5 comments about Microsoft FrontPage Version 2002 Inside Out (Inside Out (Microsoft)).

1. I just got this manual, and am pretty impressed at how in depth it is. The main reason to get this is the bonus CD. In includes Add-Ins not included in the FP2k2 software, and takes you step by step through all the features including the advanced options like installing plug-ins, etc. It's a big book, but I am using it as more of a reference manual. Plus the price is pretty good too.



2. I must say, this book was the perfect solution for me. I had a background in object-oriented programming (visual c++), but absolutely NO experience WHATSOEVER with web/internet programming.

   At first, I thought my goal was a little out of reach. I wanted to create a database-driven website that could recieve thousands of hits a day yet stay under my ISP's traffic limit of 5Gb per month. To top it all off, I wanted to start from scratch and have it all ready to go within 2 weeks.

   This book was my savior. Every single problem I encountered was covered in intricate detail. What really separated this book from the countless other frontpage books I tried was its explanation of database relationships and how to work around the standard conventions.

   Also, most people say that frontpage is too limited graphics-wise. That is true if you follow frontpage conventions, however, this book (along with the newsgroups on microsofts's website) will teach you how to "tweak" the code to get almost any result you want.

   Highly recommended.




3. I had no experience building web sites when I bought Jim Buyen's book "FrontPage INSIDE OUT". In just a few weeks, I had my first site up and running. Two more sites quickly followed. The book is 1000+ pages of invaluable information. Plus, the book comes with a CD for viewing on your computer. The cost-to-value ratio of this book is also good. One tip the author included about "Adding Favorites" icons to user's browsers was worth the cost of the book alone. Don't be intimitated by the size of this book. As you improve your knowledge, things become crystal clear.



4. This book has all of the answers you need. If you can do it in FrontPage, this book will tell you how.



5. The layout of this book is not impressive. I find myself flipping back and forth and back for every reference to another subject. As a warning, it is a pretty advanced book as far as Frontpage goes. If you have little to no knowledge of Frontpage, get Frontpage for Dummies as this book will be difficult to learn with. This is what I had to do. But after a couple years of experience with Frontpage, I can finally use this book.

5 comments about Karel++: A Gentle Introduction to the Art of Object-Oriented Programming.

1. With the use of this book and associated software, one can master the C++ or Java language in no time at all! It uses the analagy of a Robot, and the simple classes that operate it. Due to the fact that it has simple classes, time is not wasted trying to remember the many classes and their functions, and the reader immediatly begins programming the Robot. The Karel++ language has the Syntax of C++, and is Object Oriented (just like Java and C++). This is a must buy for anyone getting into programming, or just learning OOP (Object Oriented Programming)!



2. This book is meant for the earliest of beginning programmers. If you have any programming experience whatsoever, even with macros, the information in this book will seem extrememly remedial. Also, some of the terms used aren't even real C++ code, so you'll have to adjust your thinking just a little when you move on. Finally, the price is pretty steep for the amount of information you get. I would probably only recommend this book for someone needing a very, very, VERY gentle intro to programming.



3. I had to read this book for an introductory programming class and didn't find it at all helpful when going on to Java. It wasn't worth the time I spent working with it. You'd be better off just beginning the object-oriented language you're interested in. If you want my advice, try Beginning Java Objects by Jacquie Barker instead.



4. This book reminds me of the older LOGO programming language. You have a small "robot" that explores his world. You tell him how to move and what to do. The only reason this is good is that it helps you think of object oriented programming. (The robot is considered an object). There are also special editions of the book in case you want to specifically move to C++ or Java later. Basically, the book is a good start. If you have any programming experience - skip it. Otherwise, it will get you in the rate frame of mind to move toward OOP.



5. This book was the text for one of my intro to programming courses. I had no choice. You do. Run while you can.

1 comments about Integrated Approach to Web Performance Testing: A Practitioner's Guide.

1. This book offers valuable insights and methodologies in the world of performance testing and engineering. Sadly, there aren't many books on the subject in the market. This one fills a much wanted gap.
   
   Author talks about best practices and methodologies and even offers concrete metrics to measure, monitor and tune. A good discussion of all layers (Web -Web Application server and Database) along with all industry leading tools (+some more) is presented. The book is full of tiny bits of useful real-world information that alone are worth the cost. In all, it is a very comprehensive compilation of best practices and methodologies as it relates to the performance testing, engineering and tuning.

