15 Books You Must Have If You Are Doing ASP.NET Web Development
Some time back, in one of my articles Are You A Good Developer, I had pointed out that good books give you a quick and handy insight into a technology. You should choose books that are usually written by professionals who recommend best practices and different methods of solving a business problem using a technology.
Now choosing the right web development books out of the thousands available from different authors and different publishers, is a daunting task. I often receive requests for ‘good book’ suggestions. Questions like –
“Which is the best ASP.NET book you would recommend?”
“Which books should I read to become a good Web Developer?”
“Any books to learn how to architect ASP.NET applications?”
are asked very frequently. I finally decided to make my recommendations public and hope that these recommendations will help you out if you have been looking out for a similar list.
Disclaimer - I possess most of the books listed here and have been referencing them time and again. However this list is by no means comprehensive. There are many more great books written by some great authors that have not been mentioned in this list. One of the primary reasons of not mentioning them in this list is that I am focusing on the latest version of ASP.NET and related technologies and hence only the recently published ones have been included here. Abstracts for most of the books have been taken directly from Amazon.
Books on ASP.NET 3.5/ ASP.NET AJAX/ ASP.NET MVC/ Architecture - ASP.NET is a free technology that allows you to create rich interactive modern web sites. Here are six books I recommend to learn and master ASP.NET.
Beginning ASP.NET 3.5: In C# and VB - This book is for anyone who wants to learn how to build rich and interactive web sites that run on the Microsoft platform. With the knowledge you gain from this book, you create a great foundation to build any type of web site, ranging from simple hobby-related web sites to sites you may be creating for commercial purposes.
ASP.NET 3.5 Unleashed - ASP.NET 3.5 Unleashed is the most comprehensive book available on the Microsoft ASP.NET 3.5 Framework, covering all aspects of the ASP.NET 3.5 Framework--no matter how advanced. I 'strongly' recommend this book!
Professional ASP.NET 3.5 AJAX - This book is aimed at experienced ASP.NET developers looking to add AJAX to their applications, and experienced Web developers who want to move to using ASP.NET and AJAX together.
Microsoft ASP.NET and AJAX: Architecting Web Applications - In this book, Dino Esposito challenges readers to think beyond the easy way to AJAX, which involves adding AJAX capabilities to a non-AJAX system designed in the old model of Web development. Instead, he proposes an alternate, if more difficult, paradigm involving new patterns and new complexities and culminating in a new, pure-AJAX architecture. You ll learn why far better solutions result from the second, more radical approach and you ll get practical guidance on how to implement this new architecture for Rich Internet Applications (RIAs)
Microsoft .NET: Architecting Applications for the Enterprise - Make the right architectural decisions up front and improve the quality and reliability of your results. Led by two enterprise programming experts, you ll learn how to apply the patterns and techniques that help control project complexity and make systems easier to build, support, and upgrade right from the start. Get pragmatic architectural guidance on how to: Build testability, maintainability, and security into your system early in the design Expose business logic through a service-oriented interface Choose the best pattern for organizing business logic and behavior Review and apply the patterns for separating the UI and presentation logic Delve deep into the patterns and practices for the data access layer Tackle the impedance mismatch between objects and data Minimize development effort and avoid over-engineering and deliver more robust results Get code samples on the Web.
Professional ASP.NET MVC 1.0 - This book begins with a complete ASP.NET MVC reference application. The bulk of the rest of the book begins with the basic concepts around the model view controller pattern, including the little history and the state of the MVC on the web today. You will then go into the ways that MVC is different from ASP.NET Web Forms and explore the structure of a standard MVC application and see what you get out of the box. Next you dig deep into routing and see the role URLs play in your application. You will deep dive into controllers and views and see what role the Ajax plays in your applications. The last third of the book focuses entirely on advanced techniques and extending the framework.
Books on C# 3.0/VB.NET 9.0 (covers LINQ) – ASP.NET is a technology and not a language. To use the technology effectively, you should have a command over the language (like C# or VB.NET) that goes into building up the logic for these web pages. Here are two books I suggest for C#/VB.NET.
C# in Depth: What you need to master C# 2 and 3 - C# in Depth is a completely new book designed to propel existing C# developers to a higher level of programming skill. One simple principle drives this book: explore a few things deeply rather than offer a shallow view of the whole C# landscape. If you often find yourself wanting just a little more at the end of a typical chapter, this is the book for you. I 'strongly' recommend this book!
