Focusing on the .NET Framework version 2.0, this official study guide covers topics such as .NET Framework fundamentals, I/O, graphics, collections, serialization, application domains and services, application and user security, threading, instrumentation, reflection, and installing and configuring applications.

Ace your exam preparation and ramp up quickly on the .NET Framework by working at your own pace through the lessons, hands-on exercises, and practice tests. The flexible, best-of-class test engine on CD features 300 practice questions and pre-assessment and post-assessment capabilities. Choose timed or untimed testing mode, generate random tests, or focus on discrete objectives or chapters, and get detailed explanations for right and wrong answers—including pointers back to the book for further study. You also get a 90-day evaluation version of microsoft Visual Studio® 2005 and a 15 percent exam discount voucher—making this kit an exceptional value and a great career investment.

Publisher Description
Key Book Benefits: - Comprehensive study guide written by exam-certified authors - Deeper, more focused coverage of exam objectives and suobjectives—plus instructive case studies and troubleshooting scenarios to enhance your performance on the job - 300 practice questions on CD, wita test engine that enables customized testing, pre-assessment and post-assessment, and automated scoring and feedback - Complete objective-by-objective Review section, plus a tear-out exam-mapping grid - Exam tips based on real-world test experience - 90-day evaluation version of Visual Studio 2005 Professional Edition - 15 percent exam discount voucher from a leading authorized testing center (limited time offer) - microsoft encyclopedia of Networking, Second Edition, eBook - Practice files on CD - Entire study guide in searchable eBook format

Focusing on SQL Server 2005, this official study guide covers topics such as installing and configuring SQL Server, implementing database mirroring, managing database snapshots, working with XML and flat files, managing replication, backing up and restoring a database, monitoring and troubleshooting, and creating and implementing database objects.

Ace your exam preparation and ramp up quickly on SQL Server 2005 database administration by working at your own pace through the lessons, hands-on exercises, and practice tests. The flexible, best-of-class test engine on CD features 300 practice questions and pre-assessment and post-assessment capabilities. Choose timed or untimed testing mode, generate random tests, or focus on discrete objectives or chapters, and get detailed explanations for right and wrong answers—including pointers back to the book for further study. You also get a 180-day evaluation version of SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition and a 15 percent exam discount voucher—making this kit an exceptional value and a great career investment.

Publisher Description
Key Book Benefits: - Comprehensive study guide written by exam-certified authors - Deeper, more focused coverage of exam objectives and sub-objectives—plus instructive case studies and troubleshooting scenarios to enhance your performance on the job - 300 practice questions on CD, with a test engine that enables customized testing, pre-assessment and post-assessment, and automated scoring and feedback - Complete objective-by-objective Review section, plus a tear-out exam-mapping grid - Exam tips based on real-world test experience - 180-day evaluation version of SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition - 15 percent exam discount voucher from a leading authorized testing center (limited time offer) - microsoft encyclopedia of Networking, Second Edition, eBook - Practice files on CD - Entire study guide in searchable eBook format

Key Book Benefits:

• Delves into the core, must-know topics for developers working with ASP.NET 2.0, and advances their mastery with essential skills

• Examines the new controls and infrastructure in ASP.NET 2.0 in depth, while also providing the latest information on classic ASP features such as controls

• Provides hands-on code examples to illustrate concepts and build skills mastery

Key Book Benefits:

• This immensely popular tutorial for Visual Basic has been fully revised for the newest version of the technology.

• Provides step-by-step guidance on how to use Visual Basic 2005 with Visual Studio 2005 to create smart-client and Web applications.

• Features easy-to-follow, logically planned lessons, with necessary data sets and additional code samples on the CD.

• STEP BY STEP is ideal for anyone with a fundamental understanding of computer programming.

“Some books are different-the content can't be Googled from the Internet, the authors have real-life experiences to share, the code can be used in real-world projects. This is one of those books.”