5 comments about What's This India Business?: Offshoring, Outsourcing, and the Global Services Revolution.

1. This next decade will certainly see an extraordinary and painful reorganization of the social, cultural and economic orders, first because of the increasing free movement of labor across borders, and secondly, and much harder to manage, the free movement of work via telecommunications and information technology. Both create both new hopes and significant disruptions in the populations affected and the organizations that conduct them. Paul Davies, now MD of a consultancy for Onshore-Offshore, previously was responsible for transferring business processes to Unisys India. The fact that working for the Indian part of the organization is currently spoken of in Unisys in the USA as "joining the dark side" is a good indicator of the pain in this process.
   
   What's This India Business? is about two things. Firstly, it unabashedly advocates offshoring as not only a given, but as a evolutionary inevitability for successful enterprises in the now and future global economy. Secondly, it is about India and its business culture, currently the outstanding example of the global trend to offshoring work in the service sector. As Davies puts it in his introduction, his book aims to help the reader "comprehend the scale of the change and what India can do for your business" and to help the reader be more on a par with the more extensive knowledge that his or her Indian counterpart is likely to have of Western business people and practices.
   
   Davies starts with the basics of Indian economy, history and geography, what the business traveler can expect to find there. He follows this with a picture of the educational level of the people he or she will deal with. This is followed by a "primer of offshoring," spelling out which business functions are suitable for offshoring and how one can to do this as safely as possible. Given the high failure rate of outsourcing projects, this is much needed advice.
   
   The focus then turns to India's role in the services revolution and the advantages which widespread English language competence and engineering education have given it in the IT marketplace. He answers questions about how one should approach this resource, align objectives, and structure relationships to do business together.
   
   The second part of the book is a well-focused cultural briefing that concerns itself with what the eager entrepreneur is faced with having set foot in India. Like one who learns a foreign language to the point of being able to share humor and take pleasure in foreign company, Davies has learned to enjoy the differences and convert irritation into delight. Insights are shored by pungent anecdotes largely from the author's first-hand experiences.
   
   That being said, whatever the author's personal successes in navigating the Indian business environment-and they appear considerable-this section tends to drift into imperially British wit, full of off-the-cuff judgments at the expense of Indian culture. While Brits may snigger at and lampoon the things that don't work or work for them in Indian culture, this is at the expense of the host culture, and appears arrogant and somewhat off-putting to this reader. One only has to think of Peter Mayle whose Year In Provence and subsequent books regale British tourists and attract settlers with while leaving a trail of resentiment locally.
   
   Once surviving on the ground in India, it is decision time. A solid cost-benefit analysis is needed and Davies stimulates the process of preparing a business plan that fits this new environment and the particular risks it brings to the business arrangement.
   
   Chapter 12 carefully explores the rhythm of Indian style negotiation and provides valuable insights both into the processes one may encounter and into the need to control ones impulses when entering into the local rhythm of give and take. This negotiation does not end with the decision to hire or partner with an Indian firm. The following chapters are about how to manage in order to get the results you need from the arrangement, and how to leverage the advantages your Indian collaborators can bring to you, even opening doors in the Indian market itself.
   
   Most of us have already been consciously or unconsciously impacted by the services we receive from offshore agents of the many companies we deal with. Recently I had the occasion to ask for customer service for a crisis with my laptop software while I was working in Europe. Idled by the situation, I waited for the better part of the business day be able to connect the supplier during their posted Silicon Valley office hours-8:00AM to 6:00PM PST, only to speak to a Mumbai technical support professional on night shift. Not only did the US company try to dissimulate its offshoring activity, but it could have easily have offered better service hours to their customers given their multiple service locations.
   
   In a final chapter on "Corporate Social Responsibility" Davies identifies some of the public relations risks and a few of ethical dimensions that offshoring is bringing about both in the home workforce as well as in the society of the offshore workforce. There are some suggestions but few solutions to the disturbing social disruptions that are now beginning to surface.
   
   Perhaps the directness of What's This India Business? will serve not only as a handbook to offshoring to India, but as a wake-up call to reflective readers to the fact that few practical suggestions are being offered to help us cope with the social impact of what seems to the new economic offshoring imperative for Western enterprises. The energy of the new economic giants, India and China, will not be repressed. We all need better theories for managing our human planet than the worn version of Darwinian selection that seems to be capital's anachronistic mode of thinking.



