Building an ASP.NET Intranet

Book Description

This book uses ASP.NET and Visual Basic .NET to develop an intranet application that provides all of the features that users expect.

By basing our intranet on Microsoft's free best practices example, the IBuySpy Portal, we can rapidly create an application that makes good use of the advanced features of ASP.NET.

A full explanation of the IBuySpy Portal architecture is provided, allowing you to get the most out of it. We look at how to customize existing portal modules, as well as building some of our own.

What You Will Learn From This Book

The intranet we build will enable users to:

- Publish content - Manage documents - Schedule events - Access human resources information - Hold online discussions

Along the way, you will learn a wealth of techniques for ASP.NET development - everything from making effective use of stored procedures through to integrating with Windows security and creating an advanced user interface with ASP.NET Web Controls./p>

Reviews From AMAZON.COM

Outstanding IBuySpy (pre-DotNetNuke) Book!

[...]

I picked this book up about three years to late, as it is entirely written about the original IBuySpy Portal framework, and I am an avid DotNetNuke module developer. The author presents numerous great examples of custom module development for IBuySpy, including a simple library application, extended discussions module, a complex Human Resources module, and a great Document Management System. Keep in mind IBuySpy is the forerunner to DotNetNuke, and all of the modules outlined in the book port nicely to the newer architecture, as they leverage many of the features moved forward into DotNetNuke, like user account integration, portal security, and more.

As I worked through configuring the various samples provided with the book, I got to set up & play with the original IBuySpy Portal framework after nearly three years of playing with it for the for the first time. When it was first released, it very intimidating in some of it's implementation details, although it didn't appear as sophisticated in it's business architecture, unlike the original Reports, Time Tracking, & Issue Tracking kits.

The book provides one of the best guides I have read to everything IBuySpy. The second time looking at IBuySpy portal, I was more able to appreciate the great concepts introduced in it, and I was at times amazed at how simple the IBuySpy Portal is when compared to the latest version of DotNetNuke. With the Introduction of the DotNetNuke Data Access Layer (DAL) in version 2.x, DotNetNuke was able to encapsulate all of the sophistication, and more, of the business layer found in the Time Tracking/Reports starter kits, at which point I was hooked.

I found the Document Management System described in Chapter 9 sophisticated enough that I believed it was worth the effort to convert it to a modern DotNetNuke module. The module is very well designed and documented in the book, so I decided on an uneventful Sunday afternoon to start converting it. Approximately 40 hours of development later, I have completed converting the module to DotNetNuke 2.1.2 (DotNetNuke 3.0.9 was released two days before the writing of this review).

No CD, broken promise of downloadable code

I bought this book for 62 Euros (75 USD) in Lisbon that is too much for 450 pages (with promos, content, indexes, images from internet) book without any CD and with broken promise of the downloadable code!

IMHO, there was no need to bloat the volume of a book and reader's tiredness reprinting from internet the lengthy code examples just for the sake of a few modifications and after that again printing, again, the resulting snippets (it is proper only for e-books)

Since the book is oriented for working with codes, the absence of electronic version is also the great drawback.

The book seems to be the monopolist on IBuySpy Portal (the only one available) , but I wouldn't have bought it, had I known about mentioned above.

While the book is useful (in abscence of any other choice, esp. in electronic version), I estimate the ratio "price/worthyness" as extremely high

PS
I was also more interested in C# and/or Visual Studio .NET versions of IBuySpy Portal, and I think VB.NET is just inappropriate language for the middle-, like IBuySpy Portal,
and large-size projects)