Review of .NET Framework Essentials

Title:.NET Framework Essentials
Buy .NET Framework Essentials
Author:Thuan Thai & Hoang Q. Lam
Publisher:O'Reilly and Associates
Book URL:http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/dotnetfrmess/
Sample Chapter URL:http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/dotnetfrmess/chapter/ch06.html
Reviewer:Craig Pfeifer, cpfeifer@acm.org

Rating: 10/10: the most concise, up-to-date,no-nonsense guide to all of the capabilities of the .NET framwork.O'Reilly is known for producing high quality books, and they haveextended this into the .NET

Review:

The term ".NET" has been thrown around in somany different contexts, that it's unclear as to what exactly isinvolved in Microsoft's .NET offering. No worries, O'Reilly is here toset it straight.

First off, the authors begin with anexplanation of some of the fundamental portion of .NET, the executionenvironment (the runtime). They explain how classes are generated bycompilers, loaded and executed in the runtime. This includes adissection of a simple example in IL (intermediate language) toillustrate that there isn't any ugly magic going on in the byte code,and that it is very possible to compile code to execute in the .NETruntime.

From here, the authors give a brief discussionof the major features of developing with .NET languages (currentlyincludes managed C++, VB.NET and C#). They give code samples for thesame sample class as it would be built in each language. Additionally,they dissect the IL that is produced by each compiler for C#, VB.NETand managed C++ to show you how the unified programming model isachieved with the different languages. Finally, they end this chapterwith a sample of how to easy it is to reuse a .NET component with zeroknowledge of the original language that was used to develop thecomponent.

The next chapter covers deploying .NETcomponents in depth. It covers all of the facilities that are providedby the component container including, versioning, remoting,transactions, pooling, security and queuing. The last 4 facilities areactually COM+ services (originally provided to COM components by MTS),and the authors are quick to note this and draw appropriate parallelsto help apply your existing knowledge to .NET.

The next 4 chapters are very thoroughoverviews of each of the major .NET framework features: ADO.NET, WebServices API, ASP.NET, and Windows Forms. Each of these chapters coversexactly what you need to know to get your feet wet with thetechnologies and give you a head start in understanding and applyingthem correctly the first time.

I have no prior experience with developing forthe Windows platform, in fact, I am a Sun Certified Java Developer. Butthis book told me everything that I needed to know about .NET to bevery excited about it, and understand exactly why there is such a hugebuzz about it. If you will be using .NET in the near future, or youjust want to get an excellent view of what all the fuss is about, pickup this book, and it will all be very clear. This book answered many ofmy questions about how .NET works and why it will be so popular.

Table of Contents:
Preface

1. .NET Overview
Microsoft .NET
The .NET Platform
.NET Framework Design Goals
.NET Framework

2. The Common Language Runtime
CLR Environment
CLR Executables
Metadata
Assemblies and Manifests
Intermediate Language (IL)
The CTS and CLS
CLR Execution
Summary

3. .NET Programming
Common Programming Model
Core Features and Languages
Language Integration
Summary

4. Working with .NET Components
Deployment Options
Distributed Components
COM+ Services in .NET
Message Queuing
Summary

5. Data and XML
ADO.NET Architecture
ADO.NET Benefits
Content Components
Managed Providers
DataSet and XML
Summary

6. Web Services
Web Services in Practice
Web Services Framework
Web Services Provider
Web Services Consumers
Web Services and Security
Summary

7. Web Forms
ASP
ASP.NET
The System.Web.UI Namespace
Web Form Syntax
ASP.NET Application Development
ASP.NET and Web Services
Data Binding and the Use of Templates
State Management and Scalability
Summary

8. Windows Forms
Introducing Windows Forms
The System.Windows.Forms Namespace
Windows Forms Development
Windows Forms and Web Services
Conclusion

A. .NET Languages

B. Common Acronyms

C. Common Datatypes

D. Common Utilities

Index