2. Notice that almost all the negative reviews of this book do not actually review the book, but go off on a personal rant about something else. Davies' book is terrifically well-written and clear. The first section deals with the hard business aspects of outsourcing to India. The middle is an informative and very amusingly candid explanation of Indian culture and business manners that I would recommend to cultural trainers as well as to business people. The third portion of the book explains more business considerations. Contrary to what you might think from some of the non-review reviews, Davies does do a good job explaining what can go wrong when outsourcing corporate functions to India, and he encourages scepticism and close monitoring throughout the process. While he tells a lot of success stories, any alert person reading the book will also come away knowing that failure is possible and how it may be prevented. He does deal to some degree with the ethics of the whole issue, but from the point of view of someone who considers the whole outsourcing trend to be inevitable. I would highly recommend this to anyone interested in the issue of Indian outsourcing, even if, like me, you have no part in it.



3. English is not my first language (even though I scored 720 in my SAT verbal), but I still must say I feel there is an undertone in this book of how on earth did we lose the Raj. There is a grudging acknowledgment of India's excellence but as a fait accompli rather than to understand the organic strengths of India, interrupted for what in its long history, was a short 150-year spell of playing host to the Burra Sahib.
   An interesting work as a handbook of the hows and whats of this undeniably violent element of globalization. Like a Lonely Planet for CIOs.
   In other words, interesting, but not good for those seeking the whys - in India and abroad.
   By far, I prefer Rising Elephant, by Ashutosh Sheshabalaya. This goes to the core of what India was, could have been, and in case we forget, is becoming. And what this means (and could mean) for the West.
   Do not forget to note his dedication note. Grandparents Rai Bahadur and a university professor. Parents educated in Oxford, Harvard, Columbia. A different perspective from an Indian aristocrat, but married I believe from the name, to a European or American (and also part of a local motorcycling band in Europe).
   In other words, hard to place. Maybe the Burra Sahibs should speak with him. But my feeling is this is a good book for Western CEOs, but all Indians (and Western IT workers) would understand more if they read Rising Elephant.



4. Mr Paul Davies gives a good assessment of my country. His guide to cultural do's and dont's is spot on. No Indian should quarrel with those. He also does not hide the many problems in Indian society, as he talks about the benefits of offshoring to Westerners.
   
   On offshoring, I hope you will seriously consider his assessment that this trend will continue and grow. Americans might be undrstandably uneasy about their jobs. But they never seem to question how natural it is that Hollywood should dominate the world film industry, and that their chipmakers and software firms do also in those industries. To Indians, the U.S. still has immense strengths in technology.



5. It is kind of ironic that Amazon lists this book. Obviously they have not read it. Since 2000 they have outsourced almost all of their customer service. And not exactly done a bang up job of it.
   
   Notice that there are no contact phone numbers even listed on the site anymore? You have to have them call you. I had a problem with my last order (and I do mean my last order ever with Amazon) today. While unfailingly polite, the customer service rep took 5 minutes to locate my order ( the computer kept giving him the wrong one) and could not resolve my problem. At least I think that's what happened. I could hardly understand a word he said.
   
   What has happened to this one proud company? What has happened to this one proud nation?

5 comments about Python Programming Patterns.

1. I was disappointed in this book for essentially the same reasons as Stephen Ferg (see his review dated Dec. 19/2001). I find that the book does not do justice to the 'Patterns' buzzword.

   I suggest you read Stephen's review before you buy this book. I will not rewrite the same comments here. The reason I am writing this review is to say that I find unacceptable that the author would review his own book here, not clearly identify himself as the author, give it 5 stars, and be so vain in his review. I believe in modesty and letting the readers decide for themselves (isn't this what Amazon's review system is for?) as opposed to what the author has done here. Also, as of this writing there is only one person who voted Stephen's review to be 'not helpful' -- and I would not be surprised in the least if it was the author himself put in that vote..!




2. There is a need for a decent book on Python OOP and patterns, but this is not it. This book is simply a poor intro text with a some buzzwords slapped on the front cover. I have not found any of it useful. Try a google search instead.



