1 comments about The Game Design Reader: A Rules of Play Anthology.

1. Curious minds that have delighted in games will love this book! I adored the compilation of shared thoughts from "Who's Who" in game design. Aesthetically, the book is so cute! My copy sits on my coffee table. The book had me at the cover...

3 comments about Java Programming for the Absolute Beginner, Second Edition.

1. This is a book oriented to the complete beginner. It basically starts with a blank sheet of paper and begins with a simple applet that just outputs a single line of text to the screen.
   
   From here he goes on to provide a very simply step by step tutorial to cover the fundamental rules of Java. In this book he doesn't get everything there is to know about Java. It's an introductory book, it covers the bases of the language well enough to get you started. You will probably want an additional book before you become the local master.
   
   If I have one complaint about the book it is one that I complain about a lot on Java books. On page 5 he starts talking about object oriented programming. And he talks on for two or three pages. Then he skips saying anything more about object oriented programming for about 160 pages. By then the reader has completely forgotten about the few pages on page 5.



2. When this book says it is aimed at the absolute beginner it means beginner to programming rather than a programmer with no experience of Java. The book's format of making the topic interesting by gradually building up examples that are games is a good concept but the book does not execute the concept very well.
   
   In practice the book launches into Java and programming in too complex a fashion for the total beginner, there are lots of abbreviations (often not explained) and it discusses terms and concepts that are not explained until a much later and do not need to be introduced this early. It seems odd to be using terms like how many bits a data type has without explaining the term, particularly considering the audience of this book. References to hex and octal are not explained, and as you go into chapter 3 the book covers methods of the random and math class before covering how to use "if" and even what classes are. The flow and structure of this book feels very awkward, covering try/catch and the basics of exception handling very early in the book before the total novice even knows WHAT you are trying to catch and why.
   
   The general jokey examples such as snippets of song lyrics and how to add comments around them, or a fortune teller routine demonstrating random numbers that print text such as "You will talk to someone who has bad breath" seem aimed more at attracting kids that want to write simple games on their home computers rather than someone who wants to learn Java and computer programming for professional reasons. If you are serious about learning Java, try the latest editions of either "Head First Java" or "Core Java" and skip this book. If you have never programmed at all, first try "Sams Teach Yourself Beginning Programming in 24 Hours". The Sam's Teach Yourself series can be rather hit-or-miss, but that particular book is definitely a hit.
   
   Since Amazon omits the table of contents I show that next:
   1. Getting Started
   2. Variables, Data Types, and Simple I/O
   3. The Fortune Teller: Random Numbers, Conditionals, and Arrays
   4. The Number Guesser: Using Loops and Exception Handling
   5. Blackjack: Object Oriented Programming
   6. Making Your Life Easier: The java.util Package and Generics
   7. Learning to Read and Write: The java.io Package
   8. Creating a GUI Using the Abstract Windowing Toolkit
   9. Advanced GUI, Layout Managers, and Event Handling
   10. Writing Applets
   11. Rendering 2D Graphics
   12. Animation, Sounds, and Threads
   13. Putting it All Together: The Block Game



3. This book helped me get my foot in the door for Java programming. Before this book, I was getting "stonewalled" trying to get started into Java programming. This book is aimed at people who want to start computer programming and is making Java their first language. May not be adaquate for experienced programmers who want to learn Java and already know programming conventions.

5 comments about Practical RDF.

1. I started reading the book and very soon realized that even though I was learning a few things about RDF, I was getting stuck with mismatch between text and graphical representation, and other editing problems that can and should be fixed... may be in a new release or in a revised printing. I am happy to have a book to read but by no means I am happy with the quality of presentation.



2. This book is Practical RDF and not "Progamming with RDF (with examples)". Yes, you can find all of the information in this book by searching the Internet. The point is that your results will vary based on who you, how much time you have at your disposal, which day it is, and whether your phone is about to ring.
   
   What Powers and the editors have done in Practical RDF is put the most relevant information (available at the time) in one place, with the typical advantages and disadvantages of a book, such as, you don't need an internet connection, it's operating system neutral, you can make notes in it, it's easy to put down and return to, etc..
   
