Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Game Engine Architecture Top Quality


Read the first few pages and see if this is a beast you want to own. I think you will, because of the way this Text is written. The author gives you the correct terminology and the explanations behind them. This ones going to be on the night stand for a while because of the mere size and content. But dont take my word for it....check it outGet more detail about Game Engine Architecture.

Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything This instant


There's a power shift underway that's calling into question all our fundamental beliefs about how the world works. Don Tapscott's and Anthony D. Williams' penetrating insights in "Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything" are a timely orientation to the new world of mass collaboration where peer-to-peer communities consistently outpace hierarchical bureaucracies. These collaborative communities, leveraging the powerful new technologies of the Internet, are routinely accomplishing previously unthinkable results by discarding all the accepted ways for how large numbers of people get things done.

Tapscott and Williams make a strong case for the proposition that we have entered a new age with new rules where the nature of the game has completely changed. The participation revolution unleashed by the Web is creating a new world where, for the first time in history, large numbers of people can now work together without having to go through a central organization. More importantly, these new forms of self-organization produce smarter, faster, and less costly results than their hierarchical counterparts. That's why, according to the authors, it's just a matter of time before these agile new ways of organizing eventually displace the plodding habits of traditional corporate structures.

The new economics of this new world of mass collaboration, which Tapscott and Williams dub "wikinomics," are based on four fundamental principles: openness, peering, sharing, and acting globally. Companies, such as IBM, are discovering that, by breaking down their boundaries and being open to external ideas, they are outperforming counterparts who rely solely on their internal resources. Linux is leading the way in inventing new forms of peer-to-peer organization that belie our notions for how to build software. Biotechnology firms are redefining the economics of intellectual property by sharing their discoveries to mutually leverage their collective knowledge. And the Internet is transforming markets into global villages where people and assets will need to be managed across traditional cultural and organizational boundaries.

The level of agility, creativity, and connectivity made possible by the new economics of our new age will raise the competitive bar for all industries. Consequently, Tapscott and Williams warn that the organizational values, processes, and architectures of the command-and-control economy are not simply outdated; they are handicaps on the value creation process of our fast-arriving future. If you want to be prepared for this future, "Wikinomics" is a good place to start.Get more detail about Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything.

Monday, November 29, 2010

QuickBooks 2009 For Dummies Immediately


Despite 30 years of accounting experience and multiple accounting systems, QuickBooks is new to me so I need all the help I can get. This is one of the tools I am using along with tutorial software.Get more detail about QuickBooks 2009 For Dummies.

Professional C# 4.0 and .NET 4 (Wrox Programmer to Programmer) Best Quality


90% of everything is crud -- Ted Sturgeon
And this book is just another heap on the pile of the 90% of computer books.
It is pretty much a perfect illustration of the bitching that Phil Greenspun (you can find it on his site in the writing section) wrote about years ago that affects a lot of the commercial IT publishers (the F1 racecar on the front should never be used to judge, but it definitely isn't a good sign).

I ended up much happier and informed with C# 4.0 in a Nutshell: The Definitive Reference# supplemented with online reading about some of the ASP.NET and Web improvements. I think that is a better deal for practicing programmers.

I concur with other reviewers that things are "mile-wide and an inch deep". I'll extend it to say that books of this nature often have their place, but this book is inappropriately bulky for its mile and inch. This book really has more like 300 pages of content, buried in a lot of crap.

Some of the crap is just plain inaccuracies on tangential material. The inaccuracies for the most part are timewasters or groaners, as these silly statements usually are in discussion that has little salient value to conveying techniques. It is either part of a) unnecessary filler b) part of the most annoying stuff mentioned later.
More annoying are constant explanations of old concepts from programming ancient history being presented as "innovations." (The POV seems to be, for the most part, excepting a smidgen on DLR: anything not in the C++/Java hegemony must be an innovation). And the most annoying and depressing thing is the incessant cheerleading for C# and .NET combined with nearly no criticism or admission of problems of limitations in the design. It's not that I don't think these are overall good technologies, but I'm an engineer, don't insult my intelligence (average or possibly below average), there is nothing that is perfect, often simply due to real world constraints and necessary tradeoffs. A good comprehensive reference for "professionals" will talk about pitfalls and outright flaws in a technology candidly, and possibly talk about tradeoffs. It's depressing after reading page after page of material where you suspect there is a wart and the words just ignore it. Do the publishers really think I'm so simpleminded that if I hear a "critique" of some small flaw I'll drop everything and go drown myself and stop buying IT books?

