Mike did some last minute clean-up and checked in the files, so I’ve uploaded the code sample for the Windows Forms 2.0 book. Enjoy.

I packaged off the final chapters, figures and PDF files for submission of the WinForms 2.0 book this morning. Michael made it easy by fixing all the last minute nits I found, producing the PDFs and bundling all of the figure files together (he separated the graphics from the Word docs using a WinForms 2.0 program, of course!).

In spite of the fact that I’ve been working on long-lead prototype coding for the last month and Mike’s been moving to the US from Australia, we managed to get the book submitted a full 15.5 hours early (they meant midnight when they gave us a 12/16 deadline, didn’t they?!?).

I’m so excited to get the book in your hands, that I’ve asked Mike to check in the files he’s got checked out so that we can post the code samples ASAP. It’ll still be a while before the book is in your hands, though. We took 22 months to write it, but it’s the 3 months it takes to print it that always sticks in my craw the most for some reason. : )

Wahoo (2)!

How can you argue with someone so obviously intelligent?

For those of you that reviewed or got free access to our Avalon book while we were still writing it, please please please post a review on Amazon.com. Thanks!

You can also order them online. I find that even Thanksgiving is good for gift giving, as is Halloween! What could be better than the gift of knowledge?

All of the initial copies of Programming the Windows Presentation Foundation have been sold out at the PDC. That’s a double edged sword, of course. On the one hand, it’s nice that so many people wanted a copy that they were gone by the time I got to see the remaining display copy on Tuesday after lunch. On the other hand, I want the publisher to have provided enough copies to feed a longer buying frenzy.

The good news is that another, larger shipment of the book will be available @ the PDC in the Marketplace store Thursday afternoon. Please form a line in an orderly fashion and keep the sleeping bags out of the normal aisle of traffic. : )

Or, feel free to purchase one online (or two — XMas is coming up!).

I took a quick glance at some reviewer feedback for the Avalon book and already I’m trying hard not to hate the folks that send it in. Mean, hateful things like “who is this guy?!?” and “well, he’s never written a book” spring immediately to mind.

The thing is, reviewer feedback, especially harsh, blunt, spit-in-your-face reviewer feedback, is an extremely critical part of the book writing process (although, ironically, I most hate the reviews that sound like stuff I would write when I review…). Without reviews, authors don’t have any idea how their writing will be received ’til it’s published and we’re bound to do all kinds of stuff that’s reader or subject hostile that need correcting. Please, feel free to hit me with both barrels when you’re reviewing my stuff; I won’t promise to act on all the feedback, but I promise to consider all of it seriously.

I do have one request, however. This is something I try to do when I’m reviewing (and I’ve been known to make grown men cry): please start with something nice. This does two things:

1. Gives the author a little ego boost before you chop his legs out from under him.
2. Establishes your credibility as a reviewer. If you say something nice, especially if it’s insightful, e.g. “Avalon data binding is a large topic, but I really love how this chapter presents practically all of it in an easy to follow manner,” then I’m much more willing to take feedback like, “don’t let the sample app drive the chapter, make the technology coverage drive the sample” (not to pick on anyone in particular : ).

Of the two things, establishing your credibility as a reviewer is by far the most important because w/o it, there’s a good chance that the careful thought you put into your reviewer comments will not be fully considered (who wants to listen to a curmudgeon?).

Anyway, if you encounter me in the next month and I’m grumpty, it’s ’cuz I’m spending my weekends dealing with reviews. I might be crabby and violent, but at least I’m slow and easy to see coming. : )

Here’s a question for folks. Right now, the 1st edition of the WinForms book has several footnotes like the following that include URLs:

“The ntcopyres.exe tool can be obtained from http://www.codeguru.com/cpp_mfc/rsrc-simple.html.”

Unfortunately, unlike the browser you’re using now, while we can underline an URL in a book, we can’t do anything useful with you “click” it, which forces you to type it. Since the URL above is by no means the longest in the book (MS likes to put GUIDs in theirs), I’d prefer not to put that burden on the reader if I don’t have to. With the invention of shrinkster, I don’t have to:

“The ntcopyres.exe tool can be obtained from http://shrinkster.com/452.”

The problem with this, of course, is that I don’t really know if shrinkster is going to be around forever or if I want to tie my book to a single external resource that I can’t control. The idea I had this morning was to use both, which increases the size of the URL in print but gives the reader a shortcut and doesn’t hold me hostage to shrinkster*:

“The ntcopyres.exe tool can be obtained from http://www.codeguru.com/cpp_mfc/rsrc-simple.html (shrinker.com/452).”

What do people think?

*Don’t get me wrong. I’m a big shrinkster fan, else I wouldn’t be dropping their links into my books at all.