No comments about Programming PC Connectivity Applications for Symbian OS: Smartphone Synchronization and Connectivity for Enterprise and Application Developers (Symbian Press).

2 comments about Mobile Phone Programming: and its Application to Wireless Networking.

1. I have more than 6 years experience in this industry and can tell that this is the first book of this kind I saw. It will allow you to get your own hands-on experience with many different platforms, from Series 60 to Qtopia. Due to real programming examples, it is very praxis oriented, but also with several scientific aspect rising open questions. And all this without any "hypes" or "bubbles", as you maybe know from other books about "mobile". If you are an expert, it will also allow you to get a piratical impression of other platforms in a short time. So, in the nutshell, this books is worth each $$ use spent on it! Great book!



2. Very good introduction and high-level overview of the different mobile "primary" application platforms (Symbian/C++, JavaME, and WinMob). The book even dedicates chapters to Maemo Linux and Qtopia Greenphone -- although, as a critique, I doubt too many mobile developers would currently be focusing on either one of those OS platforms. Given today's environment, it would have been nice to see some mention of Apple's CodeX or Google Android; but, the book was published in 2007 when those platforms were just starting to bubble up. Giving the book an additional star due to its coverage of Device Discovery, P2P, Power Consumption considerations during design, and Cross-Layer Communication. If you are new to -- or just interested in -- mobile application design, this is a great resource to start with to see how vast the playing field is....and what the future may hold.

5 comments about MCDST 70-272 Exam Cram 2: Supporting Users & Troubleshooting Desktop Applications on a Windows XP Operating System (Exam Cram 2).

1. The book had a lot of useful information, however it did not really go indepth on any of the subjects. I wish the book had given more examples or details on the topic. It provided only 145 questions, compared to other books for the test that provided over 300. I gave the book 3 stars because it is a useful study guide that can fit into my purse so I can take it everywhere. I would suggest reading something more in depth first.



2. This book provides a good high level overview of the material. The main shortcoming is that it makes statements like "make sure you know this or that" but doesn't explain or provide examples. I took the test and passed, but don't think this book contributed a lot to my success. This book is worth a read, but don't rely on it.



3. I recently became involved in a project to setup a course for the 2 new MCDST exam, 70-271 and 70-272. These new exams appear to give you an entry in the Microsoft arena with out requiring a full blown MCSE track. The book takes the finer points of the objectives and breaks it down in to 9 chapters.
   
   The 70-272 exam is focused on the application side of XP and with that this book shows you a lot of customizing, optimizing, configuration and troubleshooting. You'll cover XP, email, Office and the internet and the book includes 2 complete practice exams.
   
   The book has a cd rom with the Measure UP testing engine, but there should be more questions included. Overall this should be on the list of material to use in the study process.



4. I will say that I am a fan of ExamCram2 Series of Study Guides, and that is what they are: "Study Guides". I was disappointed about the lack of material in this guide, do not rely on this book to pass the 70-272 Exam. If you pass the test just by reading this book you may have all ready had enough knowledge to pass. This book does not cover all the material in the exam by any means. The MeasureUp testing software is nice to get you use to the way some of the exam questions are. I would use this book to just go over questions and answers before you do a final write. I highly suggest to get Microsoft 70-272 Training Kit if you are new to alot of the material covered by this exam.



5. My IT background: ten years as a Unix admin, pursuing a Master's degree in Telecom. Extensive familiarity with desktop OS's and apps both as a user and LAN admin.
   
   Newcomers to IT hoping to use this book as a primary study source will be disappointed.
   
   I scored a 754 on 70-272 (700 is passing). The Exam Cram helped a bit in focusing which aspects of the Office, Outlook, and IE GUIs with which to become familiar. However, entire topics on the exam were completely unaddressed by this book ("Security Center", GPOs). Moreover, The book was apparently written before XP SP2 was released; the test requires knowledge of SP2 features.

1 comments about Guide to Operating Systems Security.

1. I used this book for a University course on Information System Security. The chapters on firewall, wireless security, VPN, E-mail security, and monitoring are good. The "hands-on" projects are very useful if you do not have Check Point software installed for the class. I will recommend this book to all.

5 comments about Novell Netware 6.5 CNA Exam Cram 2.

