"Build Your Own ASP.NET Website Using C# & VB.NET" released by SitePoint

**Tryst** · Aug 25, 2004 11:17

But so I can program both C# and VB,NET in Web Matrix?

Thanks

Tryst

**yodaddy** · Aug 25, 2004 11:22

Originally Posted by zakruvalcaba

Have you looked at Microsoft Press books? How about Thompson Learning, Prentice Hall, or even Deitel. Those books get up into the $75-$80 range. I'll tell you one thing, I've authored for Que, Sams, and SitePoint and I can say that the time the SitePoint team puts into these books is well worth the extra $10 you pay per book.

Anxiously awaiting my copy. I agree, Sitepoint books rock...

**rbutler** · Aug 25, 2004 13:07

Originally Posted by Tryst

But so I can program both C# and VB,NET in Web Matrix?

Yes. Personally, it's better than programming in Notepad

**Jacob2003** · Aug 27, 2004 06:53

This is probably the only place where you get to talk to the author. this forum is great!

He doesn't have to comment but here were my concerns from a previous post in the wrong forum--ASP.

________
I'm excited about Build Your Own ASP.NET Website Using C# & VB.NET. I haven't gotten it yet but i have read a lot of postive reviews. The book seems just right for my projects. I'm wondering if the book will help me to begin coding in ASP pretty quickly.

.NET and OOP have been the source of much fear and frustration since i know little to nothing aobut OOP and seems like you have to study a whole library just to get started. My hope is that the book will also help me to ease into VB.NET and begin coding. I'm used to coding and learning along the way, but the conflicting info i get about learning VB.NET makes .NET seem so impossible. I don't mind planning, but planning shouldn't take a year to learn. what are your thoughts? will i still need another book afterwards? will it help ease the fears of learning vb.net? I hope this book will give me a good start! I love the ways it says that it only expects you to know HTML!

thanks!

**zakruvalcaba** · Aug 27, 2004 09:01

You can't expect to learn everything from one book. Web development, especially in ASP.NET encompasses so many technologies (HTML, CSS, VB.NET, ADO.NET, XML, etc.) that one book just can't satisfy. I think most people who have read this book would agree that it's a great stepping stone to learning the different areas of Web development with ASP.NET and by the end of the book (with a lot of practice) you should at the very least consider yourself an intermediate developer. Then you may want to move onto some more advanced books that are focused specifcally on one area like ADO.NET, Web Services, etc.

**rbutler** · Aug 28, 2004 09:10

I by no means consider myself an expert coder or ASP.NET developer, but zak's book is by far the best beginner's book I have found. I enrolled in a class that taught this very subject and honestly, I didn't learn a thing. VB.NET in my opinion isn't that hard of a language to learn, compared to something like jsp in a Java environment (I don't like the syntax, call me stupid

). Although it did take me around a year/year and half to feel comfortable in VB as a whole.

I think by the end of the book, which I'm almost there, you could consider yourself knowlegable in .NET and the ASP.NET technology and especially what it can do for you. Whether any ASP.NET developer agrees with me in another story but I think to really grasp and understand ASP.NET, you need to think "outside" the box so to speak. Understand what it can do in the "big" picture. The .NET framework class library has so many useful features built in, but the developer needs to know how to expose those features and use it to their advantage.

I think this book definately will help you over come your fears of ASP.NET development as a whole.

**Protoss** · Aug 30, 2004 12:33

Does this book do much by way of covering best practices? Is there a book that you could reccomend for specifically for teaching asp.net development in Visual Studio?

**zakruvalcaba** · Aug 30, 2004 13:07

No sorry, this book doesn't specifically have chapters dealing with best practices. I did, whenever possible, try to write the code so that it conforms to best practices. There are books out there that cover best practices though, try doing a Google search. As far as Visual Studio, I can't really recommend any books because I'm self taught with that program.

**Jacob2003** · Aug 31, 2004 07:01

I was wondering about this quote i found.

"Because it is new, large, and complex you are facing a big learning curve. .Net programmers with 1, 2, and more years of experience with .Net still report they are going through the learning curve. Most report it takes a minimum of six months of learning and practice before one can create a real-world application with .Net. Some programmers are still struggling with the learning curve - one or more years after getting started with .Net."

I don't know if it applies to ASP.NET or just VB.NET.

My hope is that i will be able to start developing something by the end of the book. I'm already familiar with HTML and CSS. I have no knowledge of XML.

I should get my book in just 2 more days! I'm excited!

**zakruvalcaba** · Aug 31, 2004 08:29

Sounds like a PHP guy wrote that quote. Of course there's a learning curve...you're learning a new technology and then on top of that you have to learn a ful blown object oriented programming language. I think once you finish the book though, you'll find that you'll be able to build your own apps.

