XML Books

This book is very concise and it tells a lot about the subject including other topics such as XSLT, RSS, and many other web technologies related to XML. Would highly suggest buying.

I'm currently reading this book and enjoying it very much. You probably would understand it more if you are already a programmer. But I think it's good for non-programmers as well.
Covers a lot of the new technologies that are using XML, which is very useful.

Other than the fact that you can tell that the book was written by 5 different guys because of the the difference in writing styles between chapters, overall it is packed full of information and a handy reference.

I am taking an XML class at the University using this book as the required course text. The authors do a good job at highlighting the key technologies, and the examples and tutorials significantly enhance the material. I enjoy the straight-forward manner with which Hunter and his friends explains what the example code in the book does. My only disappointment is that the book does not explain in enough detail how to use XML technologies on non-Microsoft systems. I believe a greater emphasis on Java and non-VB/ASP/.NET can extend the benefits this book otherwise offers.

(I don't have time for a full review right now,so I will write a few comments and try to add to them.)

I knew very little about XML, so this sounded promising. As of Chapter 8, my general comments are:

1. The teaching structure is often murky. At many spots, the authors don't seem to grasp what a beginner needs to know first in order to go to the next step. This makes the material unnecessarily difficult and confusing.

2. Instead of one example page, for some reason the authors will sometimes create one XML page to illustrate a point, then create another completely different page to illustrate the next point, then go back to the first one for the next point, etc. It's inexplicable. The book would be much easier to follow, and probably easier to write, if they built one XML page from scratch and used/modified it throughout the book.

3. There are too many editorial screw-ups, such as "Figures" that are labeled incorrectly or don't exist -- that is, the text will say "see Figure 7 for the output" and Figure 7 will be the wrong one. I really have no patience with expensive books that don't bother to pay for one thorough copy-editing.

I am currently on Chapter 8 (XSLT), one of the worst-written ones. After a completely unnecessary discussion about "procedural" versus "declarative" programming (I imagine every reader is at least basically familiar with css, and if not, it is hardly difficult to understand "declarative" programming), the book just starts throwing XLST terms at you, with no foundation as to what they are doing or why. I finally gave up and pulled up the online W3C tutorial. This tutorial is free, covers most of the material, and is well-organized and easy to understand. Teaching in logical order isn't that hard.

There is a ton of good information in "Beginning XML", and the information on how to find, install, and use software such as Saxon and Schematron is invaluable. It is a shame that the authors didn't take the time to actually give the book to a few XML novices and then rewrite it as the introductory text it is supposed to be. The poorly organized writing at least doubles, and often triples, the time, energy, and painful confusion needed to learn the material.

Hi, All

I bought the Professinal XML 2nd editon and quite like it so far. However I could not download any source code form www.wrox.com anymore, would anyone help to tell me where I can find a complete copy of the source code? Could some one help to email me one? My email address is wangqunx@yahoo.com. I really appreciate your help.

Written in 2001 it's really starting to get dated with advances in many of the XML and related specs (not to mention new specs). But overall it's a good solid tome if you had to just have one but I'd prefer to have something more recent. That said it helped me pass my IBM developer certification for "XML and related technologies" in 2003.

This book would have been more useful if all pages were blank, then at least I could use it to keep notes. I would not buy any other books by any of the authors of this book it is so poorly written. A total waste of time and money. Topics are presented in a very unorganized manner, there is no effort to develop understanding but rather ideas are presented before being explained. There is too much verbose and poorly worded explanatory material to make this even a good reference book. Avoid this book unless you're looking for something to start a fire.

I am astounded at the vicious, even obscene references to this book! One reviewer was using the book (according to him, "defacing the book") in a class, so this may account for the resentment towards the work and its authors. (It is interesting to see that when I reported the obscene reviews to Amazon, they removed them almost immediately. Impressive!)

