I just got my first copy of the new book. It'll be stocked at Amazon and other bookstores very soon.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/076...Fencoding=UTF8

Wrox created a new forum to answer questions regarding the second edition. Please use that forum for any questions on that edition:

http://p2p.wrox.com/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=261

The author's blog is here:
http://www.dotnet2themax.com/Blogs/mbellinaso/

This is an entirely new book that uses a new sample website, and it's purpose is to demonstrate how to use the new ASP.NET 2.0 features to build a modern website. It uses almost all of the new features, such as Master Pages, Web Parts, Personalization, Membership, and the new controls (like the awesome DataGridView), etc.

It uses the RSS technique to both publish and subscribe news feeds, and it has newsletters, forums, and it has new coverage of e-commerce and localization.

This is not a simple facelift of the first edition: every word in the book is new. I can confirm the quality of the work because I was the technical editor. It's hard for us to keep up with constantly evolving technology, so it's important for us to learn the new techniques and methods because they made our lives easier as developers. The point of this new book is to show you how easy website programming has become, so you can focus more on the business requirements.

I'm not saying it's now very easy to develop websites, but its much easier than it used to be and this is a welcome change. Microsoft's first goal in developing ASP.NET 2.0 was to enhance programmer productivity, and they deserve to be congratulated for meeting that goal.

As for the first edition, this is not an introductory book on ASP.NET. You have to have some familiarity with it already. But if you could understand the first edition, or if you are familiar with developing individual pages in ASP.NET (any version), then you're ready for the second edition.

Now is the time to get the second edition and update your skills! It really is worth your effort.

Eric

You'll also want to check out this site that Marco has put up:

http://www.dotnet2themax.com/BooksMarco.aspx

Eric