As the Greenspun essay on IT publishing elucidates, there is a completely sound, logical process by which those competent in the subject matter individuals can end up having their "authorship" of a book that is another representative of IT schlock. I don't know what the authors' intentions are or really what their level of expertise on knowledge outside of Microsoft-land is, so I don't want to imply that the authors are unqualified, but this book is annoyingly cruddy for sure.

Short story: I think this is just another "pack it till it bursts", rush it out the door, and heavily edited by the IT publishing ministry of knowledge/marketing force. I gave it two stars because for the salient technical information it contains buried in their, it seems fairly well explained and with detailed care, but reading it is depressing for those that expect the author/publisher to giveGet more detail about Professional C# 4.0 and .NET 4 (Wrox Programmer to Programmer).

Saturday, November 27, 2010

Friday, November 26, 2010

The Wrong Box Right now


This was a great read! I couldn't wait to get to the end. It has quite the tangled plot and gave laughs along the way to boot. I didn't know who would end up where, but when the characters started bumping into each other in strange and twisted ways it was that much more interesting. Who would have thought that Robert Louis Stevenson had it in him? I never heard of this book until I purchased my Kindle and it was the first thing I read. I would recommend this to anyone who likes to be entertained.Get more detail about The Wrong Box.

Lowest Price Dreamweaver CS5: The Missing Manual


At over 1000 pages and 27 chapters, 'Dreamweaver CS5: The Missing Manual' by David McFarland is one of the rare books that I can EASILY give a Highest Possible Recommendation for. It has been known for quite some time that Dreamweaver is THE #1 resource for creating a professional web site in the most efficient way possible and with the fewest steps so that you can get your site created with netters surfing to it in the shortest amount of time. Now learn how to use Dreamweaver as efficiently as possible and get a peek at all the newest features in CS5!!

The material contained within is simply staggering: Basics, CSS, Forms, Flash, Automation, Database connectivity, and server-side XML and XSLT, it's all here!!

The Missing Manual is my favorite line of books because of the logical separation of content, the writing, and the design. My only gripe with this book would be the lack of color which could have easily been put in for only a small amount more added to the retail price, but this is not enough to knock my recommendation down. If you use Dreamweaver or want to learn more about what CS5 has to offer, pick this book up TO-DAY!!

***** HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATIONGet more detail about Dreamweaver CS5: The Missing Manual.

Thursday, November 25, 2010

Low Price Photoshop CS4, Volume 1: Visual QuickStart Guide


Has a lot of details, but does not go into some advanced techniques. I wish it did.Get more detail about Photoshop CS4, Volume 1: Visual QuickStart Guide.

Save Master and Man


Ayn Rand, in her The Art of Fiction, called Tolstoy "the archetype of a naturalist," a writer who describes events, but offers "only one layer of motivation." The writer who is "romantic" is better. He looks "not only at the immediate onion skin, but (examines motivation) as deep as the author can go." Other critiques disagree and consider Tolstoy one of the world's greatest writers. They may think that Tolstoy does not delve deep into character, but they do not see this as a negative. Despite her critique, Ayn Rand would probably agree that Man and Master is a very interesting short novel.
While its title indicates that the tale concerns two people, actually there is a third, the master's horse. The master thinks that he far smarter than his servant and nearly everyone else, including his wife. He cheats everybody, thinking they do not understand what he is doing, but he only succeeds because he is the master, not because of his wit. He takes his servant with him to buy land and cheat the seller, but gets lost several times because he thinks he knows directions. Actually the servant knows more than he does and the horse knows more than both of them.
Readers will leave the tale, as they leave all well-written stories, with many questions and their own answers. This is how good literature should excite us. What did the master learn from this experience? Did it really change his behavior and his attitude to life and to people and to money? And what about the peasant, was his life pathetic? Did the fact that he always had a good and happy reaction to everything make his life less pathetic? Is Tolstoy's portrayal of the three beings only a superficial glance at an onion skin or is the story multi layered and quite thought provoking? Does a writer have to point out everything, or are we expected to see some things ourselves?
Get more detail about Master and Man.

