My Toolbox column in the August 2007 issue of MSDN Magazine is avaiable online. The August issue examines three products:
- SharpGraph for .NET - create impressive and eye-pleasing graphs and charts with little to no code.
- Mail for .NET - this library provides a straightforward API for working with the Internet's core email-related protocols: SMTP, POP3, and IMAP.
- UltimateSpell - add spell checking to your web applications.
This month's issue reviewed Pro ASP.NET 2.0 E-Commerce in C# 2005, by Paul Sarknas. Here is an excerpt from the review:
In Pro ASP.NET 2.0 E-Commerce in C# 2005 (Apress, 2006), author Paul Sarknas walks readers through the key steps of building an e-commerce ASP.NET Web application. Rather than focusing on just the e-commerce related tasks, Paul takes readers through the entire application building process. For example, there are high-level discussions on the application’s design and motivation, a look at creating the data model, techniques for building a tiered application architecture, deployment options, and so forth. This background, which encompasses nearly a third of the book, is especially helpful to intermediate ASP.NET developers who may not have had much exposure to building large and complex Web applications; expert ASP.NET developers can skim through these early chapters.
As always, if you have any suggestions for products or books to review for the Toolbox column, please send them into toolsmm@microsoft.com.