In any case, the book is covering a subject that is huge and complex. Furthermore, the specifications for the XML technologies are not static. So it is quite a task to try to cover all of this material in one book. The authors have done a good job of it -- better than most, to be sure. I would say that it would be best to wait to get the third edition that is coming out since this one is a bit dated, but if a reference is required now it is still a very good one to have.

There are many confusing things that are inherent in XML. One simple example is the difference between "Document Type Declarations" and "Document Type Definitions" (DTD's). The authors go out of their way to point out that this confusing issue exists and to help you avoid mixing up the two concepts. We have to face the fact that the XML Specs are tedious, confusing and difficult to learn at times, and should not take our frustration with the subject out on this book! Childish comments like, "This book is boring", etc., are not helpful. LEARNING XML IS BORING! Grow up and get over it! ("Here we are now, entertain us..." Smells Like Teen Spirit, Nirvana 1991)

IBM listed this book as the reference for their XML Certification (141) exam for a reason. I'm using it and finding it to be a very complete, helpful learning tool.

(One flaw I do notice in the book is that it has a definite MicroSoft slant. This leads to occasional errors like this one:
or using type="text/xsl". The type should equal "application/xml". The MicroSoft MIME types are not and WILL NOT be registered with the IANA.)

This is a very boring book. Chapters look like well organized, but content inside is mass and hard to follow. Don't buy this book.

This book provides answers to questions on threading that have confused me for a long time:
1. Why use a thread pool and why not?
2. How expensive are synchronization, thread creation and concurrent collections?

It clears up a lot of myths and rumors I have heard.

Before I bought this book, I had to prototype threading examples in my own workspace, setting up race conditions and such, but it was a lot of work and left a lot unexplained.

Scott Oaks, the author, did a good job of describing the synchronization process and the various Object methods relating to threading protocol. There were plenty of good examples, and clarification on several minor technical points including: how the wait/notify methods release monitors, the determinability of prioritization, and the practical uses of threadgroups. If you have nagging questions, you may find them answered here.

O'Reilly books are small-sized, which makes for easy carrying and storage. Little if any of their content is redundant or inaccurate. Given how dry the material is, O'Reilly astounds me by consistently finding authors who can write well, have something to say, and whose works can be read in a sitting.

Of course, it's important to mention that some things have changed since the first edition of this book. Methods like resume(), suspend(), and stop() have been deprecated due to their unpredictablity; the JVM will now enable programmers to address multiple processes; and there are a variety of classes which facilitate thread administration. A newer edition will bring you up to speed on those details, but this first edition is still a valid reference in all other respects.

Obviously your first read on Java should be "Concurrent Programming in Java(TM): Design Principles and Pattern" by Doug Lea. If this does not completely satisfy you this might be a possible second read on the subject. This book has a somewhat different perspective that it is closer to the classes and more distant to the principles. Here it delivers a good groundwork.

Review Date: Dec 2004.

Please Rate the overall value of the book from 1-5 where
5=Well done! This book will be a valuable teaching and reference tool.

Please rate the instructional value of the book from 1-5 where
5=Excellent! An essential book on this topic.


Please rate the reference value of this book from 1-5 where
4=This book has earned a valued place on my reference shelf.


This is a book for Java programmers of all proficiency levels; the book also provides information for

advanced users of Java. the book uses J2se 5.0 version of the compiler - and explains the

improvements in the threads implementation in this version of java.

the book is a well written book with a gradual introduction to the various aspects of thread

implementation and a detail study of the subject. the authors delves into various of aspects of

thread implementation such as creation, management, data synchronization, notification, scheduling,

pooling, performance, parallelizing loops, and other IO functions.

there are sample codes through out the book and the codes make no assumption about the skill level of

the reader. this is a good thing. there are enough diagrams to explain the threading concepts.

overall, this is an excellent book for readers interested in concurrent programming. i will use it as

a reference when i need and i have no hesistation in recommending this book to other java programmers.