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Discount WPF 4 Unleashed


This is now the number 1 book for learning WPF 4 - it is a significant update of "Windows Presentation Foundation Unleashed" which was the best book for learning WPF. The book looks like it is twice as thick as the previous book; however, it is exactly the same style with material that looks just like the previous book - many of the same samples. The code is downloadable and uses Visual Studio 2010 solutions.

Very highly recommended.Get more detail about WPF 4 Unleashed.

Cheapest The Animator's Survival Kit--Revised Edition: A Manual of Methods, Principles and Formulas for Classical, Computer, Games, Stop Motion and Internet Animators


Starts from the beginning, and ends at the end, with teasers and challenges for you. I can easily translate the principles into 3D CG, and have learned so much, and my reel at [...] shows it. In fact, I can barely stand to watch bad Flash animation now!Get more detail about The Animator's Survival Kit--Revised Edition: A Manual of Methods, Principles and Formulas for Classical, Computer, Games, Stop Motion and Internet Animators.

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Cheap Gods and Fighting Men


This is a wonderful book for anyone interested in the Irish revival. Lady Gregory's literary recreation of western Ireland's Anglo-Irish dialect is simply a delight. Some readers complain here that these are not faithful translations of the Old Irish texts. No doubt, but we don't read Lady Gregory for philological accuracy. That said, she had a profound knowledge of many of the older texts.

Readers should beware that the Kessinger Publishing edition is riddled with misprints and mistakes on almost every single page (hence the low rating for this particular edition). The publishers seem to have scanned an original edition and then changed the type to a very boring and ugly text. Unfortunately, their scanner was not very good. "b"s and "h"'s are regularly interchanged (p. 19" "be [read `he') lost his arm") and many of the proper names are mangled beyond recognition (e.g. p. 44: Ild -strange double cross symbol -nach for "Ildanach). I have never seen a more poorly presented text. Shame on Kessinger!

Get more detail about Gods and Fighting Men.

Buying Beginning ASP.NET 3.5: In C# and VB (Programmer to Programmer)


Great book! Easy to read and broken down well. I'm about half way through the book and I have a very good understanding of ASP.Net and C# now. I am a Classic ASP programmer trying to make the transition to .Net and this book has helped considerably. Some things are a little too easy but it is a Beginners book after all. I probably should have got the professional version but so far Im quite impressed.Get more detail about Beginning ASP.NET 3.5: In C# and VB (Programmer to Programmer).

Monday, November 22, 2010

Buy The Bobbsey Twins at the Seashore


I liked this book because it was very, very exciting. It was so suspenseful, I stayed up really late at night to finish it. My favorite part was when they found the message in the bottle.Get more detail about The Bobbsey Twins at the Seashore.

Purchase Landing Page Optimization: The Definitive Guide to Testing and Tuning for Conversions


You've built your Web site, but are you still waiting for them to come? In this book, Tim Ash dispels the "If you build it, they will come" myth and provides guidelines for creating well-optimized landing pages. However, buyer beware: this is not a "quick fix" compendium, but rather a discourse on the fundamentals of what the author describes as "this challenging and rewarding field" (xix).

Tapping into an area for which you'll find few but increasingly numerous titles, Ash provides a valuable perspective that more than lives up to the promise that this step-by-step book will teach you the skills necessary to realize greater profit from your landing pages.

After helping you realize that the site that you and others in your organization have worked so hard to create is ugly, Ash encourages you to go a step further in your design. He shows, through a discussion of personality styles and excellent examples, how users judge your landing pages, as well as how your users reach their decisions. While maintaining that your site should adhere to usability standards, he suggests testing discrete factors and tuning pages to include what compels your users to make purchasing decisions.

