5 comments about Assembly Modeling with Solidworks, 2004-2005.

1. This book appears to have the identical structure; Chapter headings, subheadings and order as the 2003 edition. My comments are based on the 2003 edition.
   
   I have been doing CAD modeling for over 14 years, and am just moving over to SolidWorks from a far more intuitive but not parametric package.
   
   This has been one of the most infuriating, and badly written textbooks I have ever seen or had the displeasure to use.
   
   I started with book one, by the same Authors - SolidWorks 2003 Tutorial, which plods through the exercise at an excruciatingly slow pace. This book is way worse. The title of the book is Assembly Modeling in SolidWorks, but it is not until half way through chapter two that you actually model a very simple part. Chapter one is spent almost entirely on how to order your files and folders and the simple task of putting three components together to form an assembly; this is repeated three times or more over 60 pages. Simple tasks are made complex, while the important things are rushed over.
   
   The authors have a poor grasp of the English language and appear unable to use tenses, everything is written in the present tense which is VERY confusing as chapters are structured to tell you what you will be doing, how to do it, doing it, and then a review of what you have done. Sometimes what you will be doing and doing it are mixed together in the body of an exercise, sometimes not. While you are building parts or assemblies the Authors are constantly showing you all the underlying complexities of SolidWorks, which becomes frustrating as it takes for ever to do the simplest things and only adds confusion.
   
   My advice - look elsewhere.



2. I have purchased other books from these authors in the past two years and I have found them all to be very useful and complete. The book on Assembly Modeling is no exception. This book does an excellent job in providing a sound learning structure with clear and concise procedures on Assembly Modeling. It is one of the few SW books out there that addresses Assembly Modeling. It is an excellent book to have in your arsenal of information on SW.
   
   I am a Mechanical Engineer working in a small company; approximately 50 employees. I do not have the luxury to ask other engineers in my department for assistance, because I am the only Design engineer here! I had a formal SW training class 16 months ago; a one week bootcamp that was good, but I was overwhelmed with the amount of material and the speed in which it was presented. Over the past two years, I have been purchasing books on SW to build a resource library at my company. This book provides an easy to follow procedure with all of the required commands in bold. I like the way the authors use pictures to enforce the procedure. It was slow in a few areas, but it was a good review for me. This is the third Solidworks book that I have purchased from these authors.
   
   I have contacted both authors in the past for assistances when I was working on an area that was not covered in their book or I required extra assistance. They are a great resource with a wealth of knowledge and experience in design. Both are Mechanical Engineers with equipment design backgrounds. I would recommend this book.



3. This is the second of two books, the first being, "Engineering Design with SolidWorks 2005" that I purchased from these authors. Both books are well written and have clear and succinct instructions. The books walk you through various projects in each chapter. The enclosed CD in the book is very useful. I would recommend this one!



4. First, about me. New to solidworks, not new to CAD. Bought the book knowing the basics but needing to learn more about Assemblies. My prefered way of learning software is to start with a project that is of interest to me (work or personal). When I get stuck, I like to go to a reference and read about a topic and then hopefully see an example. Then I apply what was shown to my project.
   
   This book is very awkward for trying to learn this way mainly because the examples are way too complicated for demonstrating simple operations. I really think to get the most from this book you need to start at the beginning and work your way through - like you would do in a classroom setting - I'm guessing this is what the book might be written for and it might me a fine book in that setting.
   
   My interest was to use the book as a reference to quickly learn solutions to specific problems I encounter while working on my own projects. For this purpose, the book did not meet my needs



5. I have been using SW for approximately five months. I was an old Pro/E user. I purchased this book last month and I AM GLAD THAT I DID! The book is very well written and I agree with the other reviewers in that the book provides an easy to follow step by step procedure. SW is a great software tool. The author works with toolbars and right-click commands. The screen shots in the book are clear and accurate. I was able to simply follow the steps with their bold commands and watched the enclosed CD for the proper procedure. It was simple and straight forward. What a concept! Very good book.

5 comments about Revolutionary Guide to Assembly Language.

1. I've been programming in assembly language (among other languages) since 1980, but just recently I decided I needed a book to brush up on some of the aspects of programming in assembly language on the 80x86 chip set. I bought this book because I felt like out of the books I reviewed, it was the easiest to read and the most well laid out in general. It also was very complete.