<< Review of the 3rd Edition >>

This book is written for developers who are targeting the second wave of java programs - Intermediate to advanced level programmers will be able to get best value out of this book. Developers who are already familiar with the basics of java may also be able to get some value, but if you are completely new to java, please look elsewhere.

Without any futher ado, i will dive right into the deep end of the pool. This book is partitioned into 4 logical sections, though it is not explicit in the TOC.

1. Important Threading Concepts:
In this section, the author prepares us with the fundamentals of creating and managing a thread, basic synchronization concepts, synchronized keyword, lock mechanism, thread communication using wait-notify and condition-variables, minimal synchronization using volatile keyword and atomic variables, advanced synchronization classes like Barrier, Semaphore, CountdownLatch, etc. Chapters 1 through 6 underwrite this section and this is by-far the best part of the book.

2. Thread Pools/Schedulers:
This section first lectures around how thread scheduling materializes in java and how it is related to the underlying Operating System. Next, you are guided through a tour of Thread Pools and Task Schedulers that will enlighten us with quite a few new classes in java 5. Chapters 9 through 11 cover this section.

3. Threading and other Java APIs:
This section details how the threading API plays with other inbuilt java APIs like Collections, IO and Swing. Chapters 7,8 and 12 cover this section.

4. Misc topics:
Some miscellaneous thread topics like ThreadGroup, Security, Class Loading, Exception Handling and Performance are addressed in this section. Chapters 13, 14, and 15 cover this section.

Though this book wasn't an easy read, i found it extremely encouraging to have ONE comprehensive manual to understand both the threading concepts and the new java 5 inclusions. I recommend this book to anyone who is in the middle of a complex multi-threaded system or wishes to create one.

full of nonsense in whole book.
For example, xml schemas chapter is from page 108 to 164 about 60 pages, but realy useful w3c xml schema only take less 8 pages, others, useless, forget them.
Hi my dear author,
you have a lot of work to do, from simple to complex, how can you just give a long example and finish. Do you know "learning" means ***FOCUSING ON CORE***

This book taught me a lot about XML and how it is used in the digital publishing world. XML is not limited to web sites and is a great resource for businesses institutions and other publishing needs where a common format is needed for each and every document.

I recommend this book for anyone wanting to learn more about XML and how it is used.

I am amplifying a prior review (Daniel McKinnon's) in order to balance a misperception as to the intent and execution of the book.

This is not XSLT or XPath or "DOM processing in Firefox" or "node traversals with Java", it's an introduction to XML. If you need a solid foundation upon which to base further study, I wholly recommend the book. Unlike other reviewers, I am not in search of the One Canonical Tome on a subject, because I know it doesn't exist in any genre. My needs for learning XML were basic and required a grasp of fundamentals, which you will achieve with this work.

It also has numerous points of interest that a reader can use to further a study of specific issues, such as processing XML using a scripting language, or weighing a schema for implementation, and so forth. As a result, the reader is well-armed to continue learning on the specifics that are of personal interest.

Ir requires a third edition to correct errors and update content, but that doesn't diminish the value of the book for anyone who wants to comprehend what XML is and is not, and what the major issues and challenges are.

-Fred

Most O'reilly books are praised for describing computer programming concepts in a very readable way for an educated audience. Although, Erik Ray's book is engaging enough, he has left out so much detail in the language definitions and real examples that, after reading this book, it is not possible for even an experienced programmer to actually use the material. For example, the book explains the definition of schemas (without enough detail) but how do I use a schema in a project? The intended audience for this book appears to be people who already use xml that want a refresher at an elementary level. Very disappointing.

1. YOU WILL NOT TOUCH A KEYBOARD USING THIS BOOK, IT DOESN'T NOT WALK THROUGH EXAMPLES- for those books, try "XML step by step" by Young (Microsoft), and for more advanced, "XML in Action - Web Technology" by Pardi.

