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The book is not a 'VB programming for beginners' publication - you need to understand VB before using it. The sample code is full of errors that only an experienced VB user can detect and correct. The authour insists on using the Visdata utility to create SQL commands but does not make clear how to translate these into VB code; a VB beginner would be hopelessly confused and not understand the power and flexibility of this command. Readers also need to understand the concept of relational databases.
This book assumes that you know VB, and concentrates on teaching you how to develop database applications. In this area it does a marvelous job. I do agree with the authors mix of DAO/RDO and ADO. There is still a lot of DAO/RDO stuff out there which will need to be supported! It does an excellent job with its treament of ADO, DED, and data report designs. Not forgetting how to design and implement robust databases! Its database treament is even better than most database-only books I have reviewed!!
I know of pricier books that do not come anywhere close in terms of what this book offers(teaches). If you need more or exclusive ADO stuff look elsewhere.
I am both a professional VB/Database designer and also an instructor in VB and DB in a CIS dept and comparing this book to other books especially textbooks, you can't find anything more readable than this book!
I score this book a 4 because of code mistakes!
If you know VB, this is an excellent database design book for you! (Common! Let's be FAIR! The authors actually warn you up front about this fact!)
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The email addresses listed as publisher contacts for this book came back as 'unknown'. I began to wonder: Did they have so many complaint emails they canceled the email accounts?
I pushed on through the book to discover coding errors in the examples as well.
I give this book a 'thumbs down' and will avoid buying SAMS publishing books in the future.
(If I had known about Amazon's rating system at the time I purchased the book, I would have avoided this loss of good $)
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