Free eBooks for Data Developers -- Visual Studio Magazine

Data Driverby David Ramel

Free eBooks for Data Developers

When Microsoft blogger Eric Ligman recently posted a collection of free eBooks, he found the topic so popular that he followed up with even more.

"The response and feedback I am receiving about it is incredibly positive about how much you liked it," he wrote.

So I thought I'd check out what free offerings Microsoft has that would be interesting to data-related developers. Here are a few representative examples from his first post:

Transact-SQL Data Manipulation Language (DML) Reference
Data Analysis Expressions (DAX) Reference
SQL Server 2012 Tutorials: Analysis Services - Multidimensional Modeling

There aren't as many data-related resources in his second post, but you'll surely find the SQL Server 2012 Developer Training Kit useful. There are also development titles available for data mining, Windows Azure, Dynamics CRM, SharePoint, Windows Phone, LightSwitch and more with data-related components.

They come in a variety of downloadable formats, with many available in your choice of PDF, EPUB and Mobipocket, and some in Word (DOCX) and Open XML Paper Specification (XPS).

Everybody loves free stuff, of course, and reader Anthony expressed the views of many when he commented "Thanks, Eric! … really good gesture. It helps many a MS technology developer." So please go ahead and share your favorite free information sources for data developers. Comment here or drop me a line.

Posted by David Ramel on 08/23/2012

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