I mentioned earlier I was at Tech Ed 2008 in Orlando all last week. While there, I took advantage of the really sweet pool at the Caribe Royal as well as finished reading Accelerated C# 2008 by Trey Nash.
Accelerated C# 2008 surprised me, because what I was expecting was a book that covered the new C# 3.0 Features, and what I got was a solid and fast-paced book on both the fundamentals of C# as well as the new features in C# 3.0.
The book literally starts from the beginning. If you find yourself needing more information on the fundamentals of C# like
- Value types
- Reference types
- Boxing and Unboxing
- Classes, Structs, and Objects
- Strings
- Arrays, Collection Types, and Iterators
- Delegates, Anonymous Functions, and Events
- Threading
- Generics
- etc...
you get solid coverage from Accelerated C# 2008. You also get solid coverage of the new C# 3.0 Features, such as:
- Automatically Implemented Properties
- Anonymous Types
- Collection Initializers
- Extension Methods
- Implicitly Typed Local Variables
- Lambda Expressions
- LINQ
- Object Initializers
- Partial Methods
Accelerated C# 2008 seems most appropriate for someone who 1) is new to C# that doesn't need a lot of handholding to understand development concepts or 2) has experience with C# but wants a more thorough understanding of the fundamentals as well as the new features in C# 3.0. I know I threw around a lot of topics above, but the books dives into subjects and types in the .NET Framework that can be a challenge to understand:
- Exception Handling
- Finalizers
- Locking and Threading
- Formatting Strings and implementing IFormattable, ICustomFormatter
- IDisposable and ICloneable
- etc...
I highly recommend Accelerated C# 2008. Let it be known that it packs a lot of information in 500 pages :) There is not a lot of white space, no fluff, and no goofy pictures and tables that try to make the book look like it has more content than it really does. As the title suggest, it moves quickly from topic to topic to maximize your time and knowledge.
You can learn more about Accelerated C# 2008 here.