1. Time, determination and this book. That's all it takes to become a CNA.



2. Passed with 700 on first try.
   
   I thought I was pretty advanced already - I have installed and upgraded many 6.5 servers, clients, managed a huge e-dir tree, file system, NSS volumes, rights, NDPS. I thought I was totally ready for the test.
   
   Just to make sure I wasn't wasting my $125 on the test, I figured $20 for this book was good insurance. And it SO was!
   
   The test includes a lot of little esoteric facts about NetWare that even someone with lots of experience might never see. This book does a good job of bringing all of those little esoteric facts to light.
   
   The sample questions at the end of each chapter and sample tests at the end of the book are also very good simulations of the type of questions you'll see. However, I wouldn't say that any of the questions are word-for-word from the real test.
   
   Also, there were some questions on the test that I didn't feel received adequate coverage in this book. Experience got me through those questions.
   
   The sample test questions on the included CD are clearly written by someone else. Some of them made no sense grammatically. It only includes multiple choice and fill-in questions. (The test has several other types of questions).
   
   The fill-in style questions on the CD also have a little quirk: unlike the real test, it is case sensitive. If the answer is "2" on a fill-in question, the real test will accept 2, two, Two, TWO, to, and too (so even bad spellers can get it right). But on the sample test CD, the answer might be programmed as "TWO" and "two", "2" and anything else is wrong.
   
   I didn't actually learn anything useful from this book, except how to use what I already know about NW 6.5 to pass Novell's exam. I would emphasize that you should already know a lot about Netware and have some recent and fairly advanced experience before reading this book and certainly before attempting the test.
   
   On second thought, I did find one very useful bit of information: Appendix A has a very informative table of IP ports used by all Novell products. It is the first time I have seen this information collected in one place.



3. I'm certified now thanks to this book. And what a time saver... the objectives are clearly defined and the material is straight to the point. As a bonus, the author includes brief notes on the do's and don'ts in a real world Netware environment. This is good stuff. If you are serious about getting certified, then this book is for you.



4. I have read the reviews from previous owners and have found a total difference in opinion of the book. I just took the test today and did not pass the exam. The new test is more diffucult than what I read in the book. Since this is the only book out there for the 6.5 exam we have no choice. I found that out of all the questions that are on the cd and in the book only about 4 of the questions were on the test. The book was written in 2005 and I think that the author should take the new test and update the book.



5. I used this book and Foundations of Novell Networking: Netware 6.5 to pass the test. This book alone might not be enough, especially if you don't have hands on experience with managing Netware server. I thought this book did not have enough exercises to pass the test. It is still an excellent source to use as part of your exam preparation.

5 comments about Operating Systems: A Systematic View (6th Edition).

1. If you are looking for a text that only covers Microsoft operating systems then this is not your book. BUT, if you want a book to teach the fundamentals of an operating system as a platform for today's bread and butter applications(AR, AP, BILLING, SA, INVENTORY, ETC) then this is super. The current world of new computer-ist they only know/learn the Microsoft systems. The bulk of processing done today is still in the backrooms with mainframe & midrange range systems using MVS, VM, VME, UNIX(and similars), and OS/400s, which Microsoft Win/95/98/NTs don't touch. This is for the student that must interface with the total computer industry not just word processing and INTERNET. It should be complimented with a good Win/98/NT bible type book.

   I do wish it was updated a little.




2. Operating Systems a Systematic View is written in clear, easily understandable language and is copiously illustrated. Unfortunately it virtues end there. I used this book as the text in the "Introduction to Operating Systems" at University of Phoenix. Both the course and the text were wanting.

   The text starts with a high level description of basic operating system functions that are common to all operating systems. This is the best section of the book. It benefits from the clear writing used throughout the book.Since it is a high level over view it is not hindered by its' superficiality, as the
   rest of the book is.

   The book then includes a description of UNIX, MVS, Windows 2000 and surprisingly, MS DOS. These are suitable to a very naive user who has never seen the operating system. They only provide a brief overview of each system. We are then treated to an extremely brief summary of each systems scripting or Job Control Language. If fact they are so brief as to be useless. These sections should have been left out.

   The text then leaps into a detailed description of each systems virtual memory management system. These sections are too superficial to benefit anyone who will actually be attempting system programing. They are to detailed to be worth while to someone who will not be doing system programing.