   I spent the last month researching RDF online. After all that work, I frankly didn't learn much from the book. However, I could have saved myself a lot of time had the book arrived at my door earlier.
   
   We in the information business know how hard it is for our colleagues to embrace semi-new technology. Having a (or several) copy of this bookoin your bookshelf can save you loads of breath. Most people don't take well to "go do your own research." This book contains the research on RDF and is therefore indispensable for all except those who are fortunate enough to work independently.
   
   As noted in other reviews, there are areas for improvement. The technology has advanced since 2003. The original text was probably rushed. This book is due for a second revision, perhaps with more focus on OWL and inference (e.g., take the cwm out for a spin).
   
   For those seeking programming grit, the problem is very similar to programming with XML: which platform, language, and tools do you choose? With XML and RDF, many cross-platform tools exist (Jena, Sesame, Redland). As with most programming books, online documentation from open source tools are likely to be far more useful.
   
   When you want to learn about a largish subject, buy a book. When you want to program, there's no substitute for writing code.
   
   In sum, if there was a book that better educates the uninitiated to RDF, I would mention it here. But I haven't found one, and of course I'm hopeful that someone will write it. Until then, Practical RDF is the best of the pack.



3. This book is jam packed with RDF information. RDF itself is a fairly obscure and it is often difficult to find a single mass of information that is comprehensive enough to be useful. This book is definitely a good move towards consolidating the information available about RDF, though I fear that "Practical" is a misnomer, as this is much more comprehensive than practical.



4. If you want to know how to apply RDF to information processing, this book is for you. Whether you are interested in large-scale information aggregation and analysis or in smaller-scale projects like weblog syndication, this book provides a solid foundation for working with RDF. If you are looking for a theoretical explanation of intelligent web bots, tutorials on how to create knowledge systems, or an in-depth look at topic maps and ontologies, you should probably look elsewhere. Also, a basic understanding of XML and web technologies is helpful for reading this book, so you may want to start with those first if you don't have any background in them.
   
   The first section of this book (Chapter 1 through Chapter 6) focuses on the RDF specifications. Chapter 1 focuses on introducing RDF, but more than that, it also looks at some of the historical events leading up to the current RDF effort. In addition, this chapter also looks at issues of when you would, and would not, use RDF/XML as compared to "standard" XML.
   
   Following the introductory chapter, the rest of the first section covers the RDF specification documents themselves. This includes coverage of the RDF Semantics and Concepts and Abstract Model specifications in Chapter 2; the basic XML syntax in Chapter 3; coverage of some of the more unusual RDF constructs--containers, collections, and reification in Chapter 4; and the RDF Schema in Chapter 5. As a way of pulling all of the coverage together, Chapter 6 then uses all you've learned about RDF to that point to create a relatively complex vocabulary, which is then used for demonstration purposes throughout the rest of the book.
   
   The second section of the book focuses on programming language support, as well as the tools and utilities that allow a person to review, edit, parse, and generally work with RDF/XML. Chapter 7 focuses on various RDF editors, including those with graphical support for creating RDF models. In addition, the chapter also covers an RDF/XML browser, as well as a couple of the more popular RDF/XML parsers.
   
   To be useful, any specification related to data requires tools to work with the data, and RDF is no exception. Chapter 8 provides an overview and examples of accessing and generating RDF/XML using Jena, a Java-based RDF API. Chapter 9 covers APIs that are based in PHP, Perl, and Python.
   
   After the programming language grounding, the book refocuses on RDF's data roots with a chapter that examines some of the RDF query languages used to query RDF model data, in a database or as persisted to RDF/XML documents. Chapter 10 also has the code for the RDF Query-O-Matic, a utility that processes RDQL (RDF Query Language) queries. The last chapter in the second section finishes the review of programming and framework support for RDF by looking at some other programming language support, as well as some of the frameworks, such as Redland and Redfoot.
   