2. THIS BOOK IS GREAT: because it teaches in a fundamentally different way. Most of what we see of XML is tags, attributes, the structure of the data in the elements, etc. But this book focus on the DOM. This crucial focus helps understand XML with its uses, XPointer, and transformation.

3. If you want to do a lot with XML, beyond RSS feeds, buy this book along with a walkthrough, like the books listed above.

The problem with Learning Web Services is just one - there is too much happening..the technology has grappled everyone's attention and a lot of Organizations are on it..
A beginner to web services just doesn't know where to look..strong foundations give 'empire estates', this book does just that
The primer on XML was one of the best i ever read anywhere and i am a big fan of Dr.Google, the clarity of the authors on WSDL Element model is very informative. All in all - if you need a book to trace Web Service concepts and build your foundations - i would strongly refer this book.

If you are looking for a quick reference/book to get started in implementation you should look elsewhere..Sam's 'Teach Yourself Web Services in 24 Hours' is a good choice..but then i believe that this book is definitely worth a reference because it goes a distance conceptually.
Kudos to the authors

This book has helped me immensely in implementing some really intense production quality data interchange across systems using web services.

This book will quickly help you understand the entire XML stack of technologies that you will need for Web Services.

The authors have uniquely enabled the readers to develop an understanding of the underlying technologies that make up the web services. Certainly expect to put in some effort in understanding the content.

Without a doubt one of the worst computer books I have ever bought. The intent of buying a book about programming is to actually learn programming. I have fought the XML section until I have a screaming headache with very little accomplished. So far I have found it impossible to get the so-called examples to run. The source code is not available from the publisher in spite of what others may tell you. Yes, there is a file to be downloaded. However, it has almost none of the source code in it. For example, it only contains the source code for one .jsp file for the entire 2nd chapter. The writing style is practically incomprehensible, jumping around all over the place without ever finishing anything. There are nine authors listed on the cover. Perhaps that is why this book is such a clusterf#@k. How did this thing get to a 2nd printing? STAY AWAY FROM THIS BOOK. I cannot stress that enough.

I am still wondering why the authors don't provide all the code, since the book describes an application and that should have been tested and the code is there. Just a few wsdl files don't help very much.

The writers either do not understand the topics, or they want to confuse the readers intentionally. You will find their writing style extremly annoying. They use the Skatestown(??) example to mislead the readers whenever they need to explain something. I dont know how such a bad written book can make it out to the book stores. If you buy this book, it will be the biggest waste of money.

This book is very easy to read. The author takes a very simple building block approach. A chapter will talk about a group of CSS commands/options and at the end of the chapter, the author shows how these items can be used in a praticle web site.

The book is simple enough for beginners to understand and yet it provides enough details that advanced CSS users could still learn something from this book.

To say that I love this book is an understatement. This was the first book that I'd read on CSS that clicked from the first page all the way through until the last. I have many other CSS books on my shelf, but this one is the one that gets reached for the most.

I was recommended this book by co-workers and I haven't been sorry. Yes, the book is for beginners, but it's answered some questions and has helped out with browser compatibility - a skill I was lacking. The book does jump around a bit, but I feel that it covers each topic completely over time. It's not a dry read like many technology books. What is most helpful is reading the author's recommendations for best practices.

For the beginner, this is a good book to get a leg up on CSS.

There are many books on CSS out there, and I've investigated quite a few of them in order to gain some proficiency in it.

However there were always pieces of the puzzle that never came together for me. CSS books seemed to lean towards either the technical or design aspects of CSS, without sufficiently showing their connection. For instance, technical books would discuss in varying detail the types of selectors without examining their practical significance, or what all the properties were without exploring their aesthetic ramifications; or, on the other hand, design oriented CSS books would discuss the wondrous ways to use CSS to create beautiful websites, but without exploring on a satisfactory technical level some of the reasons for their decisions.

