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Rating: 
Summary: Concept of the book is GREAT, however. It does not deliver.
Review: I bought this book on the sole purpose of the concept it was
driving. I was literally excited when I first started reading
the material, only to drift further away from the previous, a
few pages in. Basically, I became more and more frustrated as I
continued reading. Why? Well just check the other reviews about
this book. You have about 30% who are saying it's a great book
and 70% stating that the book is filled with errors and missing
files. I just wonder where the 30% came from and if they
actually purchased and tried to use this book.I'll put it to you like this. If you want to use this book as a
... paper weight, or stylish mouse pad from the get go, go right
ahead and buy the book. Don't say you weren't forewarned. New Riders', seriously needs to put a recall on this book.
Rating:
Summary: If I could give it zero stars I would
Review: I can only believe that those who gave this book more than 2 stars either know the author or work for the publishing company. How could one possibly give a book that contains no less than 5 errors on the first page of coding a passing grade?
In my mind this book epitomizes the whole tech boom - "quick, let's get it out there while the technology is hot and then fix it later".
Thank goodness it's out of print and no longer for sale here. It's so bad that I felt compelled to review it still for those who may find it on another site. Jessica Spiegel is undoubtedly a great programmer but an awful teacher, and New Rider's - shame on you!
Unless you want hours and hours of frustration avoid it like the plague!
Rating:
Summary: If I could give it zero stars I would
Review: I can only believe that those who gave this book more than 2 stars either know the author or work for the publishing company. How could one possibly give a book that contains no less than 5 errors on the first page of coding a passing grade?
In my mind this book epitomizes the whole tech boom - "quick, let's get it out there while the technology is hot and then fix it later".
Thank goodness it's out of print and no longer for sale here. It's so bad that I felt compelled to review it still for those who may find it on another site. Jessica Spiegel is undoubtedly a great programmer but an awful teacher, and New Rider's - shame on you!
Unless you want hours and hours of frustration avoid it like the plague!
Rating: 
Summary: Great Subject, Sloppy Book
Review: I didn't like how the book opens in a non-traditional landscape way. They said it would make things easier to show code etc. (try a smaller font) 13 lines of code takes up 1/3 of the pages. Spelling Mistakes take away from the books overall feel. The thing that truly slamms this rating down to a 2 is the fact that i could not get the examples to work with HER CODE!!! The book concentrates on three applications. All of which would be great to learn, and deploy (or at least 'tag-along' with the programmer) which is kinda how the book is presented. The bottom line is that the book did not make it easy enough (or bug free enough) to get the reader to deploy the examples. I will say however that the exmaples she made are awsome, and truly unique. Going out on the "java" limb and trying to get an application using Java as a back end was brave and heroic. She should get together with her Java Programmer and write a book from soup to nuts on how to fully utilize Flash MX and Java to make the application she set out to make in the first place. (but this time let her Java buddy write explanations about his/her code). It sorta left me wanting more orgainzation and more success out of it. I will also say as a footnote that i have not checked the "new-riders" website for possible bug fixes to the code she sent. So i don't know if she did in-fact remedy the problems or not. (i imagine she has).
Rating:
Summary: I returned it!
Review: I was left scratching my head after the first chapter. The screenshots do not even match up with the text on the same page! The author, reviewers (if there were any), publishers and editors should be ashamed. I've never seen a book that was so unsuitable for publication. I hope the author will review her work in the future.
Rating:
Summary: There's Better Things Out There
Review: Jessica is great. I'm on were-here all the time and really like the girl, and she's a phenomonal programmer, but her first attempt at writing a book could probably be parallelled to her first time riding a bike....failure perhaps? Hopefully she'll get up and write some more cause she's obviuosly got some genious in her, but they were definitely trying to get this book on the shelves instead of making it good. too many errors. VERY HARD TO READ. I'm an intermediate actionscript programmer and hard a hard time following a good bit of her code and then the explanations aren't even worth talking about. It also is very out of date now that 2004 is out, whereas the really good flash programming books are still useful. peace out-
Rating:
Summary: Total and utter garbage!
Review: Looking at the average rating for this book, seeing 3 stars is way too good for this book. It fails on every level to deliver what it promises. The hope of learning how to construct an e-commerce site and an avatar-type chat room made me rush to order this book. I have read over 20 Flash books in my day and consider myself an advanced Flash user but I couldn't make heads or tails of what to do with this book. Basically, it forces you to type out code without explanation and when you are finished, it never works. Don't bother with this waste of time and money. Can anyone recommend a book that does cover the avatar-type chatroom? I'm sure there would be huge interest if someone could do this the right way.
Rating:
Summary: Find another book -Forgot to teach how to see your results!!
Review: There is virtually no explanation of setting up the backend. So guess what? You can't even view the finished files for the book - let alone anything you create. The readme file on the CD that is included is apparently full of file name errors and references (the files don't exist for the database, as another person mentioned) and is unusable for anyone except a web server guru. The book itself offers little more than a typing exercise in recreating these applications (with no explanation of live operation with the databases), offering little in the way of programming education and explanation of methodology. Additionally there are typos, illustration errors or omissions every few pages, with instructions that don't match the screen captures. I'm continuing to try to learn something from it - but it's a poorly reviewed and tested book and extremely frustrating to deal with. Like the other guy - if anyone has any insight into getting the backend working, let me know too. PS - The support site for the book is still "coming soon"! Big help...
Rating:
Summary: Sad - so very sad
Review: This book fails to live up to both its title and its claims - I have only got to Chapter 3 and already there have been so many errors that I have stopped reading the book - the other reviews of this book are spot-on. The code doesn't work - the contents of the CD are lacking, etc, etc. Save yourself the time and money - keep looking for another book to help you out.
Rating:
Summary: Badly Organized Book
Review: This book is definitely NOT for beginner. I am not sure if it is for advanced user either. Step-by-step instructions are not exactly clear. Author never really explain why she do thing the way she does. So, I alway feel like I am blindly following her instructions. The worst part is that she put the instructions on one page and then put the samples of Actionscript on 3 pages later. So, I always have to flip the page back and forward. VERY VERY irritating! I am often too lazy to write a book review, but this book is just so bad that I have to write my first one. I STRONGLY suggest people NOT to buy this book. You probably will learn more by going to the Macromedia Flash developer site than spending [money] on this truly badly organized book.
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