   The reader would have been better served by less introductory material on each OS, and by complete elimination of the discussion of virtual memory management. Instead that space should have been replaced by a more in depth study of the scripting and job control languages and by a look at performance tuning. The time spent of describing the data structures of the Windows virtual memory could better have been spent learning what parameters of the operating
   system can be tuned, and how to measure them.




3. This is not a college-level text. It includes shallow coverage of topics one would expect in an OS course, but not at a level appropriate of such a course, and then spends a tremendous amount of space on computer literacy issues, like how to use MS-DOS and Unix command lines, etc. I think the authors couldn't decide whether they wanted to write an OS text for non-majors, or a computer literacy text.

   In their preface, the authors seem confused about the meanings of the words "applied" and "theoretical," saying this is an applied text, and suggesting that texts for actual OS courses are theoretical. While I will grant them that pretty much any other OS text out there has more theoretical content, this one also has less applicable content than most.

   Had the cover and preface made it clear this text was predominantly a computer literacy text, I'd have had no problem with it, nor would it have made its way to my bookshelf. But the title, the text on the back cover, and the preface are all misleading.




4. This book gives excellent explanation of how an operating system works and will suit a new computer user or someone on a more advanced level. The only downfall of this book was its limited text on Linux. Otherwise its a great book and worth having!



5. Unlike other OS books I've seen, A Systematic View is a clearly written, concise introduction to the foundations of operating systems -- or at least the first few chapters are. As noted by other reviewers, the book doesn't know where to go after the first section -- it meanders into too-brief-to-be-useful hands-on tutorial sections for the middle portion, then moves on to touch open a few particulars with a few popular systems in a way remniscent of excerpts from a heavier text before concluding with a section on distributed computing (the bulk of which concerns remote file access via CIFS/SMB). Scattered amongst the latter half of the book are some decent portions on virtual memory and x86 architectural features.
   
   The book would benefit greatly from having the tutorials moved to online appendices, the OS-specific analysis moved to standard appendices, and the core principles delved into more deeply. Davis and Rajkumar could also do with a few more technical proofreaders; while grammatical, spelling, and typographical errors are kept to a minimum, terminology is used oddly at best throughout the work with many of the "real-world" examples being flat-out wrong.
   
   Reservations aside, I have not found a more approachable introductory/survey text. It's just a pity that there are so many problems with it even in the 6th edition. With a bit of work this could be a respectable upper-division text, but at the moment I can only recommend it for two-year technical/community colleges.

5 comments about Operating Systems (3rd Edition).

1. The content of this text is decent. However, the organization and display of the content is horrendous. Maybe the final editor of this book was blind and was going through a braille copy, I'm not sure. The typeface used for the headings and topics in this book are so awful they are literally distracting. There are headings in an "olde script" font face followed by subheadings in a modern cursive font face. Everything about it is over the top and tacky.



2. I personaly love this book. Its on my must have list. Its very up to date (3/E includes detailed case studies on Windows XP and Linux) and the information is presented in an easy to understand method. The pictures are orginized nicely in a way that they help with the concepts instead of just taking up space. As a computer engineering student Ive had many textbooks on subjects like this and this is by far one of if not the best in the subject matter. I definatly recomend this book.



3. There are some good things to say about this book. It's written in clear, plain language, with helpful illustrations and code examples. Key terms are highlighted and defined concisely.
   
   Unfortunately there are many more bad things to say about it.
   
   Let's face it, this subject is about as exciting as counting freckles. The book's designers have tried to liven things up by suggesting in the book's appearance an old notebook of Leonardo da Vinci. The baroque ugliness of the book's design has already been mentioned by other reviewers.
   
   The authors have tried to liven things up by including anecdotes, biographical sketches, mini-case studies, and other sidebar material. It's a good-hearted but wrong-headed effort. None of this material is necessary, and it only serves to make a long story longer. The book is over 1200 pages long. The last thing a college student needs in his backpack is more weight to carry around all day. And who's actually going to read this stuff? (Hmm, let's see... what to do with my study time? fix my data structures code? perpare for my Calc exam? no, I think I'll read some speculation about the origin of the word "glitch".)
   
   It isn't just the sidebar fluff that pads the book's length. A typical chapter finishes up with a two-page summary, four pages of glossary (unnecessary if you've read the chapter, where the terms are already defined and set in colored type), four pages of exercises , and four pages of bibliography. Yes, a bibliography is appended to each chapter. I am not talking a simple "suggested for further reading". I am talking works cited, 100 or more per chapter. In one case the bib is 13 pages long, with over 400 citations. Who is this for? How many undergraduate students are going to pursue these references?
   
