Wednesday, November 19, 2008
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What books should I buy for CSLA .NET?

As the Expert C# 2008 Business Objects book becomes available (now in alpha ebook form, and in paper by the end of this year), I'm getting more questions about what book to buy for different versions of CSLA .NET, and for different .NET technologies.

(Expert VB 2008 Business Objects should be out in February 2009. The one unknown with this effort is how quickly the team of volunteers can get the VB port of CSLA .NET 3.6 complete, as I don't think we can release the book until the code is also available for download.)

I do have a summary of book editions that is often helpful in understanding what book(s) cover which version of CSLA .NET. But I thought I'd slice and dice the information a little differently to help answer some of the current questions.

First, by version of CSLA .NET:

CSLA .NET Version Book(s)
3.6 Expert 2008 Business Objects
3.5 <no book>
3.0 Expert 2005 Business Objects &
CSLA .NET Version 2.1 Handbook &
Using CSLA .NET 3.0
2.1 Expert 2005 Business Objects &
CSLA .NET Version 2.1 Handbook
2.0 Expert 2005 Business Objects

 

Next, by .NET technology:

.NET Technology Book(s)
WPF Expert 2008 Business Objects
WCF Expert 2008 Business Objects
Silverlight <no book yet>
Expert 2008 Business Objects gets you 80% there though
WF Expert 2008 Business Objects &
Using CSLA .NET 3.0 (for WF example)
ASP.NET MVC <no book yet>
ASP.NET Web Forms Expert 2008 Business Objects
Windows Forms Expert 2008 Business Objects &
Using CSLA .NET 3.0 (for important data binding info)
LINQ to CSLA Expert 2008 Business Objects
LINQ to SQL Expert 2008 Business Objects
ADO.NET Entity Framework Expert 2008 Business Objects (limited coverage)
.NET Remoting Expert 2005 Business Objects
asmx Web Services Expert 2005 Business Objects

 

As always, here are the locations to download CSLA .NET for Windows and to download CSLA .NET for Silverlight.

Books | CSLA .NET
Wednesday, November 19, 2008 9:17:58 AM (Central Standard Time, UTC-06:00)  #    Disclaimer  |  Comments [5]  |  Related posts:
WP7 upgrade notes
CSLA 4 version 4.0.1 released
CSLA 4 WP7 progress update 2
CSLA .NET and MVVM video series
Getting CSLA 4 to compile for WP7
MSDN Bytes interview on WP7

Thursday, November 20, 2008 2:31:06 PM (Central Standard Time, UTC-06:00)
You have written that for Windows form apart from 2008 book, 3.0 book is also needed. I wanted to ask if there is a chapter of windows form in 2008 book or not. If we just have the 2008 book, is that not sufficient to cover windows form.
Vinod
Thursday, November 20, 2008 2:38:33 PM (Central Standard Time, UTC-06:00)
The 2008 book does not show how to create a Windows Forms UI. It does discuss the design of the Windows Forms controls in Csla.Windows, but doesn't really show how to use them.

If you already fully understand all the Windows Forms data binding issues discussed on the forum (http://forums.lhotka.net) and in the "Using CSLA .NET 3.0" ebook then you should be fine. But if you don't have a good understanding of those issues, then the 3.0 ebook's chapter on Windows Forms is probably still quite valuable to you.
Rockford Lhotka
Thursday, November 20, 2008 3:05:12 PM (Central Standard Time, UTC-06:00)
Thanks for replying. I have been using CSLA .net (ver 3) and have running applications using windows form, so basic stuff related with databinding is clear. But I'm not having 3.0 book..

can you pls advs if there is something new in CSLA 3.6 which is totally different from CSLA ver 3 and is not covered in 2008 book and to cover that 3.0 book is a must.

Vinod
Thursday, November 20, 2008 5:57:43 PM (Central Standard Time, UTC-06:00)
If your Windows Forms experience is satisfactory then you don't need the 3.0 ebook. If you are struggling with data binding in Windows Forms, and don't know about or understand the unbind/rebind techniques used in PTWin then you need the 3.0 ebook.

The differences are not in CSLA. The 3.0 ebook has a chapter covering everything I've learned (thanks to a lot of people on the forum) about Windows Forms data binding from 2005 to 2007. That has nothing really to do with CSLA, just Windows Forms.

What there _is_ in 3.6 are some new Windows Forms controls - most notably CslaActionExtender - that radically simplify the code necessary to implement your typical Save and Cancel buttons on a form. This is thanks to Miguel Castro, and the design/implementation of CslaActionExtender is covered in the 2008 book (not in the 3.0 ebook). And there's a sample in the Samples download to show how to use this new control.
Rockford Lhotka
Friday, November 21, 2008 9:12:49 AM (Central Standard Time, UTC-06:00)
Rocky,

Thanks for all of your hard work over the years. I am glad to see that members of the community have stepped up to convert the CSLA to VB. I am also glad to see that you will be releasing a VB version of your 2008 book. (I actually bought your C# alpha book but it can be time consuming to convert some of the code over to VB.) It seems as though all too often the VB community is a step behind the C# community in terms of resources and examples. Just look at WPF. I have used portions of the CSLA for years and I was greatly disappointed when you posted that you would no longer support VB. Examining your framework has served as a great learning tool for me.

Al
Al
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