C# 4.0 The Complete Reference Book Review

This book is all about C# the language and some of the .NET Framework class library. It is broken into two parts. Part I introduces C# with a view into the language's history. It then spends 19 chapters covering C# in detail. It begins those chapters with an introduction to object oriented programming, encapsulation, polymorphism, and inheritance. Part II digs deep into the .NET Framework's System namespace, collections, multithreading (including the Task Parallel Library and PLINQ), and networking. I have listed the book's chapters below. Part I: The C# Language Chapter 1. The Creation of C# Chapter 2. An Overview of C# Chapter 3. Data Types, Literals, and Variables Chapter 4. Operators Chapter 5. Program Control Statements Chapter 6. Introducing Classes and Objects Chapter 7. Arrays and Strings Chapter 8. A Closer Look at Methods and Classes Chapter 9. Operator Overloading Chapter 10. Indexers and Properties Chapter 11. Inheritance Chapter 12. Interfaces, Structures, and Enumerations Chapter 13. Exception Handling Chapter 14. Using I/O Chapter 15. Delegates, Events and Lambda Expressions Chapter 16. Namespaces, the Preprocessor, and Assemblies Chapter 17. Runtime Type ID, Reflection, and Attributes Chapter 18. Generics Chapter 19. LINQ Chapter 20: Unsafe code, Pointers, Nullable Types, Dynamic Types, and Miscellaneous Topics Part II: Exploring the C# Library Chapter 21. Exploring the System Namespace Chapter 22. Strings and Formatting Chapter 23. Multithreaded Programming, Part One Chapter 24. Multithreading Part Two: Exploring the Task Parallel Library and PLINQ Chapter 25. Collections, Enumerators, and Iterators Chapter 26. Networking Through the Internet Using System.Net Appendix A. Documentation Comment Quick Reference The thing I like best about this book is the way the author is able to use reasonable size examples get his message across and that there is a sample for everything. There is tons of code in the book. One thing I did not like was the lack of the use of the using statement to properly dispose of objects. The author mentions that it should be used, but doesn't make use of it. The reasoning is he wants to show you how and where things should close without using it. That is fine, and should be shown once, but I would have preferred the majority of the examples showing it being used. The downloadable code is in the form of text files. Each chapter has a file. The samples are in the order they are found in the book. In the sample files they number each listing, which is nice, but it does no good since they aren't numbered in the book. Nevertheless they are easy to find and all of them are console application that can be cut and pasted into a console application for running. The authors writing style makes this an easy read. He does a great job of explaining complex topics. The book is good for beginners and as a reference for advanced developers. All in all I highly recommend this book to every C# developer!!!

C# 4.0 The Complete Reference