Programming with
Visual Basic.NET
I have just finished a class on Visual Basic.NET and problem solving concepts. This book was standard issue for the class and I used it throughout the course. What I have found is that this book is rather difficult to understand most of the concepts of
Programming if you had no previous knowledge of programming. The beginning programmer should stay clear of this book and purchase some other Visual Basic.NET book that specifically states it is for beginners or dummies. This book is designed for the intermediate user looking to advance on the basics of programming. In order to understand the text you need to know some of the basics of programming. People should know how a computer works as far as storing and organizing files, how applications start and what programs they will interact with. A brief knowledge on how to write XHTML (The new HTML) code for websites would be beneficial.
When the authors are writing about various routine procedures they are a bit clear to a degree at describing what is actually going on here. For example when the authors are describing decisions what programmers call If/ Then statements they make it difficult to understand conditions of the statement. Conditions as "Or", "And", "Not", "AndAlso", "OrElse" and "Xor" are given a meaning, example and explanation. The meaning tells you clearly what will the condition of the statement is doing. An Example tries to illistrate the meaning with an explanation as to what this condition is calculating. However the extent of how one can use each condition is not mentioned. One would have to take the concept and then play around with the diffent options to make things work.
I myself, not having much knowledge on Visual Basic but knowing how to write in XHTML, XML, CSS and Java web languages found the book useful to a point. With specific projects given to me in class and lectures, I was able to navigate through the book and take bits and pieces of techniques to build off of. Then it was just a matter of taking a concept and playing around with it until I found the condition that worked, eliminating all bugs in the program.
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