Professional XML for .NET Developers by Kevin Williams, Dinar Dalvi, John Slater, Darshan Singh, Francis Norton, Andy Olsen, Bipin Joshi, Fredrik Normén, Joseph Alan Gray and J. Michael Palermo IV is a comprehensive look at reading and writing XML, DOM navigation and XSL transformations, validating and serializing XML, MSXML vs System.Xml, ADO.NET and ASP.NET XML support, Web Services and SOAP, Remoting, XML code documentation and more. Once again, the proven Wrox formula of assembling a cadre of six to ten professionals to collaborate on a single volume "delivers the goods", both in quality and quantity.

As most programmers are by now aware, XML is so tightly integrated into the .NET Platform that it has become mandatory for the professional developer to have a good working understanding of XML and XSLT at a minimum. While much of the XML employed in the .NET platform is "behind the scenes plumbing" such as with SOAP Webservices and configuration files, .NET has a rich set of base classes to allow for the use and manipulation of XML and its derivatives. Microsoft has placed a heavy emphasis on the quality, extensibility, and processing speed of the XML - related classes in .NET, as well as on standards compliance.

This is why I believe it is of the utmost importance for the enterprise - level developer who intends to target the .NET Platform to become as well - versed in these technologies as possible. This book is targeted at intermediate-level programmers who have already started .NET development, and who want to see how to use XML within their applications to its best advantage. You'll need to have some knowledge of C# or Visual Basic .NET as well as XML and XML related technologies (XSLT, XPath, and XML Schema) in order to fully benefit from this 724 page book.

The book begins with what has appeared to have become the obligatory "Introduction to .NET" chapter, which occupies some 30 pages.

Chapter 2 proceeds with excellent coverage of the XML - based configuration files such as web.config, XML code documentation (native to C# only, although I've already seen some attempts to provide third-party tools to make it available with VB.NET), brief overviews of ADO.NET, ASP.NET, and WebServices, XML serialization, and the streaming and DOM - based XML classes. Then it gets into a detailed look at System.Xml, the granddaddy of all XML base classes.

Chapter 3 deals specifically with the reading and writing of XML When you finish this chapter, you'll be able to do most everything you did with MSXML 3.0 or 4.0 in .NET, except XSL transforms.

Chapter 4 covers DOM navigation with .NET, and COM developers will quickly see the analogous methods and classes, plus a number of new features. Code examples are presented in both C# and VB.NET and include screen shots of command - line output. This chapter covers namespace support and even includes a section on how to extend (inherit from) the XMLDocument class to solve a specific business problem.

Chapter 5 is where you will do your first .NET XSL Transformations, and it covers not just the basics but also how to embed scripts in stylesheets, pass parameters to a transformation, extend the functionality of the XSL stylesheet with .NET code, navigate with XPATH, and finally, a section on optimization of transformations.

Chapter 6 proves extremely useful in its extensive treatment of the XSD Schema, how to use the SOM, the xmlvalidatingreader, and how to use the XSD Schema Designer in the Visual Studio .NET IDE. While there could be more content as far as this chapter is concerned, most developers will find it sufficient.

Chapter 7 covers XML serialization, what it's used for, how to do it, how to customize it, and much more. The treatment in this chapter is both extensive and concise, with plenty of example code to "feed your brain".

Chapter 9 shows us how to extend the XmlReader and XmlWriter classes with an interesting example of how to hook into the Visio COM object model to read and write both Word and Visio documents.

Chapter 10 covers ADO.NET with an excellent introduction to the unique integration of XML into the Dataset and XMLDataDocument class. Nearly 50 pages in all, this chapter will prove to be a big selling point for the book, in my opinion.

Chapter 11 explains how ASP.NET works with XML in the web control syntax, web controls that can deal specifically with XML data, and how ASP.NET uses XML in web application configuration files.

Chapter 12 is an actual case study in using ASP.NET and ADO.NET together to build a DVD rental system.

Chapter 13 covers Webservices and SOAP, and Chapter 14 is a case study in Webservices to build a calendar application that stores appointments and tasks.

Chapter 15, which covers remoting, is somewhat of an anomaly because the only "XML" thing about remoting is the configuration files. However, it's a pretty good (although not very extensive) introduction to the Remoting classes and includes some good sample working code.

Chapter 16 covers C# code documentation with XML, a feature that I find particularly useful in a multi-developer environment (and in fact one of the reasons why we prefer C# at my company over VB.NET). This is an excellent and concise "reference" that you will refer to often.

Finally, Appendix A covers System.Xml in reference format, and Appendix B covers System.Xml.Xsl and System.Xml.XPath likewise. Both useful tools, as the .NET documentation does not offer a simplified reference - type presentation like these.

I've also been informed by the Wrox technical editor that there is a download covering the BETA2 to RTM changes for this book, and it is available here.

There are other good books out about Xml in .NET - at least two I can think of, and of course each has it's own approach. However, if you are looking for a single volume that covers a broad range of interests each relating to XML In the .NET platform, I think you'll find Professional XML for .NET Developers an excellent choice.

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Peter Bromberg is an independent consultant specializing in distributed .NET solutions in Orlando and a co-developer of the EggheadCafe.com developer website. He can be reached at pbromberg@yahoo.com