   The last section of the book then focuses on the use of RDF and RDF/XML, beginning with an overview of the W3C's ontology language effort, OWL. If RDF is analogous to the relational data model, and RDF/XML is analogous to relational database systems, then OWL is equivalent to applications such as SAP and PeopleSoft, which implement a business domain model on top of the relational store.
   
   The next chapter focuses on RSS, the implementation of RDF/XML most widely used, which supports syndication and aggregation of news sources. RSS is used to syndicate news sources as diverse as Salon and Wired, as well as online personal journals known as weblogs, a web technology gaining popularity.
   
   A specification is only as good as the applications that use it, and RDF is used in a surprising number of sophisticated commercial and noncommercial applications. I say "surprising" primarily because RDF is not a well-known specification. However, it is one of the older specifications, and this is a good guide to it.



5. This is a fairly readable introduction to RDF - however, you will need an RDF Reference open while reading. My only complaint is not with the book but the nomenclature adopted by RDF. Some terms used in RDF are excellent, descriptive and contribute to understanding (e.g., subject-predicate-object). Other terms make simple concepts confusing (e.g. "Striped" syntax). RDF is not a new technology - it is an extremely interesting and useful technology that is handicapped by an needlessly ambiguous and unclear nomenclature.
   
   Bottom line - use [...] while reading or buy a supplemental reference.

2 comments about Practical WPF Graphics Programming.

1. I have purchased almost every book on WPF programming that has been published in the last two years. I want to build a new look to my graphic programs and I don't want to pay the $1400 or more that some graphic library vendors are charging. I have specific needs for 3D Charts and data displays that this book meets very well.
   
   This book introduces the subject of WPF graphics better than any of the other books that I have read. It's introduction to the design of 3D graphics shapes and their projection onto a 2D plane is comprehensive and very clear. Even after reading the previously published books on this subject, I was delightfully surprised to discover that this book gave me a better understanding of XAML, shape transforms, animation, and placement of 2D objects on 3D surfaces than I thought possible.
   
   If you want to thoroughly master graphics programming or steal a few choice secrets for a custom view, this is the book for you. Dr. Xu's book has exceeded all my expectations and I'm giving it a five star rating.



2. Well like previous reviewer I have purchased almost every book on WPF programming that has been published in the last two years.
   I have seen one sample from other book, where on a 3D cube has a 2D button, otherwise all samples are original. It is a unique book and reading is to the point and simple. Only I wish that it should contain some game examples.
   
   For complex rotation please check my samples at [...]
   I have sent him email, which he replied.

5 comments about WebLogic: The Definitive Guide.

1. In chapter 8 author wrote a note: Even with container managed transaction in MDBs there may be message redelivery .The Cause - was pointed out as possible server crash. But why was important point that onMessage exceeding transaction-timeout also causes message redelivery left out?? Topics lack depth.. Things like what happens when <trans-timeout-seconds> is exceeded in MDB, stateless EJB etc is not written crisp and straight.. Didn't like anything much including clustering, JVM tuning etc.. What I expect is - that which is not there in weblogic documentations.. Something extra is needed based on extensive author experience.
   Go for book like "BEA Weblogic Server 7.0 deployment and Administration"- Aaron Mulder- Wrox.



2. Tons of typos and technically inaccurate in many places - according to me.



3. Hi,
   Though a good book but it is simplly a cut and paste of online weblogic documents.
   if you want to carry all the online doc in one book then buy this book.
   But still, I would recommend this book to all interested in weblogic admin.
   
   
   Thanks
   
   deepak



4. I just got this book about 2 weeks ago. I followed the link in the book where it said that I could download the examples code. I found the book, but not the examples code. Without the example code, I can not really follow the book. Can someone send me the link to the examples source code in the book or post the link on this review.



5. Don't be fooled by the bad reviews here...if you need to learn WebLogic in "21 days" or want a "kick start", then perhaps this book is not for you. But if you are an experienced developer that needs information one notch better than the BEA docs, then this book should be on your bookshelf. Mine stays at work, dog-eared and always ready to explain some detail to help solve a problem. Node Manager? Clustering? Domains configuration? SSL? It's all covered, in depth. Note that this book covers BEA WebLogic Server 8.1, not Portal, Integration, or WorkShop.