Very beneficial is Ash's specific roadmap through analyzing the results of your multivariate testing. In this very meaty chapter, he gives you a foundation for performing a statistical analysis of your test results. Those of you who "don't do math" will likely need to read this chapter several times so that you can interpret your tests accurately and ultimately use the results to get buy-in from your development team.

Using the sound principles Ash presents, medium and large businesses with designated departments may be able to move forward with his suggestions right away. The biggest criticism for this work is that small and other businesses with limited financial resources, personnel, and time may find it difficult to do the extensive multivariate testing he recommends. Ash's discussion, in an appendix, of Google Web site Optimizer provides hope that anyone can delve into landing page optimization. Encouraging his readers to go forth and test no matter the method, he writes, "A little bit of something is better [than] a whole lot of nothing" (310).Get more detail about Landing Page Optimization: The Definitive Guide to Testing and Tuning for Conversions.

Sunday, November 21, 2010

Order QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter (Princeton Science Library)


Feynman is so masterful that he makes everything perspicuous. The book tells you what complex numbers (those things that you learned in high school) are for (amongst other things of course). It also tempts you to interpret the quantum nature of light - but you have also been warned by Feynman not to (page 9). You will have the chance of having Feynman himself explaining Feynman diagrams. You will learn that things can travel backwards in time (page 97) - or do they? You will also comprehend how all the three forces (electromagnetic, weak and strong) are inter-related (pages 136-142). And towards the end, Feynman will try to marvel you with the elegance of nature and its imbued mystery. Truly a masterpiece!Get more detail about QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter (Princeton Science Library).

Where To Buy The Magnificent Ambersons


A great novel - one of the greatest American novels but not as well know as it should be. George Minafer should be as well known as Gatsby. I cant imagine anyone not loving it.Get more detail about The Magnificent Ambersons.

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Shop For JavaScript: The Definitive Guide


Explains JavaScript with almost perfect clarity. Great for someone who is painfully confused by JavaScript.Get more detail about JavaScript: The Definitive Guide.

Microsoft SharePoint 2010: Building Solutions for SharePoint 2010 (Books for Professionals by Professionals)


Sahil is an outstanding author for many reasons. I have all his books and attended lot of sessions and that make me believe so.
One thing which is great about any Technology book author is examples/scenario's he/she provide and thats the reason I feel this books is a must have. All the examples are very close to some common business requirement and thats why it's so easy to understand them. On top of it author has mixed good humor to the book to make you smile in between. I will highly recommend the book anyone who want to know SharePoint 2010 capabilities without getting lost in 1000s of online blog posts.Get more detail about Microsoft SharePoint 2010: Building Solutions for SharePoint 2010 (Books for Professionals by Professionals).

Friday, November 19, 2010

Practical Guide to Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux, A (5th Edition) Review


The fifth updated edition of A Practical Guide to Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux offers an all-in-one reference packed with all the techniques needed to succeed with Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The latest coverage of Fedora 12 and REHL 5 is just the tip of the reference iceberg, setting this reference far above and beyond competing Linux books. From better coverage of network administration tasks and complete directions on using yum for Linux updates to a 500+ term glossary and index, this also includes a DVD with the full version of the Fedora 12 release.
Get more detail about Practical Guide to Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux, A (5th Edition).

The Gardener Top Quality


excellent collection of indian poetry. found it accidently while browsing in a huge 6 story library. quite a lucky find.Get more detail about The Gardener.

Thursday, November 18, 2010

The Door in the Wall and Other Stories This instant


These eight stories were better than I remembered them. In these stories, Wells wrote mainly about the time he lived in, and he is very capable of bringing the reader back to the time and helping them to see just what it was like. From a historical perspective, fascinating.

The plots are intriguing, and the characters are believable. Unlike Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who I think was only able to bring Holmes and Watson to life and found it difficult to write about other characters, Wells creates numerous characters that come alive.

