This was just about the first ASP.NET book out there. The first edition dates back almost a year! Many ASP.NET developers used this to get started (like me), and believe me, it wasn't always easy. There are some great parts, some incredibly repetitive parts (the effect of having so many authors), and some infuriating mistakes. Finally they fixed those in this edition--did anyone else but me struggle with the completely wrong description of security rule priority?

The factual problems are fixed in this version, but it is still a painfully disorganized way to learn. It's best for programmers with hefty .NET and ASP experience. Many fundamentals (like session state) just aren't covered. Now there are other best first choices. I particularly like ASP.NET The Complete Reference (McGraww Hill), which has a comprehensive look at code-behind development, VS.NET, and best practices, which most books ignore. ANother good one is Programming ASP.NET (Oreilly) which covers everthing in VB and C#! AsP.nET unleashed is a solid title too (very comprehensive), but it is a little wonky in places. Who would use a database trigger to write a file on updates? That's one of the most unscalable ideas i've ever heard. One thing I've discovered is that books that pretend to be more specific, like e-commerce with ASP.NET, or data-driven sites with ASP.NET, are really just basic ASP.NET introductions that don't cover all the features. You are best off (right now at least) with an all in one.

In short, this book will do, and has good parts. But why bother now that other books (written carefully by a single guru instead of patched together from a whole comittee) are available?

A Torch In The Dark

Rating: 5/5

When ASP.NET was introduced it sounded like a lot of our development problems were solved. Web Functionality doubled, dev time halved, it sounded too good to be true; which it was, as actually getting our heads around serious dev issues with this new technology meant a very steep, almost overhanging learning curve, often stopping dead where the MSDN online help finished. One of the guys nipped down the book shop one lunch and came back with this book. We havent used the online help since. It covers just about everything you need to know to get your first show on the road. at just over 1300 pages there is a lot to take in, but its worth it if your taking it seriously. The book tackles ASP.NET specifics rather than design techniques so if your looking down that road i would recommend another wrox title ASP.NET Distributed Data Applications as this covers more of the hows and whys of data driven sites.

MCSD.NET,MCSE,MCDBA,MCSA and MCT

Rating: 2/5

oh, I hope that the authors read my review. This could me the best ASP.NET book in the market but it isn't. Many pages, many chapters and many information but all these need time to manage and arrange. I think that the former publishing company just wanted to publish 1000+ book. Please in the future try to make in better. Something like Professional ASP.NET using C# and Professional ASP.NET using VB.NET. And please authors not more than 1000 in the same book.

Alghough I like many of the former wrox's titles.
Michael Youssef
Microsoft.NET Architect/Trainer