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Mastering Delphi 6
by Marco Cantu

Publisher: Sybex, Incorporated  Buy it Now!
ISBN: 0782128742
Format: PaperBack, 1104pp.

Mastering Delphi 6 is the completely revised and updated edition of the industry's favorite Delphi programming book, and offers the most complete coverage of Delphi 6 programming available anywhere.

Much of the introductory material included in previous editions has been removed in favor of plenty of exposure to the enhancements available in Delphi 6. Among others, these include CLX, the new cross-platform component library, dbExpress, the new database engine, and Delphi's extensive support for e-business and Web development.

The book is divided into four parts: Foundations, Visual Programming, Database Programming and Beyond Delphi: Connecting with the World. The first part introduces new features of the Delphi 6 IDE (including tips about some lesser-known features), moves to the Object Pascal Language, RTL and the Visual Component Library. The second part is devoted to examples of the use of the various (visual) components. The most interesting part for an experienced Delphi developer is the one that explores the foundations of the libraries available for building user interface, the native Windows VCL and the newly introduced Qt based CLX. For those who don't know, Kylix -Delphi for Linux, comes with a cross platform component library called CLX. Some real-world user-interface techniques are also discussed, like form splitting and tollbar docking. The third part of the book, Delphi's Database Arhitecture, contains 300 pages of information about one of the key features of the programming environment. Marco skips the theory of database design and starts with an overview of the database components that are available with Delphi. Chapters in this part ofer some more advanced topics, such as client/server programming, dbExpress (cross platform database library), the use of dbGO (ADO support, in D5 known as ADOExpress) and Interbase Express. The final part of the book is devoted to "connecting Delphi with the world". The last chapters will show how to take advantage of Delphi's support for COM, OLE automation and COM+. The final part of the book covers Web service, XML and SOAP.

The companion CD includes all the example sources and several additional elements. You also get a copy of Essential Pascal (an introduction to the language), Essential SQL (brief introduction), Graphics in Delphi (additional chapter that covers development of graphical applications, including simple games) as well as a fully searchable electronic copy of Mastering Delphi 6.

The book is presented clearly and attractive; practical, tutorial-based coverage helps you develop key skills, solve tough problems, and build and implement sophisticated Windows applications. In all, there are around 300 examples, with clear explanation of the key skills in view. Mastering Delphi series by Marco Cantu are not for people who think they can learn how to code Windows applications from it - however, even newcomers will benefit from this book.

Since this is a book review, I'm supposed to find some book weaknesses. I simply can't.