5 comments about C++ Common Knowledge: Essential Intermediate Programming.

1. I was already a very productive C++ programmer when I first saw this book, so I didn't think it would be of much help. I was pleasantly surprised, however, by the wealth of information that this little book contains. Any casual or professional C++ programmer should have this book as a reference. It is not encyclopedic, but that is its main strength: it tells you exactly what you need to know and no more. After reading it I found myself structuring my code better and reusing more code (especially by utilizing templates more appropriately). Additionally, the book is very clear about the terminology of the C++ language so my communication with other developers improved. A must-have.



2. Yep, this is perilously close to supplanting Scott Meyers and Herb Sutter as the definitive book for propelling a neophyte C++ programmer towards competence.
   
   On the face of it, this is yet another book on 'intermediate' C++, of which there have been many since the early 1990s. The book consists of a few dozen short pieces on how wrestle some complexity of C++ into behaving itself, such as the use of const, how to implement copy constructors and the assignment operator. Do we really need yet another one of these?
   
   But this manages to stand out from the crowd. It covers more basic material such as references and the new cast operators. There's a very nice section on pointers to members. It's also very handy for people coming from other languages, such as Java, particularly as it highlights areas where C++ differs from Java, e.g. name lookup and hiding rules. However, some material assumes knowledge of the handle/pimpl idiom which is normally covered in other intermediate books.
   
   There's also an emphasis on higher level abstractions, general object oriented design principles, like the Hollywood principle, and separate items on design patterns (command, template, prototype).
   
   And nearly half the book is on templates. And it's a very thorough and systematic coverage, including traits, policies and some metaprogramming (e.g. SFINAE). I was very impressed with this part of the book, it is very effective at demystifying a part of the language that even the better introductory books can fail to enlighten fully.
   
   The only negative of this book is that, subjectwise, there is a fair amount of overlap with the author's previous book, C++ Gotchas. If you've already got that, you may find yourself skimming the first half of this one (and it's not a huge book). However, the excellent template section is all new. Nonetheless, you might want to knock a star and a half off my rating.
   
   In short, this is an excellent, well-organised book with clear coverage of beginners topics all the way up to OO principles like those found in Robert C. Martin's Agile Software Development.



3. This book like effective C++ gives very important pointers.I found that some topics are worth reading like function objects because this kind of information is something you gain only with good experience.
   
   Lot of optics are covered. There are couple of design issues like factory method discussed.The topics are well explained but I felt some topics are too short like for example, the items on smart pointers and auto_ptr.More explanation could have been given for better conceptual understanding (I don't think he explained why auto_ptrs can't be used in containers properly).No item on reference counting unfortunately.
   
   But in general this is a very good book, good for interviews(should be complemented with other books like that of Meyers) and to improve one's understanding of certain topics like, funtion objects, function pointers, how to prevent heap allocation, how to make concrete classes act like ABCs etc.



4. I was looking for a good C++ book to dive back in when I found this book and it was by miles the best book out there. The book covers a wide breath of C++ idioms and best practices in a succinct manner and with very skillful use of example code. The layout of the book makes it useful for programmers of all skill levels. It is approachable enough for a beginner to come away with solid practices that will serve them for a long time and yet it packs enough advanced material that it is a great reference for experienced developers. I felt that it covered the advanced topics in a way that even novice programmers could get a lot out of them, whereas most books on advanced C++ topics are practically arcane tomes for anyone without solid experience, "Modern C++ Design" (otherwise an excellent book) being the worst in that category.
   
   After finishing "C++ Common Knowledge" going back to the old standards such as "Exception C++, "Effective C++" etc... was pretty painful and made me wonder why it took so long for such an elegant and intuitive book on C++ to be written.



5. I really recommend this vook insstead of exceptional/effective book series. After reading some book about the C++ syntax (where Storstroup is an excellent election), you can take a look to this one in order to avoid common mistakes in C++.
   
