No comments about Graph Theory for Programmers - Algorithms for Processing Trees (MATHEMATICS AND ITS APPLICATIONS Volume 515).

No comments about Letters Home From - Brazil (Letters Home From).

1 comments about Microsoft Windows XP Color Management.

1. Color used to be so simple, you left it to someone else to handle. To be sure you could select the film you wanted to use to highlight blues or reds or whatever, and when printing the image you had some control over the printing process. With the advent of desktop publishing this has changed. Color management is in your hands.
   
   This is a book that concentrates on color. It uses Adobe Photoshop Creative Suite 2 as the standard software package for illustrating what can be done. And there is one chapter on using Quark Express.
   
   The book starts with the simple question -- why doesn't the image coming from your printer match what you see on the screen. By the end of the book you'll not only know why, but you'll know how to fix it.
   
   As you can guess from the title, this book concentrates its discussion on Windows XP platforms. It's a welcome addition to the literature of handling color

2 comments about CCNA Routing and Switching Exam Cram Flashcards (Exam: 640-507).

1. This is a good study tool, but not a study guide into itself. After taking the CCNA 2.0, alot of the subject material was on, with the execption of the switching/bridging questions, which is why I am giving it four stars instead of five.



2. I am quite shocked at how many obvious errors there are in the CCNA Routing and Switching Flash Cards that I just purchased. A number (ten or more) of them have very egregrious errors. Example: a question for which none of 'answers' in the selection of answers are correct. Example: a question that starts out "GRP is a distance vector protocol" when it should be IGRP. Example: Question about an access-list 179, but the supposedly correct answer shows access-list 155. Example: question about subnet mask of 255.255.255.240, how many host id bits are there on this network? Answer selections are 28,6,10,8 (correct answer is 4), and is not even listed, but on back of the card lists answer c (10) as the right answer, but does list a correct narrative that says 4.

   There are more examples that I won't inflict on you. Didn't anyone proof read these for correctness? It makes it quite difficult to take the rest of the cards seriously, as there might be other wrong answers that are not as apparent as these ones. I trust that Coriolis will correct these errors and republish them, however, when I checked their web site today, there were no errata listed.

2 comments about Designing 3D Games That Sell! (Graphics Series).

1. At first I only bought this book as reference material for the world of game design, however, the provides far more valuable information than how to make a design document. The book gives any new developer/designer an insight as to the whole process of producing games. It also shows how to produce a complete game proposal starting with a conver letter and ending with budgets and shcedules.

   A MUST have as far as I am concerned.




2. This is a typical Charles River Media title: It promises a lot upfront (starting with the title), but goes only so far in delivering it.
   In particular, it reads like a glorified (if incomplete) manual for 'Genesis 3D,' a free, no-programming game development engine for developing Quake-like games - with a few chapters toward the end about the possibilities of another prototyping tool called 'Reality Factory,' a supposed Genesis 3D enhancement (again free).
   The good stuff, however, is in the beginning of the book: the game development (business) process, detailed and put as it is. I liked that, and feel THAT, if nothing else, should be the basis for buying this book. Even the Appendices are moderately useful (Paul Steed's article on Low-poly tricks, anyone?).
   It's pretty much a mixed bag, really, when seen as a whole: you like some parts, but are left wanting for more in the 'actual' game development process. The author walks you through the creation of your first level, and you feel - there *could* be more; you *want* to have more; and there *should* have been more. But after reading through the first half about the do's and don'ts of the gaming business, you expect a fairly even treatment toward actually "designing" a complete, playable and likeable (if basic) game that "could" sell, perhaps at the bargain store down the road... That, unfortunately, just isn't there. Just, just isn't there. (Nope, it ain't). Create the first level, look at the features of the given game engines, check these coupla websites, resources, modeling tools, what's on the CD, there's more to come, etc., and that's it, end of story... Good beginning, directionless middle, disappointing end; a typical Charles River Media title from the year 2001. Beginners might benefit from knowing how easy it to develop a game, yet how hard it is to sell it for some real money. Professionals (even semi-professionals), however - I don't think they'd be much interested beyond the business half.
   Recommendation: This really is a good book and a bad book rolled into one. A sort of 2 1/2 stars book (though I gave it 3). But if you really want to purchase it despite its deficiencies, you might want to look at getting "Game Programming: All In One" by Bruno Miguel Texeira de Sousa too, which, I feel, covers the technical ("necessary") side of game development in much greater detail than Mr. Ahearn's effort here. In a way, it even complements the information in the latter, and may justify purchasing it for its tips-n-advice value, if nothing else.

1 comments about Creating a Photo Album in Photoshop Elements for Windows: Visual QuickProject Guide.

1. If you are new to working with photos on your computer, this book by Katherine Ulrich is a good first project. As with all the books from the Visual QuickProject Guide series, her book has easy to follow, step-by-step instructions and illustrations. Adobe Photoshop Elements 3 is a great software for beginners and Ulrich shows how to use the basic features of this software. When you are done you will have finished a photo album of your best photographs.
   
   Ulrich begins with the Photoshop Elements Organizer to get your photos into your computer, categorize the images into groups, and sequence the images in the order of the pages for the photo album. Next you will use Elements to fix and enhance your photos. Ulrich covers both the Elements Quick Fix feature as well as the basic tasks performed by the standard Editor. Once you are ready, Ulrich discusses the Elements Creation Wizard and how to make a customized photo album, which you then can print on your inkjet printer, output in the universal PDF format or upload to the Kodak EasyShare Gallery (formerly Ofoto) online service where you can order a hard cover version of your photo album.
   
   Katherine Ulrich is a writer and editor for Peachpit Press and the author of several books including the popular Macromedia Flash MX for Windows and Macintosh: Visual QuickStart Guide.

No comments about Coasts and Coastal Management (Access to Geography) (Access to Geography).

1 comments about Australia (A Ticket to).

1. This a great series on different countries and this book on Australia have great pictures and easy to read facts.

1 comments about Guidelines for Enterprise-Wide Gui Design.

1. This book is meant to be used in conjunction with the authors' software (NOT included with the book) as a framework for a customized set of GUI interface standards. The book is of very limited value to the individual developer.

   In designing a user interface you make some choices because they are good practices on their own merits. In other cases, however, you adopt standards simply for the sake of a consistent look and feel, not because they are inherently better than the other alternatives. Many of the design rules set forth in this book are of the latter variety. If you like the standards they have chosen, then it will work for you. But you'll probably get more out of a book that teaches the concepts and lets you make the choices.

No comments about PREMO: A Framework for Multimedia Middleware: Specification, Rationale, and Java Binding (Lecture Notes in Computer Science).