   The book covers most aspects of assembly language and how it can be used on the IBM PC and compatible computers. It details system (BIOS) calls available on the PC to the assembly language programmer and gives you a good working knowledge of what you are up against when programming in assembly language. However, as the author states up front, this book does not cover a few of the more advanced features of assembly language on the PC (protected memory modes, 32 bit instructions, etc). With that said, I don't think this should really be viewed as much of a short coming. In many cases, these commands aren't often used anyway and certainly their absence in this text doesn't detract from what this books sets out to teach you.

   The book (and one of the main reasons I bought it) also has a very nicely laid out reference section that clearly explains each instruction (aka the commands) available to the programmer in the Intel chip set.

   However, as good as this book is for someone wanting to get up to speed on assembly language, I would caution prospective buyers against assuming this is a book designed for the "total novice" when it comes to assembly language programming. Even if you already know how to program in a language such as Basic or Perl, programming in assembly language can sometimes be quite a change of gears in thinking. There are no "Print" commands in assembly language :-) There are macro functions in MASM 6, but at the same time when you program in assembly language, you largely are dealing directly with memory locations, registers and the core instruction set in the CPU. You have to think in terms of binary numbers, and raw data to a large degree.

   All that is fine if you already have a broad understanding of what's going on in assembly language to begin with. However, if you don't (i.e. if you are a total novice to the world of assembly language programming), then there is a chance this book may leave you a little confused at the start.

   When I first taught myself how to program in assembly language, it was at the age of about 15. At that time, I had no concept of what binary was, nor did I have any idea how memory locations, let alone how registers of a CPU fit into the big picture. Fortunately, the book I used to teach myself started from square one and assumed you knew nothing about binary or anything else. While those chapters were very hard to get a handle on initially, looking back they were very important to understanding the overall concept of how assembly language functions.

   Again, as good as this book is, my fear is that someone starting at square one might find themselves feeling a little left out in the cold by the author if they don't already have a solid understanding of what a High and Low byte are, or if they have no concept of what a Most Significant Bit is.

   In my view, the addition of a chapter on "what is going on here with assembly language and the binary numbering system" might be very helpful for those very who are new to the world of assembly language programming. Nonetheless, this is a very well laid out book and certainly should be part of any book shelf owned by anyone who has designs on programming in assembly language (which of course is the only real programming language - just kidding :-)




2. If I had to rate this book in 2 words it would simply be "BUY NOW!" This book teachers everything that you need to be an intermediate programmer (unfortuanately the interrupts are only for DOS not linux or unix or mac or so on) but it is a great book. Comes with complete source code but no compiler.



3. If you know some high level language (concepts, structure, procedures, functions) and have a basis in assembler (know what mov means) Then this book can be of value. Has a lot of good examples for each subject covered. Covers a subject that I don't see covered much in alot of the assembler books I have read, writing macros (like writing a function in a high level language, sort of). I would recommend these books in order: ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE STEP BY STEP, REVOLUTIONARY GUIDE TO ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE, MASTER CLASS-ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE.



4. I got this book when I was twelve or thirteen and I only knew how to code BASIC at the time... I must admit that at first it was a bit overwhelming; however, after reading this book I must say I had become a competent assembly language programmer. This book is superb, PACKED with info, and great for beginners.



5. This book has a lot of useful information on low level stuff. There are chapters on Disks, Video and Bios/dos services.
   Some of the material belong in a history book but I found the book very useful in my research on operating systems.
   If you don't mind learning 16 bit assembly language, you should consider this book. However it helps if you know a bit of assemly language before you attempt to read this book.
   A good introduction is "Assembly Langauge Step by Step" (if you dont mind authors who keep telling boring stories in between the material).

4 comments about Computer Organization Assembly Language (2nd Edition).

1. Don't bother with this book. I'm a student taking a class in assembly language, and it's almost hard to believe an author would gloss over so many things and give problems at the end of chapters and chapter segments which he gives no clue whatsoever in the text as to how to solve them. If I were the author, I'd be almost embarassed at some of the laxity in this book's organization. I suppose it might have a few good points, but you'd be better off looking elsewhere.



