Designing Forms for Microsoft Office InfoPath and Forms Services

By Hagen Green, Scott Roberts, Scott Alan Roberts

"Microsoft Office InfoPath represents a revolutionary leap in XML technologies and a new paradigm for gathering business-critical information. I am delighted that Scott Roberts and Hagen Green, two... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0321410599
• ISBN13: 9780321410597
• Release Date: January 2007
• Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional
• Length: 1223 Pages
• Weight: 4.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.8" x 7.1" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Perfect Book

This book is exactly what I needed - we're interested in using InfoPath as part of an electronic document routing system NOT using SharePoint. A lot of resources out there combine IP with SharePoint, so this book is really good for people looking at alternative ways to use/deploy InfoPath. I took a 2-day intro class to IP and this book is taking me the rest of the way - it covers all the advanced features and topics, and includes lots of insider tips and tricks that an inexperienced user like me would spend ages finding out on my own. Incredibly comprehensive, easy to read and concise.

Great content and narrattive

As many of the previous reviews before mine can attest, this is a great book and one of many other definitive Infopath reference-literature for someone needing to work with Infopath on an ongoing professional environment. What differentiates this book from others is its narrative. I have been reading IT technical books for 24 years now and very rarely I find a book so easy to follow. I didn't need that extra cafeine-hit to keep me awake after 20 minutes reading this book. I did need a PC beside me to practice what I was reading from time to time, and only because I like to bring thoughts come into life. However the book does enough on its own to keep you going without any yawns.

Best MS InfoPath 2007 book

Most of the InfoPath books out there do not address Forms Services like this book does. Even if you have never worked with InfoPath or Forms Services before in your life, this 1223 page book takes you from the very basic topics to the very advanced. What makes this book The Best is that it actually addresses most of the problems InfoPath developers face when developing and deploying forms, specially in a web/intranet environment. For anyone and everyone who is or wants to work with InfoPath 2007, I can't think of a better reference than "Designing Forms for Microsoft Office InfoPath and Forms Services 2007".

The InfoPath book to judge all other InfoPath books by

This is the first InfoPath book I have found answers every question I have had about InfoPath. The beauty of this book is although it does cover a lot of the technical side of InfoPath it also deals with some of the simpler solutions that are best achieved with just the InfoPath designer and declarative logic. With an easy to read style and lots of samples this book has become the definitive InfoPath resource in my technical library. If you're just beginning with InfoPath this book is for you. If you've creating solutions with InfoPath since day one I'm still confident that this book would be a worthwhile investment. Good job guys!

XML with little or no programming

As XML has become the industry standard, Microsoft has increasingly oriented its Office suite to use it. The latest result is this enhanced InfoPath, in its 2007 incarnation. The book is divided into two parts. Each targeting a different audience. The first part is aimed at a general purpose Office user, who is not assumed to be a programmer. It addresses what is a problem plaguing XML. If you want to make a new XML schema to use as a template for future data instances, you often have to write the explicit XML tags. Unfortunately, the syntax can be overwhelming to many. Plus, explicitly writing the tags is extremely error prone. What InfoPath has done is make an easy to use graphical front end. Far friendlier to the user. This user interface then can generate a schema in a robust fashion. Even people capable of editing schemas directly might still want to use what Microsoft has provided. Along these lines, chapter 5 is a good example. While not perhaps directly concerning schema, it tackles the problem of validating what the user types into a form. It follows the approach that you should clean up your data as early as possible. Preferably before it even gets into the database. The UI lets you impose constraints on the user input into various fields of your form, by offering dialog windows with many options. All commendably straightforward. The second section of the text is mostly for programmers, who have already written code for Office.