–Neal Myrddin, Independent Developer

“Chris and Michael nail the soul of Windows Forms 2.0. This book provides an insightful view into the design of Windows Forms and the integration of new 2.0 features. It is just as applicable for the first-time Windows Forms programmer as the seasoned line of business developer. The ‘What’s New in 2.0’ appendix is worth the price of admission alone.”

–Mike Harsh, Windows Forms Program Manager, Microsoft, Inc.

“This book takes an amazingly broad and deep technology, and breaks it into manageable pieces that are easily consumed. You cannot survive building a complex WinForms application without this book.”

–Ryan Dorrell, Chief Technology Officer, AgileThought

“Windows Forms 2.0 programming offers something for every .NET developer. Experienced developers will appreciate the in-depth coverage of new 2.0 features, including the most comprehensive coverage of ClickOnce deployment, multithreading, and the new designer integration found anywhere. Developers new to Winforms programming will appreciate the coverage of the fundamentals all Winforms developers need to know. Whether you’re an experienced WinForms developer or just beginning, you need this book.” 

–Fritz Onion, cofounder of Pluralsight, author of Essential ASP.NET, and ASP.NET MVP

“I don’t want just a description of the WinForms widgets. I can get that online or from other books. What I want is a roadmap for pitfalls to avoid, and innovative solutions for common problems. That is where this book shines. All of us who found the first edition of this book to be an indispensible part of our reference library will appreciate this updated edition that describes WinForms 2.0.”

–Johan Ericsson, software Engineer, Agilent Technologies

“The books Chris Sells writes are always insightful and this newest addition is no different. This book in particular is for those who want to understand not just the flashy surface of Windows Forms 2.0, but also how it fits into the .NET environment. Readers will have this book at their desks, not stuck on their shelves, for quite a long time.”

–Yoshimatsu Fumiaki, software Engineer based in Tokyo Japan

“Chris and Mike have done an excellent job presenting the information you need to be successful with Windows Forms.”

–Jessica Fosler, Dev Tech Lead, Microsoft

“This book is the ‘must have’ teaching and reference book for WinForms 2.0.”

–Jim Rittenhouse, Senior software Engineer, Siemens

Windows Forms 2.0 Programming is the successor to the highly praised Windows Forms programming in C#. This edition has been significantly updated to amalgamate the sheer mass of new and improved support that is encompassed by Windows Forms 2.0, the .NET Framework 2.0, and Visual Studio 2005. This is the one book developers need in order to learn how to build and deploy leading-edge Windows Forms 2.0 applications.

Readers will gain a deep understanding from Sells and Weinhardt’s practical, well-balanced approach to the subject and clear code samples.

  •  Windows Forms 2.0 fundamentals, including forms, dialogs, data validation, help, controls, components, and rendering

  •  Static and dynamic layout, snap lines, HTML-style flow and table layout, automatic resizing, and automatic cross-DPI scaling

  •  Office 2003-style tool strip control coverage, including dynamic layout and custom rendering

  •  Design-time integration with the Visual Studio 2005 Properties Window and Smart Tags

  •  Resource management, strongly typed resources, and internationalization considerations

  •  Strongly typed application and user settings

  •  SDI, MDI, Single Instancing, Multiple-Instance SDI, Single-Instance MDI, database-centric, and document-centric applications

  •  Databinding data-source management, drag-and-drop databinding, the BindingSource, the BindingNavigator, and applied databinding

  •  Events, delegates, multithreaded UIs, long-running operations, simplified multithreading with the BackgroundWorker, and asynchronous web service calls

  •  ClickOnce application development publishing, shell integration, and partial trust security

  •  Best practices for developers transitioning from Windows Forms 1.0 and MFC

Chris Sells is a program manager for the Connected Systems Division. He’s written several books, including Programming Windows Presentation Foundation (O’Reilly), Windows Forms programming in C# (Addison-Wesley), and ATL Internals (Addison-Wesley). In his free time, Chris hosts various conferences and makes a pest of himself on microsoft internal product team discussion lists. More information about Chris–and his various projects–is available at www.sellsbrothers.com.

