts are very abstract, Troelsen manages to relate them in very practical examples. He is also much more thorough than other books I was considering when it came to the details of various .Net items such as the Exception class. The main reason I like this book is because the order of the chapters progress smoothly from the core concepts of OOP and the .Net architecture to the more specific concepts like form/control design or ASP.NET pages.

Thomas Adams
02 December, 2008

VB2008

The book came in really fast, and it has a lot of what I expected. Thanks for such a good service.

Aviva Salnikov
17 November, 2008

The reference book all VB.net programmers should have.

I, for one, miss the days of large reference manuals as opposed to help files and Google searches. For me this book is a throwback in terms of its completeness and scope. If you program in VB.net I feel this is a must-have reference. I've given it to 2 of my developer friends already and plan to give it again. Do yourself and your career a favor. God bless.

Byron Crowell
21 July, 2008

Wow! This is THE book for VB2008 and/or .NET 3.5!!!

I cannot over-rate this book. I've been developing systems for 40 years, and I've never seen a better book of this type. The author, Andrew Troelsen, really knows his stuff, and knows how to teach it. I only wish I'd had his VB 2005/.NET 2.0 book two years ago when I started trying to learn .NET! There's a lot of advanced material in this book, but it's good for any experienced programmer who wants to really learn .NET and VB 2008. It explains not only the what, but the why and how. If you need a book on this material, this is absolutely the one to get, period.

Judson McClendon
07 July, 2008