Even the Country of the Blind, which I never liked much before, was interesting not just as a story but as a provocative statement on culture, religion and science.

I loved this book and highly recommend it.Get more detail about The Door in the Wall and Other Stories.

Free Books for Your Kindle (revised edition) Immediately


Most people think this book is just a rehash of what you can find on the internet on your own. However, there are people, like me, who suck at Google. I like that he has links directly on this book, so you can use the Kindle, or be reading the book while you type in the URL. That makes this a good, "quick reference" guide. It gives examples of why you might want something, and where you might find the more common stuff. He's giving "free" advertising to some of the websites, that we only have to pay a few bucks to keep for the future.
Also, I like how he explained the definition of "free books". It's written in plain English, and it shows why a book could be considered free. He turns the legalese into real word situations so you understand the process. That's what I am looking for.
Thank you for the effort.Get more detail about Free Books for Your Kindle (revised edition).

Monday, November 15, 2010

Windows XP For Dummies, 2nd Edition Decide Now


My wife, bless her heart, decided to try to get PC savvy in the last couple of years. She struggled with basic concepts. I had her, as is good practice for all newbies, play solitaire in order to get use to mouse clicks and movements. When it came to doing anything else, she was lost.

I got a copy of this book ... when I went off to work each day, she would work through it at her own pace and began to learn little by little how to navigate and do basic tasks. Before long, she gained confidence to begin trying new things. Thanks to "Dummies" our marriage stayed strong, it being a great alternative to frustrating hubby-lessons on the PC.Get more detail about Windows XP For Dummies, 2nd Edition.

Diffusion of Innovations, 5th Edition Right now


Everett M Rogers, Diffusion of Innovations (New York: Free Press, 2003 [1962]).

The diffusion of innovation is a conceptual framework in sociology for understanding innovation and change management. Rogers has collected findings from diffusion research and explains the innovation-diffusion process, the motivation of dissonance, characteristics of adopters, opinion leadership, consultation and the pace of change. Diffusion is about communicating a new idea and persuading people to adopt and implement it. Innovativeness as the degree to which a person or group is relatively early in adopting new ideas. Rogers identifies five types of innovativeness among people: (1) venturesome innovators, who are obsessed with being more venturesome than other members of society; (2) respectable early adopters, to whom others look for advice about an innovation; (3) deliberate early majority, bigger on deliberation and slower to follow; (4) skeptical late majority, who eventually adopt; and (5) traditional laggards who value tradition over all and slowly or never adopt innovations (pp.279-285). Rogers' categories are helpful for identifying appropriate organisational change processes. (From my "The Shaping of Things Now: Mission and Innovation in Emerging Churches in Melbourne", DTheol thesis, MCD, 2009, pp.26-30)

Originally reviewed for D Cronshaw "The Emerging Church: Pioneering Leadership and Innovation Reading Guide", Zadok Paper (Forthcoming 2010).
Get more detail about Diffusion of Innovations, 5th Edition.

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Save Mastering Canon EOS Flash Photography


Have yet to read the entire book, but from what I have read it appears to be well written and easy to understand(it dose help if you know some camera lingo). Filled with techniques and equipment ideas for the novice all the way up to the advanced professional. This book is focused on Canon EOS equipment but would be useful for anyone wanting to learn how to use their flash better regardless which type of camera you use, but of course Canon users will gain the most knowledge and techniques to use with their camera.Get more detail about Mastering Canon EOS Flash Photography.

Discount Vegetable Gardening for Dummies


We're putting in our first vegetable garden and are absolutely clueless about the process. We have several gardening books that assume there's at least a basic understanding of the gardening principles. We needed a basic book and got it with the Dummies book. For right now, for this first garden, this is the book we're using.Get more detail about Vegetable Gardening for Dummies.

