Print | posted on Saturday, February 26, 2011 1:47 AM
I’m frequently asked for SharePoint book recommendations. This is tricky because from my point of view most of them are rubbish. The publisher driven gold rush to get titles on the shelf on or around the release of a product really is very bad from a quality perspective. The amount of misinformation in SharePoint 2010 books in particular is outstanding.
The good news is that things are beginning to get back on kilter and there have recently been some excellent books released. Here’s a very mini review of some quality titles recently published.
Professional Business Connectivity Services in SharePoint 2010
Scot Hillier, Brad Stevenson
This is the best SharePoint 2010 book I’ve read. It’s technically accurate and it’s extremely well written. The authors do a great job of explaining things in clear and concise terms. It doesn’t cover everything about BCS but it’s a fantastic resource nonetheless. Did I mention it’s only 408 pages? No verbal diarrhoea here, that’s a real rarity in the SharePoint-verse.
Inside Microsoft® SharePoint 2010
Ted Pattison, Andrew Connell, Scot Hillier, David Mann
This is a really good introduction to the platform and capabilities for developers. Again, it’s quite terse, and that’s a good thing. It’s a bit weird in terms of the features the authors have chosen to cover and the ones that are missing. Nether the less this should be considered required reading for those getting to grips with SharePoint development.
SharePoint 2010 Web Parts in Action
Wictor Wilén
This is an excellent guide to building web parts. It’s amazing just how little there is out there in this space. I can’t count the number of times I've reviewed a deployment that suffers from basic fundamental mistakes in the code for custom web parts. The author does a great job of keeping the chatter to a minimum and clearly lays out numerous best practices and other tips and tricks. Recommended.
Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010 Step by Step
Olga M. Londer, Penelope Coventry
A end user book? Yup! The one thing every single SharePoint practitioner should do on a regular basis is review the core capability of the product. All the time you spend in Visual Studio can lead to you forgetting what this thing is all about in the first place. And perhaps building something it already does. Same thing for all those IT pros that worry about Content Database names and locations. You gotta know this stuff, if you say you do and don’t need to review it from time to time, you’re only fooling yourself.
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