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Search in Book Reviews

The ACCU passes on review copies of computer books to its members for them to review. The result is a large, high quality collection of book reviews by programmers, for programmers. Currently there are 1949 reviews in the database and more every month.
Search is a simple string search in either book title or book author. The full text search is a search of the text of the review.
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Title:
C# A Programmer's Introduction
Author:
Deitel&Deitel et al.
ISBN:
0 13 046132 6
Publisher:
Prentice Hall
Pages:
862pp
Price:
$49.99 (no UK p
Reviewer:
Paul F. Johnson
Subject:
C#
Appeared in:
15-3
This is a fantastic book. It is well planned, well organised with plenty of examples and high quality images so not only can you see the code, but also see the results. Basically, it is what you would expect from a Deitel title.

You can see by the style of writing that the Deitel range has developed from the nigh on impossible to read earlier books to a book which can be used by anyone. Why anyone though? The answer is that the book covers its material in sufficient detail. Where other books (aimed at the same level) assume you already know key concepts (such as OOP), this one doesn't. The classes are well explained.

The code examples are well documented and all aspects of the .NET 1.0 framework are well covered. Just in time really for .NET 1.1 - but given the lead-time of books, that is to be expected.

Unlike other C# books I have reviewed, you definitely need Microsoft Visual C#. Some parts can be compiled under GNU .NET or mono, but not the specific GUI material. There is nothing wrong with this, after all, the book is designed for VS .NET.

There are a couple of very minor drawbacks to the book.

The book is not simple enough to pick up and put down - you start a chapter, you really do need to finish the chapter. There are two completely superfluous chapters at the end on the HTML 4 specification and there is a lack of any form of questions or end of section tests. I personally would have liked to have seen this as books aimed at an introduction level really rely on reinforcement of acquired knowledge and questions or mini-tasks are probably the best way of achieving this.

A CD of the source would have been an advantage, but not essential - the source is available from the Deitel website as are errata and other bonus material. Highly recommended.