Our look is the result of reader comments, our own experimentation, and feedback from distribution channels. Distinctive covers complement our distinctive approach to technical topics, breathing personality and life into potentially dry subjects.

The animal on the cover of Mastering Visual Studio .NET is an Egyptian goose. It is common everywhere (except deep forests and desert) but is found usually in freshwater and grassy parkland; it feeds on crops and young grass. The Egyptian goose is at home in trees, regularly perching and even roosting there; cavities and holes in trees and abandoned nests of other birds may be selected to nest in.

Both sexes look alike, although the female is slightly smaller than the male. Its wing coverts are white with black primaries, and green and brown secondaries; its most distinctive feature is a chestnut-colored bandit's mask. The Egyptian goose draws attention to itself with noisy displays and fierce territorial fighting. Rivals stand or swim, breast to breast, attempting to seize each other's backs near the base of the neck while beating with their wings.

Sarah Sherman was the production editor and proofreader, and Norma Emory was the copyeditor for Mastering Visual Studio .NET. Jane Ellin and Claire Cloutier provided quality control. John Bickelhaupt wrote the index.

Emma Colby designed the cover of this book, based on a series design by Edie Freedman. The cover image is a 19th-century engraving from the Dover Pictorial Archive. Emma Colby produced the cover layout with QuarkXPress 4.1 using Adobe"s ITC Garamond font.

Bret Kerr designed the interior layout, based on a series design by David Futato. This book was converted by Joe Wizda to FrameMaker 5.5.6 with a format conversion tool created by Erik Ray, Jason McIntosh, Neil Walls, and Mike Sierra that uses Perl and XML technologies. The text font is Linotype Birka; the heading font is Adobe Myriad Condensed; and the code font is LucasFont"s TheSans Mono Condensed. The illustrations that appear in the book were produced by Robert Romano and Jessamyn Read using Macromedia FreeHand 9 and Adobe Photoshop 6. The tip and warning icons were drawn by Christopher Bing. This colophon was written by Sarah Sherman.

The online edition of this book was created by the Safari production group (John Chodacki, Becki Maisch, Madeleine Newell, and Ellie Cutler) using a set of Frame-to-XML conversion and cleanup tools written and maintained by Erik Ray, Benn Salter, John Chodacki, and Jeff Liggett.