Michael Weinhardt is a programmer/writer at Microsoft, working on the Windows Client SDK. Michael has coauthored a variety of articles with Chris, contributed to the “Wonders of Windows Forms” column at MSDN Online, Reviewed several Windows technology books, and generally loves communicating the whys and wherefores of technology to his peers. Michael is sure that his parents attribute his fascination in technology to their purchase of an Amiga 1000 in the mid-80s. They would be right.

Key Book Benefits:

• Delivers a thorough grounding in .NET Framework architecture, the runtime environment, and other key topics

• Provides extensive code examples in Visual C#

• Features authoritative, pragmatic guidance on difficult development concepts such as generics and threading

It's no secret that many computer books are pretty much devoid of an authorial personality. This title is a winning exception. The author is able to weave in clever examples (using such topics as his own long experience in computing, his dog, Star Trek, etc.) without being coy or getting in the way of presenting real technical information. Liberty's wide experience in computers and general writing skill shows, as he is able to draw on a wealth of examples to move his text forward.

These are a couple of goals at work in Programming C#. First, it's an excellent language tutorial, certainly one of the smartest and best available guides to C# as a language. Early chapters explore basic and obscure language options using inheritance, delegation, interface, and the conventions in C# used to implement these techniques. The middle part of the book turns toward the .NET Framework itself, with two useful (and somewhat introductory) chapters on both Windows Forms and Web Forms, for standalone and Web-based applications, respectively.

Later sections crank up the technical knowledge again with several advanced topics on understanding .NET assemblies and deployment in detail, as well as "reflection" APIs that allow .NET programs to essentially modify their code at run time. (One technique, reflection emit, which literally writes bytecodes, will definitely interest expert readers, though it's unlikely most programmers will need to do this.) Final sections look at the .NET stream classes (rivaled only by Java's for complexity). Liberty looks at basic file and network I/O as well as how objects get serialized and marshaled both for SOAP and Web services and "normal" .NET remoting.

The author's sure hand here in navigating the difficult waters of C# and .NET makes for a relatively concise text that is chock-full of useful information on C#. Filled with notably clever and inventive examples, this book is possibly this veteran computer author's best title to date, and it's sure to be a noteworthy resource as experienced developers tackle C# for the first time. --Richard Dragan

Topics covered:

• Introduction to C# and the .NET platform
• A "Hello World" example in C#
• Tutorial to C# as an object-oriented programming language (types and variables, operators, namespaces, and preprocessor directives)
• Defining classes in C# (including static members, finalizers, overloading, and read-only fields)
• Inheritance and polymorphism implemented in C#
• Operator overloading
• Structures in C#, interfaces, arrays, and indexers
• Built-in .NET collections, strings, and regular expression support
• Structured exception handling
• Delegate and events
• Introduction to programming with Windows Forms
• ADO.NET database APIs (including basic XML support)
• Quick introduction to Web Forms and ASP.NET used with C#
• Introduction to Web services (SOAP, WSDL, and Discover services described)
• In-depth guide to .NET assemblies (including metadata, versioning, private and shared assemblies)
• C# support for attributes and reflection (including reflection emit techniques)
• Marshaling and remoting (with and without SOAP)
• Threads and synchronization
• Tutorial to C#/.NET streams (including basic I/O techniques, Web streams, and serialization)
• COM and .NET interoperability

• Visual Studio 2005
• Generics
• Collection interfaces and iterators
• Anonymous methods
• New ADO.NET data controls
• Fundamentals of Object Oriented Programming

Key Book Benefits:

• Provides fast facts and immediate reference for administering SQL Server 2005

• Delivers must-know details for taking advantage of the improved scalability, security features, and management tools in SQL Server 2005

• Features concise tables, easy-to-scan lists, and step-by-step instructions for fast answers, wherever you need them