Friday, November 12, 2010

Cheapest YouTube and Video Marketing: An Hour a Day


Have you seen Blendtec's entertaining "Will It Blend?" videos on YouTube? Founder Tom Dickson throws such items as marbles, running shoes, glow sticks, golf balls and iPhones into his company's blenders and flips the on switch. People love these crazy videos so much that Blendtec's YouTube channel has more than 200,000 subscribers. In this book, Internet video-marketing expert Greg Jarboe explains how you, too, can become a "viral video master" and profitably showcase your products on YouTube. The book is part of John Wiley & Son's An Hour a Day series, which makes various undertakings less daunting by breaking them down into easy-to-manage, step-by-step tasks. Covering technical information, video marketing tactics, strategy development, campaign implementation and results measurements, Jarboe offers a well-illustrated yearlong workflow using 60 minutes daily for video marketing - though an hour seems more practical for some steps than others, like running a promotional campaign. getAbstract recommends his thorough manual to entrepreneurs and marketers of all types.Get more detail about YouTube and Video Marketing: An Hour a Day.

Cheap Core JavaServer Faces (3rd Edition)


I was completely new to Java Server Faces before reading this book. It was an OK book, but I think the author could have done a better job explaining the topics. They do a lot of referencing you to forward chapters in the book which I thought was confusing. The examples skipped from really easy trivial stuff, to very difficult hard to fallow examples with nothing in between. I also disliked how the authors spend so much time making everything locale independent. Every example in the book is locale independent which makes it harder to follow. It would have been sufficient to have one chapter or section on the topic, and for the other examples not worry about it. I've since read some other books that discuss java server faces, and found them to be much more helpful.Get more detail about Core JavaServer Faces (3rd Edition).

Thursday, November 11, 2010

Buying Pro Drupal Development, Second Edition


This is not about the actual contents of the book, but the way the Kindle edition is done - namely, very poorly. There are no chapter marks, so of course you can't click on the chapters in the Table of Contents to navigate to that chapter. Not only that, the Table of Contents is just copied from the print edition - complete with the original page numbers! Very confusing and annoying. Given that the price of the Kindle edition is almost the same as the price for the print edition, you're better off with the latter really. A really poor job by the publisher - and for a tech reference book no less. Even the free novels available for the Kindle from Harlequin and such have properly marked chapters and a navigable table of contents. Harlequin beats Apress for tech savvy - imagine that!Get more detail about Pro Drupal Development, Second Edition.

Buy A Practical Guide to Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux


The fifth updated edition of A Practical Guide to Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux offers an all-in-one reference packed with all the techniques needed to succeed with Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The latest coverage of Fedora 12 and REHL 5 is just the tip of the reference iceberg, setting this reference far above and beyond competing Linux books. From better coverage of network administration tasks and complete directions on using yum for Linux updates to a 500+ term glossary and index, this also includes a DVD with the full version of the Fedora 12 release.
Get more detail about A Practical Guide to Fedora and Red Hat Enterprise Linux.

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Purchase C# 4.0 in a Nutshell: The Definitive Reference


I love this book! I am an experienced C#/.NET programmer and I love that this book is (1) comprehensive, (2) concise and to the point. Let me elaborate. The book touches on every single feature of C# so if you want to look up a particular C# feature (either the syntax or how it works) it is there in this book. Every topic is explained in a concise way - no laborious explanations using extra-long samples (that you find in introductory books) while at the same time capturing the essence of the concept.

In my opinion, this book is not suitable if you want to use it to learn C# from the ground up and you don't have significant programming experience.Get more detail about C# 4.0 in a Nutshell: The Definitive Reference.

Order Head First Design Patterns


This is a very good book to read about design patterns. It is very easy to understand the concepts and remember them than just reading the books on how to code them in different frameworks.

I highly recommmend this book to anyone interested in learning the design patterns.Get more detail about Head First Design Patterns.

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Where To Buy The Prince and Betty


This American version of _The Prince and Betty_ is a combination and mutilation of the original English version (which now seems unobtainable) and _Psmith, Journalist_. The English original might be worth reading, as is _Psmith, Journalist_; but I don't see any reason for anyone but a Wodehouse completist to read this mishmash. Wodehouse didn't even take the opportunity to remove the glaring dei ex machinæ from the plot, and some aspects (e.g., [P]smith's inconsistent characterization) make sense only if you know their origin in an attempt to reconcile the unreconcilable. Some amusement is to be had, however, from the sheer incongruity, e.g., [P]smith as an alumnus of Harvard and (mild spoiler) a jailbird.Get more detail about The Prince and Betty.

