Beginning ASP .NET 2.0 E-Commerce in C# 2005: From Novice to Professional

Product Details :

Author : Cristian Darie, Karli Watson
Paperback: 704 pages
Publisher: Apress (October 17, 2005)
Language: English
ISBN: 1590594681
Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.4 x 1.4 inches




Book Description

You will learn how to build a complete e-commerce web site, following the entire design and build process. The website will be constructed following industry best practices in a modular mannerandemdash;with a new module introduced and completed in each chapter.

About the Author
Cristian Darie is a software enginner with experience in a wide range of modern technologies, and is the author of numerous technical books, including the popular "Beginning E-Commerce" series. Having worked with computers since he was old enough to press the keyboard, he initially tasted programming success with a first prize in his first programming contest at the age of 12. From there, Cristian moved on to many other similar achievements, and now he is studying distributed application architectures for his Ph.D. He always loves hearing feedback about his books, so don't hesitate to drop a "hello" message when you have a spare moment.Cristian can be contacted through his personal website at www.CristianDarie.ro. Karli Watson is the technical director of 3form, as well as a freelance IT specialist, author, developer, and consultant. For the most part, he indulges in .NET and related technologies and has written numerous books about them. He has extensive knowledge of programming database-driven websites and has authored on the titles Beginning ASP .NET 2.0 E-Commerce, Beginning ASP.NET 1.1 E-Commerce, The Programmer's Guide to SQL, Professional C#, Second Edition, and Professional ASP.NET 1.0.

Spotlight Reviews :

Reviewer: Cameron (milo) (Phoenix, AZ United States)
If you're reading this then you're probably new to ASP.NET 2.0 or you want to build an online store using ASP.NET. This is money well spent. This book is an excellent step-by-step tutorial for building an online store. AND it's just packed with ASP.NET, C# and SQL Server programming tips. I bookmarked these tips as I was building my web site and now I find myself turning back to it to implement these goodies.

The authors have outdone themselves. I really really like this book. I own the 2002 Wrox version as well so I can tell you that "ASP.NET 2.0 E-Commerce in C# 2005" has been completely updated! It is a fantastic tutorial for anyone new to ASP.NET and the best reference for more experienced programmers who may be new to e-commerce. The authors will walk you through (in detail) the creation of a fully functional online store.

One nice feature is that the authors don't assume anything. They explain each step as the book progresses. Are you in a hurry? No problem. The first few chapters are enough to get a basic store up and running. Subsequent chapters continue to build onto this existing solution. So you can get started fast and then add on features as you learn or have time.

I also find this book to be a valuable reference to more experienced programmers because it is chock full of developer tips. There is a great example of building a key word search, and search ranking system with SQL Server. The authors touch on error handling and how to show custom error messages in a way that anyone will find helpful. Other handy tips include:
* Real-word examples of how to use SQL OUTPUT parameters.
* How to send automatic email alerts when the application encounters an error.
* How to use C# static classes to cache information and improve performance.
* How to build an order pipeline!

The information on using PayPal's payment gateway, PayPal API and credit card processing is worth the cover price alone. There are five chapters on how to wire up your own order processing system. There's even a whole chapter devoted to integrating your ASP.NET web site with Amazon's web services.

I highly recommend this book for anyone new to ASP.NET or new to e-commerce. It's hands down the most thorough ASP.NET e-commerce book I've ever read. And I can also recommend it to more experienced programmers who are looking for a good e-commerce reference. Don't let the title fool. It's a great tool for anyone who wants to make money using ASP.NET. I cannot say enough good things about it so I'll close with the table of contents...

TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Starting an E-Commerce Site
2. Laying Out the Foundation
3. Creating the Product Catalog: Part I
4. Creating the Product Catalog: Part II
5. Searching the Catalog
6. Improving Performance
7. Receiving Payments Using PayPal
8. Catalog Administration
9 . Creating a Custom Shopping Card
10. Dealing with Custom Orders
11. Making Product Recommendations
12. Adding Customer Accounts
13. Advanced Customer Orders
14. Order Pipeline
15. Implementing the Pipeline
16. Credit Card Transactions
17. Integrating with Amazon
A: Installing the Software
B: Project Management Considerations

Reviewer: John Nelson (Alameda, CA USA)
There's not much more I could add to these reviews, because they are the exact same thing that I have been telling every one concerning this book. The thing I can add about this book, and all of the other ones Cristian has written is this: When ever you look through his errata sections for any corrections to the books, you'll mostly just find corrections to the paragraphs with descriptions, and not the code. It's as solid as it gets, solid as it gets. Most books that I own have at least two very garish errors, or typos in the code examples it's self.

In all his books you'll find the best practices you could ever find, so it's almost recomended to pick up this book (or the PHP version of the same book) when initially learning ASP.net 2.0, because you'll learn a lot more in a lot less time than reading tomes on the details and theory that a lot of the other books offer.

The man is better than a master of his craft, and his books are some of the best books you'll ever read world wide. He makes even the hardest technical chalanges fun and friendly, and in the end, you'll feel encoraged to want more.

Reviewer: Zarif Alimov "Unix Fan" (USA)
The book is truly for a novice, but only newbies to C# and not, say, Java, will survive chapter 3 of the book. I am a Java programmer and to me all that was the same idea with different syntax. In order not to get lost in varioius detailes of different C# object, the reader must be well familliar with OOP principles. Experience with other OO programming languages will undoubtedly help.
Other than that, which is typical of any programming book, the book is very informative and well organized. The author does a good job explaining various possibilities for working with databases in C#. I really like it. Recommended.