Mr. Shafer strikes the perfect balance, demonstrating with succinct examples the relationship between technical considerations and design aesthetics. He takes you by the hand from the beginning and leads you step by step so that the reader will develop solid, standardized habits based on theoretical considerations to produce clear, uniform, and aesthetically compelling stylesheets. He teaches you why you're doing things so that you come away with a greater understanding.

This was a book written by an expert with a complete mastery of his topic on both a technical and design level who knows how to teach. Plus it has the added advantage of being written simply and clearly, with relevant examples demonstrating everything discussed. And it's refreshingly no-nonsense, without the painful condescension or groan-inducing style of all too many computer books.

Don't let the title deter you. Though it's ostensibly written for old-style designers to definitively convince them to move from table-based designs to CSS and showing them how to do it (are there any left who remain so unconvinced?), this book would benefit anyone wishing to really gain a mastery of CSS, no matter what level of expertise. The book even includes an appendix containing a comprehensive property reference for CSS2. I cannot recommend this book highly enough for those seeking to understand the relationship between the technical and design aspects of CSS. Well done, Mr. Shafer -- you have written one of the best computer books I've yet encountered! I wish all computer books were written this well.

(On a related note, this is the second book published by Sitepoint that I've purchased, and I applaud their editorial team for publishing such good books. Judging from these two books they seem to have a successful policy in place to write excellent technical books. Their books remove the chaff that turn so many computer books into useless tomes; and they treat their readers as possessing intelligence but who lack some specific knowledge which their books seek to fill from the ground up. I've grown weary of the condescending, patronizing, and sometimes even (seemingly deliberate) mystifying tone of most of the other computer book publishers out there, especially O'Reilly, who seem to target their books for some kind of "in-group" (wink wink). In the future when I need a technical computer book I will look first to Sitepoint, then to Sams, then to Peachpit. O'Reilly's Nutshell books are often still the best reference standards; but I will look elsewhere when I need to acquire new computer knowledge.)

(On another note, I wrote the above before reading some of the other comments here about this book. Wow -- what a range of opinion! I, as many other commenters here, have been a computer professional for many years (>25). I think the only conclusion I can reach is of the 'different strokes for different folks' variety. Clearly what works for me does not work for many others. Well, Vive la difference!)

I had high hopes for this book. I was ready for something completely dedicated to teaching me everything I needed to know about creating a site without using a single table tag for layout. Although the book does explain how to do this, I was still disappointed. After a brief introduction about CSS (yet again), section two of the book explains how to create layouts without using tables. In all, seventy pages of 500 are centered on this topic. Half the book is a CSS reference. The other sections talk about fonts, colors, etc. Clearly, the book is mis-titled. This remains a good book for someone new to CSS, so they can avoid bad habits from the start.

This really is a poor reference and tutorial. But...
I haven't found anything better.

This book doesn't cover all detailed XML is got for you, and it doesn't intend to either. However, Wilson's book gave me a good foundation to explore the XML world. Good choice if you want to start nice and simple, and then focus on details later. Don't get me wrong, this is not a brochure either; it does come with plenty source code and examples.

After a mere twenty-two pages into the book, I was starting to doubt the usefulness of this book. The very top of page 22 talks about "examples above" on handling special characters. Flip back to page 21, however, go to the bottom of the page and read about examples that "are described below". I give up, are the examples on the magical page 21 1/2?

While other reviewers seem willing to let slide the number of typos, omitions and code examples that simply don't work, I am less forgiving. I got this book on the assumption that I would be able to learn how to integrate XML with my knowledge of ASP. Most examples in this book, however, are for Visual Basic, and while that only requires little to moderate tweaking, the pure ASP examples in this book are almost non-existant.

Add in the fact that the book constantly interrupts a lesson to add new concepts we're supposed to either immediately understand, or bookmark and thumb through the book hoping they remembered to include the examples, makes this a frustrating book to learn from. Doing a quick search on Google for "XML help basics" gave me more insight into XML in just a few minutes than reading this book for a few hours did.

