Rating:  - Quite a bit of hard to find information here
I have Connell's database book, and his other Microsoft Book on Coding Techniques. So, I purchased this book because I was so pleased with the other 2. This is excellent. If you wish to build a control - he covers both client and ASP.NET. And if you have a really good idea for a control, he goes into several advanced licensing techniques. Probably my favorite chapter is on encryption. I can see why Microsoft wanted Mr Connell to write another book. He has a keen sense of knowing what readers want and can explain his thoughts with crystal clearity.
Rating:  - Not particularly useful for ASP.Net developers
I have Connell's "Beginning VB6 Database" book which I found to be pretty valuable.
"Developing Microsoft .Net Controls" is better written but lacks enough meat, especially for ASP.Net programmers where it is way too sparse.
Here's the basic problem. The book is 10 chapters long. Chapter 1 is pretty much controls 101. Then there's Chapter 2 explaining the WinForm controls shipping with Visual Studio. And we can't forget Chapter 9 explaining WebForm controls that ship with Visual Studio. Oh, I didn't mention Chapter 3 is "advanced" use of WinForm controls that ship with Visual Studio. These chapters are just as long as all the rest meaning 40% of the book has nothing to do with developing custom controls!
There is some hard to find elsewhere meat on topics like licensing controls but for many coders today developing advanced web forms on intranets, there's only one rushed chapter that's useful on ASP.Net custom controls that competes with mobile and user controls for space. Which leaves us with a rather bare page counter example to build upon for advanced real world development. I outgrew the page counter example with my first try at developing a useful custom control.
I rate it 2 stars because I'm primarily a web developer. WinForm developers may get enough out of it to raise it to 3 stars.
Rating: - Book plagued with mistakes
I recently purchased this book to learn more about the advanced topics of authoring controls and I am abhorred. I feel instead like I'm an editor correcting a novice author's mistakes. Generally I seek out books published by Microsoft Press because they represent an excellent knowledge base for Microsoft products, but if I find another book like this one, it may be the last.
John Connell is terribly inconsistent with his naming conventions, often referring to classes when he means objects and objects when he means classes, abstract when he means static, and so on. The code examples are poorly written and inconsistent with his own instruction. In one sentence he advises calling Dispose() to clean up resources and a paragraph later uses two disposable objects without following his own advice. Much of the code doesn't even compile as shown. For example he shows strings broken onto separate lines that end with an ampersand and line continuation character but don't start with a quotation mark on the next line. He makes ridiculous comments on how it's unadvisable to embed an apostrophe in a string because the editor will interpret it as a comment. (Yes, he really said that. "Now set up a string with the drive the user selected, which you retrieve from the dDrive class, and concatenate two single quotes. This way, you don't get lost in a sea of mismatched double and single quotes. And as you know, the editor sees a single quote as a remark." You'll also notice he once again referred to a variable holding an object, or *instance* of a class, as a class.)
And it goes on and on and on from there. Microsoft Press guys, please don't ever let John Connell write another book for you again.
Rating: - Table of contents found
For Ramesh: Table of contents for the books may be found at http://www.booksmatter.com/b0735619247.htm
Rating: - The first I've heard of GUCCI verbs
While I've never built a control before, I need to build something for a client. After pre-ordering this, I was amazed to find out about designer verbs and designers in general. The Wizards of Redmond constructed the pieces to interact and really make building sophisticated controls easy for anyone that understands OO and VB.Net (which is what I use). I purchased and read Connell's other books so hoped this would be in a par. "Controls" takes you from soup to nuts - and even discusses sophisticated licensing so you can build a control and sell it. If you are new to controls, even though this covers some fairly complicated technology, Mr. Connell clearly explains how its used and provides tons of full examples. Anyway, that's my 2 cents worth. Personally, I found the book extremely useful even if I didnt need it as I do. The technologies he explains such as encryption, serialization, and isolated storage alone make this a valuable tool for any serious professional programmer.
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