Good VB.NET Books?

[ookete]

I am looking for a few good books for VB.NET 2003 programming, and would love your opinions. I am fairly new to the .NET environment, and am looking for both a "Beginner" book as an intro and a "Professional" book for the deeper matters.

I have used WROX books in the past, and they seem to be hit or miss. Any suggestions or reviews?

Thanks!

 

[ThatRickGuy]

In my classes we used WROX and Deitle. Not a big fan of WROX and the only redeaming fact the Deitle book had, was that you can sing the "Deitle" song (same as the "Dradle" song, only with "Deitle" instead of "Dradle") for some good laughs.

-Rick

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http://www.ringdev.com

 

[Becks25Not]

I liked the Microsoft Visual Basic Programmer's Cookbook by Matthew MacDonald when I first switched from VB6 to .NET. As I have become more experienced in NET, I am using VB.NET Power Coding by Paul Kimmel and Expert One-on-One Visual Basic .NET Business Objects by Rockford Lhotka (really good for n-tier & building classes)

 

[ThatRickGuy]

As odd as it may sound, I think the book that taught me the most about development in VB.Net was a Java book. Having tons of experience in VB made the syntax of VB.Net easy, but the concept of Object Oriented coding much more difficult. Took 2 symesters of Java and I began to understand how OO design works. Once I learned how OO design worked in Java, it was just a matter of going back to the Syntax of VB.

-Rick

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http://www.ringdev.com

 

[pzmgmb]

ookete,

In my humble opinion, and being a newbie to .NET also, my suggestion is to obtain some multimedia training.

I am a developer coming from an Access/VB 6.0 and VB .NET seemed totally foreign to me. My company was able to allocate funds for me to purchase a multimedia training app from AppDev and it saved me countless hours reading books and alleviated a lot of the frustration. It is a rather pricey option, but I came up to speed quickly and my comprehension was far better than i could have done with a book.

I'm not dissing books, they are invaluable for reference... but when you want to come into the .NET world, Its what i would recommend.

 

[ookete]

Thank you all for the great advice.

 

[paulrw1]

Actually I LIKE the Wrox book entitled "Beginning VB.Net 2003". Lots of good examples and complete programs. Plus it covers database and Web programming.

As you get more into VB .Net, I also suggest "Database Programming With Visual Basic .Net" from Apres. It's indepth coverage of programming vb.net and SQL Server, ODBC, and OLEDB database programming.

 

[Bchemist]

Personally I like Mastering VB .NET published by Sybex. It covered most topics enough to become familiar with the differences and advantages of VB .NET (especially coming from VB 6 and Access VBA) while not become so in depth that it lost me.

 

[bigfoot]

I like Professional VB.NET 2003 by wrox. It's not about the controls though, just the oop language.
It's thick and has plenty of samples.

 

[jubble]

For mine it's the Gunderloy book for the 70-306 exam - Developing Windows based apps with VB.Net. It's written so that it can be a perfect reference after doing the exam unlike most other exam books that end up on Ebay after the exam's over.
It's also full of those gems of information one tends to miss.