   It is easy to read and all the information is useful in the day to day programming.

5 comments about Coreldraw 12: The Official Guide.

1. I went to the McGraw Hill page set aside for the images in the book so that I could use them to work along with the book. This is always a very big factor in my decision to buy software oriented books. Most software books now have a companion site if a CD was not included. Literally, over 90% of the 20 software books I have bought in the past three months have a companion site online if they do not supply images and other goodies on a CD in the book itself. Being able to follow along with the same images is an invaluable learning tool. This book advertises the availability of images online on the cover and within. I'm afraid however, that the web links on the companion web page lead to nowhere and McGraw Hill's technical support person could not have cared less. He never got back to me as promised, the links are still broken and if I could I would return the book. The person I spoke to simply didn't care about my problem (apathetic beyond description)-it was quite evident in his tone of voice and in the ultimate not fixing of the problem. And yes, I spoke to the correct department. This is all Unfortunate, as this book has the potential to be a terrific workbook. Now it is nothing more than a run of the mill book and I don't like to buy from companies that do not stand behind their products and mislead their customers as to what their purchase includes. Shame on you Osborne/McGraw Hill. Hopefully, someone from this mega book supplier will see this review and fix the companion site. For now , I will not be buying any books from Osborne/McGraw Hill or any of its associated companies.



2. I use this book to supplement our graphic illustration course at a local college. It's amazingly precise for a third party manual and extremely thorough in covering every aspect of the program. We follow the tutorials to create our practical design projects.
   
   One reviewer mentioned he had troubles with the companion Web site, but we've never had a problem downloading the files. We follow the Downloads link and locate the book from the alphabetized list. It's a couple of clicks at most.



3. If you're looking for a book to get you up and running with CorelDraw 12, this ain't it. This book uses the "Start with the File Menu..." paradigm. The first several chapters are taken up with mind numbingly endless descriptions of menus and tools and options, how to save files (duh) and discussions of features, the function of which the novice user has no clue. You don't actually get to draw anything until way into the second section of the book. (Note that I said Section, not Chapter). Even then, the explanations are so obtuse and convoluted that it is almost impossible for anyone without a vector based application background to figure out what's going on.
   I suppose if one has experience with Corel or the Adobe products, this book makes sense and probably covers all the bells and whistles. But if you're a relatively computer literate person who just wants to learn how to use CorelDraw 12 from the ground up, get a different book.
   DB



4. This is an extremely comprehensive guide that is packed full of clear illustrations. I consider the volume to be very readable and useful for a range of users, i.e., users new to CorelDraw or intermediate level and above. No wonder they call it the "Only Authorized Reference on CorelDraw 12"!



5. I selected this book after reading reviews on Amazon.com. I found the book an excellent supplement to the lynda.com training I purchased for the same program. It helped to fill in the gaps and expand upon the online training. I cannot compare it to the Coreldraw 12 unleashed cd since I have not viewed it, but I am pleased with my purchase. I enjoyed the book from start to end and that says a lot for a discriminating reader of technical publications. Because I use coreldraw 12 primarily to construct business cards, I do wish the book would have addressed color matching. However, there are other sources on this subject on the net. Enough said - great book!

5 comments about Object-Oriented Thought Process, The (2nd Edition) (Developer's Library).

1. This is an excellent book. Its perfect for anybody looking for a book to get a little further insight into how object oriented concepts are used. I have read a few reference books that describe object oriented concepts such as classes, interfaces, objects, ect. And although they explain the concepts and how to code them they do not go to far in regards to the underlining meaning of the concepts and how they all fit together or how to use them. This is what the books about.



2. I am a relative newcomer to object-oriented programming (OOP), though I am an experienced programmer in non-OOP languages (Fortran 90, IDL). I've had several people try to explain to me what OOP is and isn't, but thier explanations never made sense. I picked this book up and read it and everything clicked the first time through. The author does a great job of explaining OOP and why it is important.
   
   I highly recommend reading this book cover-to-cover BEFORE learning an OOP language. And, although the examples all use Java code and I was learning Ruby, I found that it didn't matter. So, don't think you have to know or be learning Java to get something from this book.