Shop For Pro WPF in C# 2010: Windows Presentation Foundation in .NET 4


If you want to really learn WPF this is the book for you. It apparently doesn't skip anything. I have lots of WPF books, but none are anywhere near
this coomprehensive. I'm impressed, to say the least. In a field of good WPF books, it stands head and shoulders above the rest.Get more detail about Pro WPF in C# 2010: Windows Presentation Foundation in .NET 4.

Monday, November 8, 2010

Official (ISC)2 Guide to the CISSP CBK, Second Edition ((ISC)2 Press)


This book was vital in my prep for the CISSP. I just took the exam on June 25, 2010. I also used Shon Harris and CISSP for Dummies. This book contained information that was not in the other 2 books. The authors of this book presented the information is ways which I was able to absorb better. The information was consice and in detail. I would not have been as ready as I was for the test without this book. I read every page. You won't be sorry to have bought this book and used it to perpare for the exam. I am still waiting for my exam results.Get more detail about Official (ISC)2 Guide to the CISSP CBK, Second Edition ((ISC)2 Press).

Sunday, November 7, 2010

High Performance MySQL: Optimization, Backups, Replication, and More Review


This is just the best book I've read about creating software, that needs high availability and high scalability. You think, this is book is only about MySQL? Surprise! It's not, actually. Yes, some details apply only to MySQL, but common technical things such as data sharding, caching, clustering etc. can be applied to any software.

Reading this book I've learned like I read about 10 different books on the subject. Highly recommended! It's a pity there is no Russian translation available.Get more detail about High Performance MySQL: Optimization, Backups, Replication, and More.

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Version Control with Git: Powerful Tools and Techniques for Collaborative Software Development Top Quality


This book jumped into the weeds way too fast. Which is good and bad. The label "power user" is appealing and I see the merit in knowing internals. But not with source control. It's a tool. I want to be able to use it productively and quickly and not have to remember MORE THAN two dozen commands. I'm not afraid of branching or merging, but then again, I don't care how these branches and merges are represented as objects on the filesystem.

And that's the problem. This book starts with the assumption that you're interested in the details and will cherish an under-the-hood look. Actually, for me, I really don't care. The details are certain to change. I'm convinced I'll be throwing this book out in a few years because it's outdated. I wouldn't be surprised if Git's hyphenated low level command structure disappears in a few years making this book nearly unusable - these commands are more developer tools than user tools.

With all the negative stuff out of the way, the book does contain a lot of good information. It's easy to read. It hits on a few interesting ideas on managing git. I found no issue following along with the examples - all of them worked fine for me.Get more detail about Version Control with Git: Powerful Tools and Techniques for Collaborative Software Development.

C# 4.0 in a Nutshell: The Definitive Reference This instant


I love this book! I am an experienced C#/.NET programmer and I love that this book is (1) comprehensive, (2) concise and to the point. Let me elaborate. The book touches on every single feature of C# so if you want to look up a particular C# feature (either the syntax or how it works) it is there in this book. Every topic is explained in a concise way - no laborious explanations using extra-long samples (that you find in introductory books) while at the same time capturing the essence of the concept.

In my opinion, this book is not suitable if you want to use it to learn C# from the ground up and you don't have significant programming experience.Get more detail about C# 4.0 in a Nutshell: The Definitive Reference.

