Search in Book Reviews

The approach taken in this book is along the lines of a traditional programming book (in contrast to the design based approach used by 'Designing with JavaScript' above). For example, after a couple of introductory chapters setting VBScript amongst the various technologies Chapters 3 and 4 cover language basics (the<SCRIPT> tag, types, variables, constants, arrays, operators, conditional and looping statements, subroutines, etc.) To support the discussion there are plenty of programs (available on the CD) and Chapter 4 ends with an example implementing a web-based calculator. Having covered basics Chapters 5 and 6 move on to creating complex web pages and Chapters 7 and 8 cover adding ActiveX functionality. The remainder of the text looks at advanced features and how to build real world web pages dealing with links, images, forms validation, error handling, etc. The final chapter discussing how to deal with other browsers, i.e. only MS Internet Explorer 3 directly supports VBScript and ActiveX. Clearly if one is using a company Intranet where Internet Explorer is the only browser used this problem does arise. But what should a public web page do when another browser (such as Netscape) accesses it? One could display a message telling the reader to get Internet Explorer or take more diplomatic action.

A good text well worth considering by the web page designer wishing to learning VBScript or looking for a reference.