3. This book is the OOP concepts starting point with clear definitions of oop terms and practices. Just don't try to get into oop without getting the idea first.



4. Many books on programming include chapters on OOP, this book is different.
   It's not a programming book - but a book on thinking in OO and in my opinion, does a great job of it. There's some code (generally java) used to illustrate concepts - although the subtext on the cover mentions Java and .NET - neither are needed to understand the book.
   The book starts with the big picture and then drills down into specifics. I'm not always a fan of a spiral approach but in this case it really works. I especially enjoyed the Case Study in Chapter 6 where blackjack classes are created. It's a good exercise to go through creating your own classes and comparing them with those the author comes up with. As the author points out there are some strong opinions out there on the use of inheritance vs composition. I was happy to see that the author illustrates the use of both stating that they are both valid OO techniques.
   I highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in a more conceptual understanding of OOP than what is generally found in books on programming languages. I would be happy to find more books by this author, I found his writing style very clear.



5. This book is wonderful for someone is is thinking about OO. I code in PHP and have struggled through different coding books on how to implement OO in my designs. Those books showed me how, but never showed me the why. This is the first book that I've found that takes a step back and looks at OO for an abstract view that lets you better appreciate the practical view. For those starting in OO design, this book should be prerequisite reading before any specific lines of code are written. I would highly recommend this book. For the first time, I can say, "I get it."

5 comments about CSS Web Design For Dummies (For Dummies (Computer/Tech)).

1. This book is pretty good for getting you introduced to CSS. It makes it fairly easy and fun. I started building my new web site just before I started reading this book and I used the info in it to add CSS features. It helps a lot to learn CSS if you practice it on your own web page while you're learning. Some of the code has errors in it, which took me a few minutes to figure out and fix. If you're smart, you should be able to figure it out without too much problem. If the author makes fun of W3C, he's probably right. I heard from other sources that the W3C is much too academic and too slow and uncaring to keep up with the needs of the real world. I guess the thing I like the most about this book is that it lets me start using CSS features without getting bogged down into a huge long learning ordeal. I don't have months to learn CSS. I need to know it right away. It might not be perfect, but it works for me. I test my code in IE7, Firefox, Homesite, and Dreamweaver. If it looks correct in all four of those, then it's good enough as far as I'm concerned. Maybe I would be more critical of this book if I paid for it, but I got it for free :)



2. This is, perhaps, the worst instructional web design text I have ever come across. I came across a copy for free but I still paid too much.
   
   I am familiar with CSS but for the reader that this book is clearly aimed toward, this text would be a disaster for several reasons:
   
   Explanations of basic concepts are unclear and sometimes appear to trail off in the middle of a concept. (See "Controlling Layout with Offsetting", for example.)
   
   Extremely "un-sound" advice is given, such as using descriptive words for colors rather than hex codes (called a "bizarre RGB equivalant" Whaaa?").
   
   The book is about CSS. About cascading style sheets, that is, standards compliant design, and yet at every turn the author is advising the reader to use proprietary code. One of the most central issues of web design is the awareness of the number of different browsers used and cross-platform issues, and yet at every turn the author seems to be portraying a web where everyone uses IE and where IE is some kind of gold standard of how a browser should behave (cough). This flies in the face of the entire basis of CSS.
   
   I saved the best for last, the part where my eyes nearly fell out of my head, page 79, and I quote: "But my advice is to just assume that pretty much everyone who'll see your Web page uses IE. Why? Because most everyone *does* use IE.
   
   Where can I go from that? I have never felt so compelled to write a review. For the experienced designer, the book is funny enough to laugh about over lunch. For the novice designer taking this as a source of reliable information, the book is an unmitigated disaster. Stay away.



3. I actually took the time to find this title on Amazon just to write a review (and hopefully save people money).
   
   I'm not a professional designer, I'm not even a very good hobbyist designer.
   I only know what I need to know to get the result I want on the page.
   So I figured it might be time to actually understand what I'm doing and not copy and alter existing code, and this is the first book on CSS I read.
   And it was not at all helpful.
   I learned a lot more from occasionally googling to an online free tutorial, and looking at the source code of free CSS templates that I liked.
   
