<< 1 >>
Rating: 
Summary: Not much smarter now
Review: Although the book covers the major features it offers little over the online help. What is missing is the overall context or a complete example that might help understanding of how to put everything together into a working application. When it presents triggers and stored procedures the examples are so basic as to not explore the potential power. The chapter on relational database design was particularly lacking in ideas or references. Some of the more powerful features such as metadata and analysis services are barely mentioned. The book did introduce the major administrative functions well. If you do buy the book, do go the authors web site described in the book, to get the "bonus" chapters on installation and security, which should also help a new administrator.
Rating:
Summary: Not much smarter now
Review: Although the book covers the major features it offers little over the online help. What is missing is the overall context or a complete example that might help understanding of how to put everything together into a working application. When it presents triggers and stored procedures the examples are so basic as to not explore the potential power. The chapter on relational database design was particularly lacking in ideas or references. Some of the more powerful features such as metadata and analysis services are barely mentioned. The book did introduce the major administrative functions well. If you do buy the book, do go the authors web site described in the book, to get the "bonus" chapters on installation and security, which should also help a new administrator.
Rating: 
Summary: At least it includes an eval copy of SQL Server...
Review: Let's just say this is not a very good dummies book. There are very very few "real world" examples of the topics presented. The technical accuracy is pretty decent, but this book will not enlighten any beginners to the world of SQL Server. Advanced topics are rarely explained in layman terms and the depth of coverage is, shall we say, not very deep at all! Stick to the SQL Server Online Books (which this book just seems to re-hash, albeit in much less detail) and you'll learn alot more about SQL Server.
Rating:
Summary: At least it includes an eval copy of SQL Server...
Review: Let's just say this is not a very good dummies book. There are very very few "real world" examples of the topics presented. The technical accuracy is pretty decent, but this book will not enlighten any beginners to the world of SQL Server. Advanced topics are rarely explained in layman terms and the depth of coverage is, shall we say, not very deep at all! Stick to the SQL Server Online Books (which this book just seems to re-hash, albeit in much less detail) and you'll learn alot more about SQL Server.
Rating:
Summary: At least it includes an eval copy of SQL Server...
Review: Let's just say this is not a very good dummies book. There are very very few "real world" examples of the topics presented. The technical accuracy is pretty decent, but this book will not enlighten any beginners to the world of SQL Server. Advanced topics are rarely explained in layman terms and the depth of coverage is, shall we say, not very deep at all! Stick to the SQL Server Online Books (which this book just seems to re-hash, albeit in much less detail) and you'll learn alot more about SQL Server.
Rating:
Summary: Muzzled author produces mediocre book
Review: The only perceived value of this book could be the enclosed CD, a 120 day Evaluation version of the SQL 2K Server, Enterprise Edition, a couple thousand retail, which will need a updater to SP3a on the MS support website. This will bring the app to the latest version, since "Yukon" is currently in beta, will not be released until Late 04. You probably can get an Eval CD directly from MS for small shipping, or free at a trade show, such as Comdex, at a local MS Sales office, or SQL Server Users Group (UG). No additional files are on the CD. You can install this on Server 2K, Server 2K3, Server NT4SP6, and Win98SE; but the installation chapter is a download from the publisher's website to save book space!The heart of the book, Part II DataBase (DB) Design, has 4 chapters over 112 pages for describing relational DB, creating a Customer DB, indexing, triggers, programming, and procedures. He devotes 2+ pages to Locking. Then in Part III Interface Design, he has 3 chapters covering 80 pages for describing SQL, Query, and Import/Export. Slim pickings for a budding DBA, many tables; maybe one can use this book as an abridged reference. Then there's more, Part IV Enterprise Issues, Chap 11 goes over making a DB backup / restore that I agree needs to be covered. And Chap 12 covering web serving your DB is OK, but I'd hold the line on Chap 13 where he covers Distributed Queries over multiple servers, to exploit the Enterprise version capability. Like most budding DBAs are going to have multiple, remote, networked DB servers at his disposal? Nonetheless, this chapter seems to be the author's pride and joy. I'd highly recommend the author use these 12 precious pages to beef up what he has already covered. But most superfilous is his Appendix A, where he expends over 18 precious pages for Wizard flowcharts. What a waste! The Security chapter is a download from the publisher's website. The author is at tmann at vbasic dot com . His book's most significant failing is not showing how to display or print out a result or report of a DB query. Perhaps the author hasn't found out that reports are the life-blood of business. He gives a half page mention of the Crystal Report Writer in the last chapter (p338), but neither integrates reports in his book, nor indicates that an older v4.5 (96) version is bundled with the SQL Server 2K. SQL Server Help for reports is useless as Crystal has its own separate Help. As demoed in our local UG, MS has just released its own Reporting Services module (free download) to supplant the highly regarded Crystal Reports.
Rating:
Summary: Not bad, but could be better
Review: This is a good book if you are a "rank beginner" and you don't need to do anything complex with SQL. It's missing a lot of information that could be considered more advanced. I bought it to help me with my SQL queries in Active Server Pages and I just haven't found it to be that useful. One of my employees, who knows nothing about SQL has found it to be very useful, however.
Rating:
Summary: Not bad, but could be better
Review: This is a good book if you are a "rank beginner" and you don't need to do anything complex with SQL. It's missing a lot of information that could be considered more advanced. I bought it to help me with my SQL queries in Active Server Pages and I just haven't found it to be that useful. One of my employees, who knows nothing about SQL has found it to be very useful, however.
Rating:
Summary: Not bad, but could be better
Review: This is a good book if you are a "rank beginner" and you don't need to do anything complex with SQL. It's missing a lot of information that could be considered more advanced. I bought it to help me with my SQL queries in Active Server Pages and I just haven't found it to be that useful. One of my employees, who knows nothing about SQL has found it to be very useful, however.
<< 1 >>
|
