Beginning E-Commerce with Visual Basic, ASP, SQL Server 7.0 and MTS

by Matthew Reynolds

The definitive beginning guide to e-commerce with popular Microsoft technologies, this book coincides with the growth of businesses retailing online and uses the latest versions of VB, ASP, ADO, and... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1861003986
• ISBN13: 9781861003980
• Release Date: January 2000
• Publisher: Wrox Press
• Length: 777 Pages
• Weight: 3.00 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.6" x 7.3" x 9.3"

Customer Reviews

It's like a big, fat tutorial. Want to see more from Wrox.

A few months ago I decided to build a small e-commerce solution and picked ASP/SQL Server and IIS5 for the core technologies. Finding Matthew Reynolds's book definitely reduced development time and helped to quickly define a line of progress. I spent lots of time with this book, and got to know it in detail from the first pages to the last. A few negative aspects were:1) The book is plagued by code bugs and typos. Most are already included in the errata, and of the undocumented bugs. I didn't find any that was critical but still wasted some time with the less-obvious coding errors. The Wrox support/forums were useless, spending time using your IQ power to solve the problems will be more effective.2) The interface/usability/visuals of the site are simply lousy. If you are thinking about using it for a real production site, you will have to do what I did... rewrite tons of HTML/ASP and spend some time in Photoshop/DreamWeaver or similar packages. And that is for the visuals alone.3) Lots of coding details aren't brilliant. Usability is also mostly ignored except for a few minor and very basic ideas (The logo on the top left should link to the home page, etc). Reynolds could have made the shopping experience better with just a few little details. Visually and from the customer's point of view, the site is terrible.4) There is some annoying redundancy. A few aspects are mentioned too often. Perhaps newbies will value that, but I felt the space would be better used with other things (More XML use, for instance)If you are thinking about using the project as an easy production site, beware. The site is fairly generic, but many aspects (like the order pipeline system) will require lots of work to be adapted. Most VB code will need to be rewritten (plus the visual aspect already mentioned). I also did not perform any extensive load testing, but suspect significant changes will be necessary to scale properly. Security, input validation and error-checking is also very basic or non-existent (the search engine appears vulnerable to SQL injection exploits, for instance). All this however, was expected, and is not really a limitation of the book, just be warned you will not get a 100% trouble free solution. As for difficulty, If you know nothing of ASP, SQL and VB, you will feel lost and should read other titles first. But if you're the kind of reader that likes to buy books always a bit more advanced, and learn on-the-fly, then don't worry. It is perfectly possible in this case.This might sound negative so far, but I honestly can't give it less than 4.5/5 just because of the problems mentioned. Books like this one aren't very common. Reynolds basically created a really fat tutorial and will practically hold your hand from start to finish. You will get a fairly clear (but simplified) view of the whole process of implementing a Microsoft e-commerce solution - planning, coding, hosting, customer care, etc. In my particular case, I organized a few basic areas t

Excellent...but "Beginning" may be misleading

This book help pull things together for me - ASP, VB, SQL7, etc. The author's application design is very robust and real world. He doesn't take shortcuts, such as maintaining state via session variables, which can ease development but hinder scalability. Unfortunately for the author, I suspect he will lose a lot of "Beginners" by Chapter 3. Implementing interfaces is not an intuitive concept for most would-be developers. Perhaps other approaches may have proven more consistent with the book's title.

Most Thorough Book on eCommerce, for Beginners...and Better

As an Internet consultant for almost 5 years, I'm often asked by Internet newcomers: "Okay, What do I need to take on/learn today; Networking? VB? ASP? SQL? Server-IIS? something else?". And since the answer is "Well, All of them of course.", people are still short a good way to start on each of those.Well Wrox brought a very good book for those Internet startups (with Microsoft technologies). You will most definitely find an answers to all of your first questions on the How-To of an eCommerce web site.Actually, the real title of this book would have been too long to fit since it does more than VB, ASP, SQL, and MTS. To my surprise, it also goes over Credit Card security with 3rd parties such as DataCash and CyberCash, it goes over simple Private/Public Key Pair, Order Pipeline, Hosting, Up-sell, Cross-sell, and even Marketing, + more.Also, I have to admit that the coding used is well-formed, neat & clean, and extensive. I'm sure that the example would bring new content to some seasoned eCommerce expert as well.Last but not least, if you are a complete newcomer in the programming area, you might want to consider having other book such as Beginning ASP 3.0, Beginning ASP Databases, Beginning VB6; at the same time than the Beginning eCommerce in case you are not sure of what the syntax means. Even though this book is pretty easy to follow, it also assume you have some programming knowledge (which can be overcome by those other books).Good Job.

Great book

This is the book for anyone looking for the correct way to develop using the evolving MS DNA model. Certainly you need to take percaution on the "homegrown" VB COM components. Meaning, either host your own site or find an ISP before you hope to deploy. There are ISP's out there who will work with you. The author lays it out step by step on the core components for a solid site. If you are a little confused along the way, just keep going. By the time you are done, you will see the complete project. Once your there, you will understand why this is the best way to develop web applicatons.

The Dog's Bollocks

You need to read a few other books (preferably Wrox one's) before you get stuck into this, but nevertheless this is a very easy to follow book, and contains some great HTML and ASP tricks to make your e-commerce application more maintainable and scalable. I suggest reading "Beginning Components for ASP" and "Beginning ASP" from Wrox before reading this. What's more it's written by a Brit so it can't be bad (not that I'm biased at all ! ).