A poorly written book with bad and simplistic examples. don't waste your money, there are far better books out on the subject.

I agree with a number of other reviewers, skip this book. It is more frustrating than it's worth. Shame too, cause it starts out strong and then just fades away.

Code Examples are REDUNDANT.
Code Examples are INCOMPLETE in the book. (Even the "Complete" examples. Had to download the source code and go line by line to figure out what was "missing". VERY FRUSTRATING.

Book skips arround quite a bit and is confusing at times. The Summary Case (3 tier architecture) which I was looking forward to was pretty much......um USELESS.

Oh well, I didn't listen to the others, maybe you will listen to me. Take a pen, paper and write down the 3 useful pages in this book and save your money.

That's the strength of this title. It focuses on how xml can and should and is being used in the real world. Too many books documented xml in abstract and in theory and while that's a good place to begin the learning process, it's just not enough.

This was the first xml book I read and it immediately helped me understand 'how' xml should be used as opposed just 'what' xml was. That understanding helped me apply the language to real systems and real business requirements.

Be sure to check out the CD-ROM which contains code examples and supplemental documentation.

Having said all this, I would still recommend you get a purely theory-based book to supplement with this guide because its coverage of the syntax is not completely comprehensive.

Either way, it's higly recommended, especially now when xml has found itself into every corder of the IT world.

This book is clearly outdated now, in terms of the technology it covers and the advancements that have occured since its release. However, if you are struggling with how XML fits into the real world, I have yet to see better examples than the ones provided in this book.

Don't expect a lot of technical guidance. The focus is really more on introducing XML to the common person. The writing style is informal, and really geared to a broad audience. This book is still a good complement to some of the more current technical guides.

A great book for those who want to know in very general terms what XML is all about, but who don't actually want to do anything with it.

Decent book, but it's already outdated and the code samples are limited. The background information is still informative, but there isn't enough coverage of the API. The DOM API documentation is out-of-date and few useful examples are given. There is no coverage of the SAX API (which is supposed to be easier to use) whatsoever. None of the examples work with a webserver and only work if you open the file locally! I found myself using the MSDN Online website instead of referring to the book.

There are many books on the market that explain XML and what it is and does. This book explains the Microsoft IE DOM, and how to use it in the client. Since Netscape does not support XML, don't look for many examples of how to use it with Netscape. If I had to rely on this book to introduce me to XML, it would fail miserably. However, when I saw the possibilities of using XML to communicate between the client and server in the background, a whole new world opened up for our product. It is now interactive without a screen refresh. We do field level validations in real time. We have dynamic content in dropdown list boxes. This knowledge alone is worth many, many times the price of the book.

I bought this book a while ago, I think sometime in 2000. It's been very helpful as a reference. I wouldn't recommend this book to someone with no knowledge of HTML. It doesn't teach you HTML so much as it reiterates things the author assumes you already know. It's nice to have if you know HTML and CSS and need to brush up. I find myself pulling it out pretty frequently when I'm building a page and my brain farts out and I need to jog my memory. But for a beginner, this book will likely cause frustration.

Comparing to other books of the Bible family, this book is not satisfactory. It's short of enough figures that can give readers a vivid description of what these codes can make. And the real-world codes are also insufficient. The book is divided into too many chapters, which makes the whole book disordered. The 150-page Appendix is the only highlight of the book. Readers can easily query the usage of keywords. For sure, the book is not suitable to a beginner.

This book is very poorly organized. The author get so excited about CSS and the new coming XML that they neglect to explain the HTML fundamentals, syntax, and capabilities. The author has a tendency to jump from topic to topic without any warning or explanation. I would definetely not recommend this book to advanced programmers nor beginners, it's just too difficult to follow.