   The makers of this book have employed some crafty strategies to pad their work. Likely to go unnoticed is the redundant fifty-page glossary at the very end of the book, in case you missed the ones at the end of each chapter. The book's table of contents is unnecessarily detailed, with an entry for chapter headings, subdivisions, sub-subdivisions, as well as each sidebar. Next comes a list of every illustration and code example. In case you need to find one fast, or something. There follows a twenty-page preface which details the book's features, and includes a "Tour of the Book", an overview of the eight parts and 21 chapters of the book. The book's actual text doesn't get started until 66 pages in.
   
   I'm guessing this sort of content goes over well with textbook committees, because it means they don't have to read the book to get a sense of its content. I can imagine no other reason to include it unless it is to drive up the price of the book.



4. As many other reviewers have mentioned, this book has good content and very well written. However, the plethora of ancilliary information and cliche side-notes, mini-case-studies make what could've been a bar-non primer into a dreadful book. Even though I particularly think that OS is one of the bastions of computer science and thus I think it's a very interesting field, the authors totally missed their target audience insofar as design and layout is concerned! Additionally, this book is peculiar in that it tries to teach some OS examples using (of all possible languages) Java! What gives? Even my teacher (who usually defends this book) was upset about that one. And little by little the author manage to get a book you liked at the beginning of the semester into this horrendous text you don't even want to glance into. I gave three stars, because I do think that the content in the first five six chapters is really well explained and supported...overall...buy it if you must!



5. If you are a fan of the other Deitel books, you will probably like this one as well. I used this book in an undergraduate operating systems course and found it to be very useful. I later used the "dinosaurs" book (Silberschatz et al.) in a graduate course and was quite disappointed by the lack of detail.
   
   One minor complaint is that this book is quite verbose, so one tends to get a little tired reading it. On the other hand, all of the details are what make this book a very good introductory text. My complaint about the "dinosaur" book is the lack of details and lack of verbosity.
   
   In defense of the use of Java that other reviewers have complained about, I'm guessing that the writers wanted to use a language that their target audience (college undergrads) would most likely be familiar with. Also, using threads in Java is much easier than in some "OS-friendly" language like 'C'. As a way of demonstrating concepts, Java works quite well.

5 comments about Unix for Programmers and Users: A Complete Guide.

1. This was not the suggested text for a systems programming course I took, but thank god I used it anyway! The book is very well written in clear, easy-to-understand language (unlike the suggested text). The sample source code really clarifies the concepts he covers. I got to grips with UNIX quickly with Mr Glass' book. I would heartily recommend it to students and users.



2. This book teaches you UNIX in a very well organized fashion. Unlike many UNIX books that claim teaching UNIX through a light coverage of the basic commands and concepts, this book makes a balanced coverage between daily normal user needs and advanced system concepts in a very clear and understandable language.The examples are very well written and the coverage of concepts such as shell programming or the different system utilities though not very much detailed but enough to put you on track. As a reference, I keep it always beside when I get stuck in poorly written or overly detailed manpages. I don't know if this book is very well known in the UNIX community but for all whom I recommended this book, it was a great delight.



3. I was one of the guys who thought that UNIX is such an operating systems that's so difficult to understand and work with as a Network OS. I even was disturbed in choosing the NOS that I should work with. Lots of people advised not to use unix because of its difficulties in understanding although its powerfull capabilities. But when I began reading this book, I knew that all of those ideas were rubbish. Although it was writen since 1992, but I guess they replaced 8 by 2 -> 1998 .. GO FOR IT.



4. the book is fine for people in a course studying the Unix OS. For an end user just wanting to get their feet wet it is a little advanced. I found the general information to be helpful but a little more explaination would be needed. Overall it is well laid out but too advanced.



5. I do like this book for all things it show to us.. Especially there are treated in a very good order the way how to be connected in a few days with the most usefull commands of Unix. But, the editing joe command not exist./ however really good book..

5 comments about COM and .NET Interoperability.

