Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Unleashed, Sams
Microsoft .NET Framework, ASP.NET, Visual C# (CSharp, C Sharp, C-Sharp) Developer Training, Visual Studio
|
Contents |
C# Online.NET Book Review
Visual Studio 2005 is a Great Leap forward for the Visual Studio Integrated Development Environment (IDE). It boasts hundreds of new features not present in VS 2003—most of which are designed to free the developer from the more mundane chores, increase developer productivity, and promote development team interaction.
It has taken a long time for publishers to create informative, comprehensive books on Visual Studio. But, the current crop aimed at Visual Studio 2005 developers are quite good. If you are still using a previous version like Visual Studio 2003, you may want to purchase one of this new crop of books to bring you up to speed on all the new features and versions of Visual Studio.
The book is designed for anyone who depends on Visual Studio as their primary development environment on a daily basis. However, there may be more emphasis on team development in this book than many readers require: The last part of the book is dedicated to the Visual Studio 2005 Team System.
The primary topics addressed by the book are:
- basic use of VS designers, editors, projects, and solutions
- debugging under VS 2005
- using VS refactoring features
- creating rich clients using Windows Forms under VS
- accessing databases from VS
- using VS build features
- colloborating with development team members
- sharing VS code
- creating VS add-ins, macros, and wizards
- managing source code versions
- creating ASP.NET Web applications under VS
- creating and consuming Web services
- modeling using Team architect
- automated testing using Team test
The authors have done a good job organizing, writing, and illustrating the material. The only complaint I have is that they are dedicated Microsoft Men—one is even an Evangelist—and seem blissfully unaware of the state of the art of IDEs in general. They are positively giddy over the new VS 2005 features despite the fact that Visual Studio still lags the major IDEs for non-Microsoft languages such as the Java language. On the other hand, they are very knowledgeable within their fields of expertise; and, their enthusiasm is infectious.
The majority of source code examples are written in the C# language. However, in a few cases, Visual BASIC.NET is used instead. Perhaps they are holdovers from an earlier edition.
Bottom line
Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Unleashed is a good introduction to Visual Studio 2005 and to Visual Studio Team System.
Publisher's description
Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 Unleashed is a deep dive into the Visual Studio 2005 tool. Specifically, it will provide you with solid guidance and education that will allow you to squeeze the ultimate productivity and use out of the Visual Studio 2005 development environment. This book folds in real-world development experience with detailed information about the IDE to make you more productive and ease transition from other development environments (including prior versions of Visual Studio). This book will also help you increase team collaboration and project visibility with Visual Studio Team Systems and it will give you straight, to-the-point answers to common developer questions about the IDE.
Chapters include:
- Code Viewers, Explorers, and Browsers
- Refactoring Code 8
- Writing ASP .NET Applications
- Defining Standards and Practices
- Introduction to Visual Studio Team System
- Work Item Tracking
- Unit and Load Testing
About the author(s)
Lars Powers is co-owner of Brilliant Storm, a consulting company that specializes in developing intelligent tools for the .NET world. Lars has more than 10 years of experience in the software development sector, in roles ranging from programmer, designer, and architect to consultant, mentor, and project manager. Nearly all of his development expertise centers on designing and implementing highly distributed applications using Microsoft Visual Basic and COM technologies at companies large and small. He is a Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer, and was one of the original "charter members" of this certification program, first certified as an MCSD in 1995.
Mike Snell is co-owner of Brilliant Storm with Lars Powers. Mike has spent the last six years defining scalable, enterprise-level architecture for client-server and Web-based projects. In addition, he has a strong background in software architecture using UML and project management. Mike has also achieved the distinction of Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer.
Table of Contents (abbreviated)
Introduction
Part I: An Introduction to Visual Studio 2005/NET
1 A Quick Tour of Visual Studio 2005
2 A Quick Tour of the IDE
3 NET Framework and Language Enhancements in 2005
Part II The Visual Studio 2005 Environment In-depth
4 Solutions and Projects
5 Browsers and Explorers
6 Introducing the Editors and Designers
7 Working with Visual Studio's Productivity Aids
8 Refactoring Code
9 Debugging with Visual Studio 2005
10 The Visual Studio Automation Object Model
11 Writing Macros, Add-ins, and Wizards
12 The NET Community: Consuming and Creating Shared Code
Part III: Visual Studio 2005 at Work
13 Creating ASPNET User Interfaces
14 Building Windows Forms
15 Working with Databases
16 Web Services and Visual Studio
Part IV: Visual Studio 2005 Team System
17 Team Collaboration and Visual Studio Team System
18 Managing and Working with Team Projects
19 Source Control
20 Work Item Tracking
21 Modeling
22 Testing
23 Team Foundation Build