Friday, November 5, 2010

The Golden Bough Immediately







In this landmark study Frazer digs up the oldest of Christianity's roots--the worship of a god who dies only to be resurrected--and follows it to its elemental source: the cyclical death and rebirth of plant life. It's that simple. The turning of the seasons. Drawing upon examples from hundreds of cultures and peoples as divergent as African huntsmen and German peasants, Native Americans and Welsh farmers, Frazer proves conclusively that Christianity and a host of other religions all reflect the death of the Earth in fall and winter and its rebirth in spring and summer.
Ron Hogan, whoever he is, criticizes Frazer for the so-called "social Darwinism" that "finds its most explicit form in Frazer's rhetorical question: `If in the most backward state of human society now known to us we find magic thus conspicuously present and religion conspicuously absent, may we not reasonably conjecture that the civilised races of the world have also at some period of their history passed through a similar intellectual phase?'" Substitute the word "primitive" for "backward" and the statement is now politically correct; it is already correct on every other level. Hogan goes on to complain: "Frazer was much too genteel to state plainly that `primitive' races believe in magic because they are too stupid and backwards to know any better; instead he remarks that `a savage hardly conceives the distinction commonly drawn by more advanced peoples between the natural and the supernatural.' The stupidity here belongs to Hogan; scholars from Carl Jung to Claude Levi-Strauss argue quite conclusively over many pages precisely this point: primitive--or let us say primal as Jamake Highwater suggests to intimate "first"--primal cultures do NOT separate the natural and supernatural. Remove "by more advanced cultures" and Frazer become politically correct--and that is the only correctness Hogan is arguing. Frazer wasn't being "genteel" by not calling such cultures "stupid"; stupid has nothing to do with Frazer's argument. That's Hogan's area of expertise.
The Golden Bough is absolutely brilliant in its insights and breathtaking in scope. And we should be ashamed that for decades Frazer's chapter on the Crucifixion was dropped from all the abridged versions of his classic study--and let's face it; no one outside of a handful of scholars is going to read the 12-volume unabridged third edition. This is what's truly primitive--pretending that if we hide Frazer's analysis of the Crucifixion the analysis and its implications don't exist.
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Marketing in the Age of Google: Your Online Strategy IS Your Business Strategy Best Quality


Every once in a great while a new business book is published that just oozes with credibility and usefulness. Such is the case with Vanessa Fox's "Marketing in the Age of Google." Vanessa is a search engine optimization expert and former Google spokesperson. Her book takes off quickly, pointing out that 88% of online search dollars are spent on paid results, but 85% of searchers click on organic (non-paid) results. Slightly over half (56%) of Google searches return no paid ads. Although $9.1 billion was spent on online advertising in 2007, and it is projected to reach $20.9 billion in 2013, improving performance with organic search results is the focus of her book.

Worldwide there are 131 billion searchers/month, 23 billion by Americans. About 12% of U.S. searches are focused on retail items, and 63% of search-related purchases occur offline. Essentially all searchers look at the first organic result, while only 50% look at the first paid result. Fox points out that searchers will tell you exactly what will compel them to buy your products - if only you will look for the answers. Information within Google Insights for Search and Google Trends can reveal the relative popularity of similar search terms, trends and seasonality in their popularity, where (geographically) most inquiries are coming from. Other sources for useful sights include Google Adwords (Fox suggests trying a few ads, if only for the information retrieved), Google Analytics (reports number of visits, time on site, number of pages visited, bounce rate), Compete.com (degree of competition associated with various search terms), and [...] (what sites and search terms are driving visitors to your site). [...] and others can help alert marketers to PR disasters in the making before they get too far.

Must reading, and ownership for any marketer.
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Thursday, November 4, 2010

Grown Up Digital: How the Net Generation is Changing Your World Get it now!


A must for anyone who has Net Generation (born after 1977) staff or markets products and services to this demographic.

Contains some very useful and specific data relative to the size, distribution and habits of the global online community. "There are more people on the web in China , for example, than there are in the entire United States".

This insightful and informative resource will facilitate optimizing and engaging the next generation workforce. This is acutely paramount for emerging economies with majority populations under 30 years of age. This group will be the supplanters for "in the United States alone, there will be a shortfall of 10 million workers by 2010.

If nothing else, it will act as a wake up call to those that think social networking has run its course or banning Facebook in the workplace is a smart of effective measure.Get more detail about Grown Up Digital: How the Net Generation is Changing Your World.