Pro VB 2008 and the .NET 3.5 Platform - Whether you’re moving to .NET for the first time, or you’re already writing applications on .NET 2.0 or .NET 3.0, Pro VB 2008 and the .NET 3.5 Platform will provide you with a solid grounding in this new technology and serve as a comprehensive reference throughout your coding career.
Books on Silverlight - Silverlight is a lightweight cross-browser, cross-platform plug-in designed to create rich internet applications which is freely available for download. It enables developers to create Rich Internet Applications (RIA) and can easily be integrated with ASP.NET. Here are two books I recommend for Silverlight.
Pro Silverlight 2 in C# 2008 - Pro Silverlight 2 in C# 2008 is the perfect reference: you’ll learn about the features that put Silverlight in direct competition with Adobe Flash, such as rich support for 2D drawing, animations, and media playback, and best of all, you’ll experience the plumbing of .NET and the design model of WPF through Silverlight—all of the same .NET technology that developers use to design next–generation Windows applications.
Data-Driven Services with Silverlight 2 - This comprehensive book teaches you how to build data-rich business applications with Silverlight 2 that draw on multiple sources of data. Packed with reusable examples, Data-Driven Services with Silverlight 2 covers all of the data access and web service tools you need, including data binding, the LINQ data querying component, RESTful and SOAP web service calls, and Microsoft's new ADO.NET Data Services and the ADO.NET Framework.
Books on JavaScript/jQuery - JavaScript allows you interact with the DOM object and can greatly enhance the responsiveness of your ASP.NET web pages. jQuery is a fast, lightweight JavaScript library that is CSS3 compliant and supports many browsers. The jQuery framework is extensible and very nicely handles DOM manipulations, CSS, AJAX, Events and Animations. Here are two books I recommend on JavaScript/jQuery. You can even read my jQuery articles over here to see how jQuery can be integrated with ASP.NET pages.
Learning jQuery 1.3 - this book teaches you the basics of jQuery for adding interactions and animations to your pages. Even if previous attempts at writing JavaScript have left you baffled, this book will guide you past the pitfalls associated with AJAX, events, effects, and advanced JavaScript language features. Experienced programmers will also be aided by its conceptual consistency.
Professional JavaScript for Web Developers - In this book, you'll explore basic concepts of JavaScript including its version of object-oriented programming, inheritance, and its use in HTML and XHTML. A detailed discussion of the components that make up a JavaScript implementation follows, with specific focus on standards such as ECMAScript and DOM. All three levels of DOM are explained, including advanced topics such as event simulation, XML parsing, and XPath queries. You'll also learn how to utilize regular expressions and build dynamic user interfaces. This valuable insight will help you apply JavaScript solutions to the business problems faced by Web developers everywhere.
Books on CSS - Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is very important for web design as it is allows for consistent separation between the styling of a page such as layout, fonts, color from the content of the page. Here is one book I recommend to getting started with CSS.
Build Your Own Web Site The Right Way Using HTML & CSS - Build Your Own Website The Right Way Using HTML & CSS, 2nd Edition teaches web development from scratch, without assuming any previous knowledge of HTML, CSS or web development techniques. This book introduces you to HTML and CSS as you follow along with the author, step-by-step, to build a fully functional web site from the ground up.
Other Related Books –
Programming WCF Services - Programming WCF Services is the authoritative, bestselling introduction to Microsoft's unified platform for developing service-oriented applications (SOA) on Windows. Hailed as the most definitive treatment of WCF available, this relentlessly practical book provides insight, not documentation, to help you learn the topics and skills you need for building WCF-based applications that are maintainable, extensible, and reusable.
Programming Entity Framework - Programming Entity Framework is a thorough introduction to Microsoft's new core framework for modeling and interacting with data in .NET applications. This book not only gives experienced developers a hands-on tour of the Entity Framework and explains its use in a variety of applications, it also provides a deep understanding of its architecture and APIs.
Conclusion
Remember that reading books only gives you an insight into technology and recommends you the right way to use a technology. However to be able to judge the insights and form your own opinion, you 'should' practice code. Practice as much as you can!