2. About the only use I've found for this book is for kindling on those chilly winter nights. Even my assembly professor agrees that you should not waste your money with this one. The exercises are a joke, it's information on flag changes is completely wrong, and there isn't even a decent reference for the most basic of instructions. Go with Irvine, a much better investment.



3. i'm a doctor in princess sumaya university ,and i'm teching assembly language



4. This is a good book to learn assembly language. The author spends a lot of time on the fundamentals. The author fully explains the effects on the Flag registers after an instruction is executed, and also fully explains the HEX numbering system. The author also does a good job of explaining how interupts work as well as how to use them. This is the only book I have ever fully studied on assembly language and to this day, all the way from writing simple "Hello World" programs to understanding viruses, I have never lacked the knowledge I needed.

2 comments about The Motorola MC68332 Microcontroller: Product Design, Assembly Language Programming and Interfacing.

1. This book gives a different look at the 68332. Most of the information is available in Motorola's documents but this is a good cross reference and introduces additional ways of looking at the complicated microprocessor. The book covers the "A" mask and not the "G" Mask as it was written in 1991 maybe before the "G" Mask was available.

   Some of the sections give insights into the operation that are not clearly discussed in the Motorola documentation. For this alone I think it is worth purchasing.

   Be advised that the hardware development systems shown have been replaced by better equipment since 1991. However the basic processor has not changed and there are insights to be gained by study of this Reference. Many assembly language examples are given throughtout the text.




2. I am involved in the design of a VME CPU card based on this microcontroller.

   The basics of the microcontroller and software aspects are well discussed.

   Surely a must for those working with this microcontroller.

No comments about Language Translators: Assemblers, Compilers, and Interpreters.

No comments about Assembler Language for the IBM System 370 a Modular Approach.

No comments about Structured Assembler Language for IBM Computers.

No comments about Assembly Language Primer for the IBM PC (Plume Computer Books).

1 comments about 68HC12 Microcontroller.

1. - Covers assembly language programming.
   - Attempts to cover Fuzzy Logic Controler.
   - Has descriptions of hardware.
   
   Might be good for entry level.
   Certainly NOT worth the money. Nothing here you can't get from the spec sheets. Examples in asm harder to follow than C. While every student should learn asm, the focus should be on C.
   Authors show lack of software development skills, and a sketchy knowlege of computer science.

5 comments about A Programmer's View of Computer Architecture: With Assembly Language Examples from the MIPS RISC Architecture.

1. THIS BOOK STARTS OUT WELL, AND THEN DEGENERATES INTO ERRORS, ERRORS, ERRORS, AND MORE ERRORS. THE CONCEPTS IN THE LAST FEW CHAPTERS ARE EXPLAINED TERRIBLY. I FEEL GENUINELY SORRY FOR ANYBODY TRYING TO GET AN INTRO TO COMPUTER ARCHITECTURE CONCEPTS BY READING THIS BOOK.



2. Having taken the class at UW-Madison for which this book was written, and my instructor being Karen Miller (one of the authors), even she admitted to the great number of errors. It is highly frustrating to open the book read something, and then wonder, "Gee, is this correct?" Constantly referring to Karen's list of webpage errors was frustrating. Chapter 9 was completely re-written and made available to us in PDF format because the book's version was poor.

   I'm shocked that the university is still using the text. Though it was only slightly easier to follow the material since the author was also my instructor, she also seemed annoyed that through some departmental/political/publishing snafu that they are still using the text 10yrs later.

   Avoid this book if you have a choice.




3. To be fair, the first printing of this book did have a LOT of errors. But that was in 1993! And some of those copies are still circulating, especially in Madison, WI. But I only know of about three errors in the latest printing, and they are all very subtle.



4. Based on the author's review I tried to get a copy of a newer edition than 1993. According to Oxford Press, the newer edition is in press but has not been printed and they have no publication date available.



5. In my opinion, while there are quiet a few typos and errors in this book. All in all, it was an excellent introduction to computer architecture, especially looking at it from a software developer's point of view.
   
   These days, people tend to take abstraction for granted, forgetting about all the ugly stuff that it's hiding. I believe that it's essential for programmers to learn about the nitty gritty details, using a book such as this one, to fully appreciate what they're working on.