Not as good as his first effort
I bought Ken Henderson's Guru's Guide to T-SQL a few years back and was extremely impressed with it. It was a "How-to-do-it" book with a 1001 good practical ideas that the hard-working database programmer could use immediately.
I bought this book because I am now working more with the topics that are supposed to be covered by this book, Stored Procedures, XLM, and HTML. I was impressed with how his first book had quickly and easily improved my skills and was interested in seeing what he could do for me in the new arena. Unfortunately it didn't work out.
In spite of the titles, the two books are barely related to each other. This book is a "why-you-do-it-this-way" book with a lot of philosophy and best-practice stuff and relatively few of the tips and tricks that I valued so highly in the first book. Unfortunately this information isn't that valuable now because the state of the art has kept changing and much of what he discusses either isn't relevant anymore or is now blindingly obvious.
But the problem with the book goes deeper than that. The extraordinary value of the first book was that it hit to Ken Henderson's strengths; very clear writing about very small topics with obvious and immediate payback for the reader. This book unfortunately tends to emphasize his weaknesses; poor organization, wandering off topic, and frequently saying too much that adds very little.
That's not to say that there aren't good reasons to buy this book, he's still a good clear author and there aren't enough of them in the technical writing field today. I particularly valued the essays at the end of the book and there are lots of valuable little nuggets that can be found throughout the entire book, just don't buy this book with the expectation that it will be the motherlode that his first book was.
A lot of the information relates to older release of SQL server
This book would be fantastic if I would still run an older release of the SQL server ... and the stored procedures part is still very relevant. The XML and HTML parts (where I've expected most) unfortunately do not cover the new abilities of the SQL Server 2005, so I guess we just have to wait for a new release of this book.
Best Book for Hoardcore SQL Server
This book is for experienced SQL developers. No fancy stuff. I found it very useful, since you will find lot of material you won't find anywhere else. It can be a good source for those who tries to handle SQL Server administration by not using Enterprise manager (such doing a backup, reindexing databases etc.). But in any case it's a very good addition to your library. Great job by Ken Anderson.
This is the book for SQL Developers/DBAs
I have about $2000 worth of the book on asp.net, cfml, Microsoft SQL server, Oracle DB book, and other tech related books. Most of the books I had are poorly written and the authors are trying to make "quick buck". This book is very well written and in-depth of Microsoft SQL Server. Highly recommanded!
Essential
This book is essential for those building solutions with Sql Svr. It is really a developer's take on how to create applications based on the world's best database. There are chapters on database design, source code control, design patterns, testing, and many, many others. The SqlXml info is the deepest and best of any of the SQl books I have found. I highly recommend this book.
(82 reviews)