   This book is a very basic intro into CSS, pretty much only targeted to IE users (because, who uses anything else, right?! *hmpf!*) and I really struggle to try and find something nice to say about it after plowing through it all for 4 hours.
   
   And if you're using Dreamweaver this whole book can be summarized in 5 pages
   (or heck, let me try 1 line: open the CSS Rule definition box, adjust the value, and see what it does).
   
   This book did not explain things clearly, and there was a lot of useless information to sift through.
   For example: who on earth would want to use those very very ugly default image borders/bullets/horizontal lines in the first place (and the book says nothing at all about customizing those, which I think should be possible with CSS?? )
   
   Also I really want to mention the website layout/design samples in the book,
   text over a too busy background so that it becomes very hard to read: Bad!!
   
   So, in short, stay away from this one, even if you can get it for free you're wasting your time.



4. It has some interesting examples, but it got into unnecessary explanation of the thousands of ways to address a tag, a bit annoying. Then I got to page 91, where the author tries to explain the difference between "relative" and "absolute" positioning of elements. Here I encountered one of my biggest pet peeves. I will let you read it yourself:
   "Of course, as Albert Einstein pointed out, everything is relative except the
   speed of light. So, when we speak of "absolute" positioning, it merely means
   that we're being somewhat "less relative." What do I mean by this?
   You actually cannot sit still, no matter how hard you try. When you think you're
   sitting still, you're still moving at about a half million miles per hour as the solar
   system spins around the galaxy. In fact, you're moving through space in a rapid
   and complex corkscrew path. Even while you're quietly asleep, you're still flying
   aboard the rotating earth, orbiting the sun, spinning around the galaxy. And the
   galaxy itself is hurtling through the universe. So you're moving really fast in a
   dozen different circles all the time. Luckily, so is your bed and everything else
   in your room. They're all at rest, relative to you, but not relative to light."
   
   What? Did he really..? I am staring away like Jim from The Office, into an imaginary camera right now.



5. This was the first "Dummies" book I ever bought and is likely the last. The author has a clear bias against internet standards and is prone to go off on rants about committees and their supposedly bad decisions that make life hard for him. If he had simply stated his positions at the beginning of the book, it would have been fine, but the continual diatribes, many of which are ill-conceived and/or illogical, throughout the book are distracting.
   
   Don't buy this book. Get the O'Reilly book on CSS. It is much more helpful and doesn't have any of Mansfield's bias.

2 comments about Cross-Platform Development in C++: Building Mac OS X, Linux, and Windows Applications.

1. Logan tackles a lot of grubby little complications that are the bane and reality of programmers writing multiplatform C++. This is not a book about learning C++ from scratch. Conceptually, it helps to think of this book as about 1 level above writing C++ code. For example, it discusses compiling, linking and running, where needed libraries might be missing.
   
   The book describes 3 platforms. Microsoft Windows, Macintosh and unix/linux. Strictly, the Macintosh is nowadays using a unix variant. But it's done differently enough, and the Mac is popular enough, that Logan stands it separate from other unix/linux environments.
   
   Perhaps the best recommendation of the book is to use a platform abstraction library. So that you can far more easily maintain a common code base. The suggested choice of library is NSPR. One simple way that it helps is in how it makes explicit the byte lengths of various C/C++ variables. This legacy C ambiguity is still with us, and causes much porting pain. It is no accident that newer languages like Java and C# make these definitions explicit. But many of us still have to write in C and C++.



2. To be honest this one of the few technical computer books I've read from cover to cover. I usually just use them for reference. On the subject of cross platform development this is currently the best and most up-to-date however there were a few areas I would have liked to seen covered better most notably the build environment and makes. Mr Logan does touch on these subjects but they are not given as much focus as I would have like to have seen which is why I'm taking one star away. With that said if I was asked to recommend a book on cross-platform development it would be Syd Logan's, hands down..