1. most of the books about Interoperability bettwen COM and .NET for the programmer who worked with COM for a long time,but what will happen if you are learning .NET now and you don't know anything about COM (because you are new to programming world),so this book (the only one in the market) for the new developers and for expert developers too,it's easy to understand as all Mr.Andrew books,for me if they sell the book for 200 $ i will buy it,because of the way of explainning the subjects,if you want something about COM and .NET and how they work together FOR YOU without pain then go to the nearest bookshop and get this book now.



2. FIRST,LET'S SAY THAT MR.ANDREW DO A GREAT JOB IN HIS BOOKS,DO YOU IMAGINE HOW MUCH MONEY HE SAVE IT FOR YOU WHEN YOU READ HIS BOOKS ?
   THE BOOK BEGIN WITH OVERVIEW ABOUT COM AND .NET TOO AND IT'S EASY TO UNDERSTAND TOO,THE BSET THING IN HIS BOOKS THE CHRYSTAL EXAMPLES TO EXPLAIN WHAT HE WANT TO SAY,
   MR.ANDREW IS THE BEST AUTHOR IN THE WORLD AND A LOT OF MY FRIENDS SAY THAT TOO BECAUSE HE KNOW WELL WHAT HE'S DOING,



3. The very first book of his I bought about three years ago was COM and ATL3.0. The thing I liked about that book was the way the author explained the difficult concepts of ATL and COM in plain english.

   He does it again with this book. The book covers all the aspects of Interop services with examples, and explanations are clear and to the point. I was looking for a book that will help me get started on Interop services quickly and this book helped me tremendously.

   Great Job Andrew...




4. This book is definitely a good starting point. It covers most of the topics, a newcomer would like to see and enables both, the .NET programmer and the COM programmer (which is most likely a VB programmer) to find a way into the material.
   What is missing from my point of view is a section which describes the problems that a typical user/writer of legacy code (which COM definitely is from Microsoft's perspective) will have to overcome before he can reuse COM components in the .NET framework and write COM-usable components within .NET.
   Here it relies a bit to much on Microsoft's perspective, which is that "the Framework" will do everything for you.
   This is however only partly true and many programmers have gone through hard times.
   When you start with COM interop, it all seems to easy... but be assured, Microsoft has a lot of work to do for programmers to make it work seamlessly.



5. There may be times when you need to access legacy COM DLL's written in non-managed C++ or Visual Basic. This may be as a stop-gap measure until your older legacy code can be updated to .NET. In cases where performance is critical, you may have no desire to ever upgrade your C++ DLL, but would like to use C# for GUI design, rather than Microsoft Foundation Classes. If any of these situations apply, this is the book for you.
   
   This book begins with a few chapters that will bring the reader up to date on both sides of the GAP. First you are shown the fundamentals of COM objects. Second you are shown the newer .NET architecture. Only by understanding both sides will you be able to make the two effectively communicate. For experienced users, who are already familiar with COM and .NET this section can easily be skipped. The book then continues with an overview of what datatypes are available on each side, and how they cross over.
   
   The real meat of the book comes in the next two sections. Three chapters (the basics, intermediate and advanced topics) are given first for COM to .NET. Then the exact same pattern is repeated from .NET to COM. I spent most of my time with the .NET to COM part of the book, as I was using a C++ DLL with C#. The book answered all of my questions and I was able to successfully implement the application.
   
   The book provides a great deal of good information, but it is sometimes hard to find exactly what you are looking for. Each direction is covered in chapters named the basics, intermediate and advanced topics. What exactly is meant by this is not clear until you begin the chapter. I often found myself skimming all three sections trying to find an example close to what I was doing.

1 comments about The Ultimate Palm Robot (Consumer).

1. This is the first time I gave a book 1 star. The reason is that this book should not be sold as stand alone product, but with the kit from Acroname that this book is 100% tied to. The cost of the kit is 300+ USD! The writters falsely tell that you can build a robot by two options: from the kit and from the "scratch". Well, this "from scratch" is simply a lie! To build Palm controlled robot you need some kind of interface between Palm and motors, sensors, etc. Well, this book tells you to buy that interface from...guess who....Acroname! Building it from "scratch" would mean that you are provided with optional schematic diagram that would allow you to build interface. But it doesn't. Everything in the book is tioed to Acroname and its kit. The only good thing is software that comes with this book, but only if you buy that kit from Acroname (remember 300+ USD). This is the only reason book can get that 1 star, otherwise this is a perfect ZERO star book. Stay away from it!