Go to school on VB.NET! Seriously!

These are text books for use in classrooms. But that doesn't mean that you can't use them outside a classroom for the same purpose. Look at it this way … you would spend how many hundreds of dollars to actually attend a class at your local university or community college? And you'd still have to buy the books.

These books are distinctly different from all the others here. They have all the hallmarks of text books including an academic justification of the teaching method in the preface, "(the book) is based on … a taxonomy of … achievement in the cognitive domain …" (followed by footnoted references). The author has a whole series of books with the generic titles, "Programming and Problem Solving With …" everything from Ada to Turbo Pascal. You can see the occasional typo in this book undoubtedly created by the (a-hem) 'volume production writing method', "Visual Basic provides a very large library of classes … There are so many of these in Java's library, in fact, that …" Java? Perhaps 'search and replace' didn't pick this one up.

I also have a slight problem with the authors' casual treatment of VB.NET class code, especially in the early chapters. Any student who actually tries to do what the text talks about might spend a while wondering why it doesn't work.

For example, Chapter 3 (which, regretfully, doesn't have downloadable source code) has a very welcome explanation of the "Windows Form Designer generated code." The problem is that it isn't complete. The authors say that, " … it is possible to (add elements to a form) strictly from code. You can use the example code from the InitializeComponent() method call in the previous section as an example." But the example leaves out three items. First, the main text leaves out the warning that VB.NET inserts into the code, "Do not modify (InitializeComponent) using the code editor." The other two items left out show this is good advice! Both texts leave out the class declarations for the form elements and the initialization of the Forms.Control() collection. And you don't find anything about these topics in VB.NET Help. It is possible. But doing it continues to be a bad idea. (For an example of more completness, at the cost of more complexity, compare chapter 9 of Troelsen's APress book.)

In general, however, this a polished and professional text book. 'Practice' may not make 'Perfect' - but it comes pretty close. You get more and better illustrations. You get more and better example programs. You even get more and better paper. More popular books usually have fewer pages in a book twice as thick. And you get downloadable source code for most chapters at the publisher web site.

These books are a bit pricey compared to some of the other titles, but you also have a much better chance of finding good used copies. And most experienced students know that a used text book is often better than a new one because the marginal notes add value. (There are nine blank pages at the end just for notes!)

About the Author

Nell Dale has an impressive string of degrees ending with a Ph.D. in Computer Sciences from the University of Texas at Austin. She doesn't teach full time these days, but you're getting the benefit of a lifetime of genuine hands-on experience in the classroom.