Pro Ajax and the .NET 2.0 Platform (Pro)

Pro Ajax and the .NET 2.0 Platform gets high marks from me because it is concise, informative and easy to follow. After reading the first three chapters I had a clear understanding of what Ajax really is.

? Cameron Scholtz, ASU Blog

There are a few class libraries recently distributed that open the Ajax door to the .NET Framework 2.0. This book examines how the Ajax technology and the .NET Framework can work in tandem. It thoroughly covers the XMLHTTPRequest processes and the .NET 2.0 class libraries, and shows you how to turn theory into practice and concepts into code, with samples that duplicate many new web technologies. With the knowledge you gain from this book, youll be ready to put this asynchronous technology to work.

Thanks to the folks at Google, Ajax technology has become a force to be reckoned with. It is a technology that is here and now, just waiting for you to implement it with full impact. Google Maps, Google Suggest, and Flickr.com are just a few of the sites out there that have moved Ajax into the mainstream. More shall be revealed as the technology eases its way into coding. The book will also prepare you for upcoming work changes with the release of `Atlas.`

User review
Very good book - some weaknesses -not for beginners - not about MS AJAX framework
I am a very experienced C# developer with intermediate AJAX skills

The good:
This book is easy to read actually it's enjoyable. It has a lot of useful information about design patterns, various AJAX libraries and cool things you can do with them. There are a lot of good tips. The examples are excellent and done in light weight code which means you dont have to chew through a lot of logic and interlocking classes to get the point. I hated that about Jessie Liberty's books, good as they are.

The bad:
The easy to read text is written in breathless blog style. Why use one word where three will do the job? Appropriate for a blog, but I find it annoying in a text book. I find some of his code rather strange. He uses a class full of constants to hold various strings, when the modern style is to do this declaratively in the config file. He builds paths using string operations when the .NET Path class provides a suite of methods to do this that are easier, more compact and more dependable than any homegrown code. Finally, there is almost no treatment of the Microsoft AJAX framework. This is not really a flaw but I bought this book assuming that the framework would be the main topic.

This book is not for beginners. One needs to know the basics of ASP.NET and AJAX before reading it. Flaws not withstanding, this is a very good book and every ASP.NET AJAX developer needs a copy.

User review
Very Nice Book for Overall AJAX Introduction
I hardly ever review books and probably wouldn't have bothered this time if it were not for an email from Amazon seeking one. I decided to go ahead with a review because this book really filled a need I had for working with AJAX for the first time. It had me up and running in very short order. Did it go over a couple things along the way that I already knew? Yes. But I didn't mind it in that it treated all topics in an intelligent manner and helped explain where AJAX fit into the broader world of web development. Definitely geared for .NET. That's what I wanted. If that's what you're looking for, you won't be disappointed.

User review
Right book for me at the right time.
I had done some little test applications utilizing Ajax and/or Atlas prior to reading this book, and I wanted this book to really give a solid base from which to move forward with.

Mr. Woolston's writing style is personable but not too over the top. One thing I did not like about the writing style is the manner in which code is laid out at times. For instance, with many of the sample applications, Mr. Woolston will dump about 5-6 pages of code into the book and then work towards restating it in part afterwards with some explanation. I can see where it would be useful if not in front of the sample code/a PC, but in reality this book will not be useful if not in front of a computer working on the examples.

There are other times where some of the content is not really useful in furthering education about Ajax and certain examples it feels are stretched to make the chapters longer. I think there was likely a challenge in filling out a reasonable sized book because simply put - the fundamental elements of Ajax aren't that complex. I found myself done with the book in a period of less than a week.

Those things said, after reading the book I can certainly say the overall content has an excellent `perspective of the landscape`. From a history of Ajax to a little primer on Javascript, CSS/DOM, and the XmlHttpRequest, he moves forward to examples of Ajax demonstrating the technology with an Ajax framework named Anthem. The main meat of the book are really these examples, where practice implements the ideas from the prior chapters.

Lastly, the book closes with a few chapters covering security, testing, usability, performance, and a token chapter on Atlas.

One other element that I appreciated in this book was the identification of a few free tools out there to aid in Ajax development. Those tools in their own right would have definitely contributed to some time savings a week or two ago when I was struggling with a couple DOM/CSS issues prior to reading this book!

In summary, perhaps a book stretched to fit it's cover but nevertheless a very useful read to me and I would certainly recommend it.


User review
Best of Apress
i didnot think that i would like this book because for me apress is famous with their books having lacking style of examples. Normally you find yourself lost in the examples eventough the topic is covered very well.
This book is different than others absolutely; it starts with what is ajax; and why ajax and with simple examples.
if you dont know javascript; it is still ok because one of the chapters covers javascript; so you can learn enough javascript to handle the simple ajax pages.
Before diving into ajax; it tells you about different ajax libraries; so i like this part too; you will have an idea about other ajax libraries too.
I could not run the first example which is the easiest one and i struggle a lot to solve it;but most of the codes in the book is easy to implement.
And guess what; as you can see from the title; the book is for .NET developers; so if you are a .NET developer; this is right book to buy.
It is not like other apress books that have coding examples problem. the sequence for the chapter makes the book easy to follow.
After reading this book; i start reading some tutorials about Atlas ( which is basically Microsoft's Ajax ) and it really helps you to understand atlas too;
If you like google maps; or virtual maps; this books has a suprise for you :)
i read 4-5 different books from apress and this one is the best; i will highly recommend this book to all .net developers who want to learn ajax with .net

User review
Great book
About 3/4 done with this book. Today I just built my 1st Ajax feature in a few hours at work with the suff I learned. This books is a quick read with great examples works in both 1.1 and 2.0. Buy it!