**jerrypaz** · Sep 24, 2004 17:05

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but there are many errors in the book and when you report it to tech support, they don't know what you're saying or they can't help. When I clarified something they couldn't understand, they refuse to answer. The first 4 chapters were great, can't say the same for the rest of the book.

**Tryst** · Sep 24, 2004 18:27

As you probably know, the author of that book posts solutions to ASP problems right here on this forum.

May be if you point out a few issues, he may be able to erradicate them.

Tryst

**M. Johansson** · Sep 25, 2004 07:02

Originally Posted by jerrypaz

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but there are many errors in the book and when you report it to tech support, they don't know what you're saying or they can't help. When I clarified something they couldn't understand, they refuse to answer. The first 4 chapters were great, can't say the same for the rest of the book.

It would probably be very good if you could post about these specific issues on the forums. There are many knowledgabe programmers here, inclusing the author himself, that can rectify the problems.

**jerrypaz** · Sep 25, 2004 12:05

Zak makes it very difficult for someone using C# and MSDE. You need to manually filter through his examples and pickuot what needs to go in the program and what can be left out (by trial and error). Once you get used to this, it's not to bad, as Zak does explain the code quite well.

Microsoft Access is a $400.00 program where MSDE and Web Data Administrator are free. Not everyone has access to Microsoft Access, so it might have been better to concentrate on MSDE/SQL; also because this is what you use on servers, not MS Access.

**rbutler** · Sep 25, 2004 13:33

I didn't program the book in C#, I did VB.NET, but found working through his step-by-step approach quite easy.

Microsoft Access is a $400.00 program where MSDE and Web Data Administrator are free. Not everyone has access to Microsoft Access, so it might have been better to concentrate on MSDE/SQL; also because this is what you use on servers, not MS Access.

It could be argued either way, but I tend to think most people would have Access instead. Access is quite portable and quite robust for its purpose. He did concentrate on both Access and MSDE/SQL, matter of fact, he pointed out exactly when to switch namespaces. You can use MS Acess on servers, I'm doing so on my Windows host right now.

**zakruvalcaba** · Sep 26, 2004 19:11

Interesting, you're the absolute first person who has made mention of the fact that the book was riddled with errors. We've given the book to numerous senior forum participants, Microsoft MVP's, and ASP.NET instructors and no one has reported issues with having to manually pick apart what is needed and what is not. To demonstrate this point, I need only to point to Amazon feedback which by the way has it at 5 stars. I hate to break the news to you, but this book is geared towards the beginner-intermediate who are getting up and running with ASP.NET. If you have to strip out code to get it to work with what you have then maybe this book isn't for you.

Also, this is a first edition book. Sitepoint and I went through great lengths to fix bugs and what not. Obviously no first edition is absolutely perfect. If you find errors, it would help out with future revisions if you could send them to me or post them.

**Tryst** · Sep 27, 2004 04:22

To demonstrate this point, I need only to point to Amazon feedback which by the way has it at 5 stars.

I wish Amazon would hurry up and send me my book. I ordered it 4 weeks ago now

Tryst

**complexity** · Sep 30, 2004 18:37

Just wondering, does the actual Sitepoint webstore utilize the ecommerce solution provided in this book?

**zakruvalcaba** · Sep 30, 2004 19:13

If you haven't noticed, this site is built on PHP not ASP.NET. My solution is a simple one that will get a beginning - intermediate user up and running.

**Leoleo76** · Oct 5, 2004 03:32

Hi. Just got the book and loving it... I got a question though...
I am up to chapter 8 and tried out the code for inserting helpdesk details. Inserting seems to work fine BUT the categoryID and subjectID do not get inserted correctly. No matter what I do, the values I get is 1 for both. It seems the dropdown list is always choosing the first item to be "selected". Any remedy to this problem?

**Leoleo76** · Oct 5, 2004 04:39

I fixed the problem. I had to check for IsPostBack on the Sub Page_Load(). Now the insert works fine but the dropdown lists now do not get initialized. i.e "Hardware" and "Computer not starting" used to come up as the initial values for the dropdown lists but now the initial values are whatever the previously chosen values were.

**rbutler** · Oct 6, 2004 06:31

Post some code if you're still having problems. Mine works fine.

**jerrypaz** · Oct 15, 2004 19:45

How do you start a new thread. I have a problem that nobody has posted yet?

**rbutler** · Oct 17, 2004 12:54

If its regarding the book, either post the problem here or select the "New Thread" button at the top of the forum window. Other problems, I would start a new thread by following the above instructions.

/*be nice if I could ever spell and type what I meant to say on the first go around instead of hitting the edit button five times */