This book truly is my HTML bible. I've been doing HTML constantly for the past four years and have used a lot of resources, both printed and on the web, and when I got this book I didn't need to use any other resources because this book always had the answers to my multitude of questions. I admit that this book would be a little hard to follow if you're completely new to HTML but if you're familiar with HTML and are hungry to become very good at it this book will satisfy you. If you're totally new to HTML I reccomend the book on HTML published by Visual (it's white with a blueprint of a bridge on the cover). It was my first HTML book and it served me well until I learned everything in it and wanted a book that would teach me more. That's why I got this HTML bible.

I have to say I disagree with an earlier review. This bible book explains syntax very very well and gave me a great understanding of it. It would actually break it down and tell you what was what in syntax. No other HTML book I've read did that. I also found that, unlike some other bible books, it was written in language that was easy to understand and follow.

The appendexs in this book are utterly devine. I use them ALL THE TIME. You can look up any tag in html, any attribute for CSS, how to make special characters, and even more, and get information on how to write them, how to use them, what they effect, and what attributes go with them. I think this is just so awesome.

Now, no book is perfect, but this one comes very close :)

Teaching HTML for the past 5 years I have certainly found that there very few really in depth reference manuals, this book does have some really nice features, however at the same time there things that confused me about the book.

One thing I found odd was the 4 pages covering XML/XSL, after reading this I think the author could have left this out of the book and expanded and very good section on severs and server options.

Part III, development of pages with HTML is very good with fairly good coverage of each section. In the next edition they should bring some of the web editors more up to date. One section I found to very well written is Part IV or CSS, the authors seem to have everything covered here.

Part VII - cross browsers, deal with DHTML and JavaScript, I found this section to be okay but certainly more, much more information should have been included. One of the most impressive sections of the book is Appendices A through G, which is by far the best breakdown of attributes, CSS syntax, color and hex conversion I have ever seen.

The cd included is mostly made up of trial version of software and most of the software has newer version available, so this will also need fixing for the next release. Overall, since I don't need the eval software, I found that the book certainly serves a purpose and for those new to the HTML arena this book should be helpful.

I got this book from a friend and after reading a few chapters I checked the Amazon reviews to see if "it was just me" or if this book was horrible. I was surprised to see it had even 3 1/2 starts. Then I read the reviews carefully...

Just days after the book came out, there was a rush of excellent reviews, most of which where only a few sentence long and lacked any detail. Then reality set in. People who really read it, universally hated it. -- And gave detailed examples why.

Now, I'm not going to say the original reviews where astroturf... but read them in order and watch the dates. Then consider you have a book with 14 authors all of whom use the internet and know the power of good Amazon reviews...

Things just don't add up.

This is definitely a good book for developers having good knowledge of ASP and XML and how to integrate XML in ASP. I just loved this book. People who say they don't like it, they have not read the book I am sure. Its sure worth the money!

This book was a real dissapointment.

I LOVE wrox ASP 3.0 Ref and ADO 2.6 Ref. Maybe Wrox should have taken that approach with this book -- instead of trying to act like this book can in any way teach anything about XML.

The examples in this book are horrid, they aren't in depth enough, and more importantly, don't even correspond well with each other.

Too many of the chapters jump into the middle of a subject, then try to work back to the beginning and then forward to the end.

Trust me, I've read the first 5-7 chapters of this book and finally got so sick of all the ambiguity that I went out to the MS Site and learned more in 30 minutes there than I ever could have with this book.

Some of the case studies in the back are nice, and this book would have made a great reference (had they gone that route), but it is a horrible book to learn how to integrate XML with ASP.

Save your money.

Excellent! for ones who are pro to ASP and need to intergrate XML with ASP! A must buy!

I'm a big fan of the WROX publications (for ASP in particular), but this book was a disappointment. The writing was choppy - as you might expect from a book with 14 guys on the cover. The examples were cryptic and raise more questions than they answer.

The author(s) seem to me to be attempting to impress us (and each other) with their knowledge of the subject rather than really trying to write a digestible explanation of ways to utilize XML in an ASP environment.