3. Many of the reviewers here seem rightly disappointed that Python Programming Patterns is not a Design Patterns book rewritten with Python source examples. When I bought this I was expecting something similar, and was at first dismayed that PPP wasn't that book. But as I started to read through it, I realized that this was the first book I'd seen which actually focused on *Engineering* solid and comprehensive solutions in Python. If you want to know how to write a 'Hello Python' application, look elsewhere. For all the rest of us needing some insight into how best to apply Python to problems of any complexity, there is no more appropriate book out there.



4. Alot of discussion has focused on the title of the book. So, it's not a classic "design patterns" book but if you take a second to look at the table of contents you'll figure that out pretty fast. The introduction even states the following in a section titled, "What the Book is Not" - "... this book cannot be a hard-core object-oriented design patterns book." I don't think that's a problem with this book.

   What I think this book does well is cover alot of ground on writing python with some pretty good examples that go beyond the usual intro book stuff. There is talk of threads, regular expressions, abstract data types, modules etc... stuff you need to do real work but that usually gets left out. To me this is really a kind of python for programmers type book with some very good examples. If that's what you're looking for then check out the table of contents. I liked it.




5. Even though the book is light on true examination of the 20 object oriented patterns it contains, it is a great python book. I use the book as a reference and I must tell you that I feel that you get your moneys worth with this book, thus it gets 5 stars...

No comments about Programmable Logic Controllers.

1 comments about Theoretical Introduction to Programming.

1. Ok, that was just a joke. But the author is trying... Mills wants to take you beyond the low level details of any given programming language. No nifty little coding tricks. Or even cool patterns.
   
   In essence, he offers precepts that hopefully transcend the languages. Ignore "Introduction" in the book's title. The subject material he discusses tends to be fairly advanced. Going into such topics as NP completeness, the Turing Test and Godel's Theorem. Think of these topics as cultural, if you will. Rounding out your programming education.
   
   Some topics will have little bearing on your typical coding. Like the above mentioned Godel's Theorem. But other topics may well be very germane to some readers. Finite state machine, for example. Mills also sprinkles code snippets in various languages, just to make some lessons concrete for readers.

5 comments about GPRS and 3G Wireless Applications: Professional Developer's Guide.

1. Let me confess, the author's being an Ericsson member (me, too :) further helped me to add this book to my library.
   I found this book an average book that is nothing but a good collection of information which you can find through internet.
   I expected the author to tell me from how to define effective user interfaces to how to combine servers, which directions to take about future apllications (positioning services, notification, charging etc.)
   I expected good examples from the industry, since the author was a practician, but I didn't find any concrete example from the real world that can really change the way I develop a WAP application (if I develop one).
   I didn't find these...
   Another reason for me to buy it was the CD-ROM. I thought it would be a good idea to have a collection of tools compiled in one CD for me. Let me tell you before you get frustrated like me. The whole 650 MB capacity CD contain the Nokia WAP Toolkit (an old version), and a WAP Toolkit of Ericsson plus Ericsson R380 emulator and that's it! No editors, no GPRS simulators. I still can not understand why did they stick such a content-less CD at the back of the book.
   Good luck...



2. If you're looking for a book on wireless application development from a code perspective this is the wrong book. The value of this book is it provides a solid foundation that needs to be in place before coding starts.

   It begins with basic concepts of how wireless infrastructure works. Developers can safely ignore this section of the book. I liked it because it sorted out the "moving parts" as well as the technological underpinnings. It also answered a lot of questions I had regarding where standards and the industry as a whole were headed, and the strengths and weaknesses of existing technologies and why 3G is so important. As an aside, I learned one trivial fact that had been bothering me: where did the name "Bluetooth" come from? Answer: It was named after a Danish king, Harald Blatand who brought unity among different groups of people. Blatand means Bluetooth in English. Not only does the name capture the spirit of Bluetooth as a technology, but this piece of trivia might gain you "Alpha Geek" status at a seminar or convention :-)

   From chapter 3 on, however, is of paramount interest to architects and developers because it gets into lower level details of GPRS, 3G and Bluetooth. The author provides all of the key characteristics of each technology from which a design and development strategy can be derived. Chapter 6 is where both developers and architects will gain information for performance aspects of their products. The author is meticulous in describing the issues and factors that will arise with protocols (the realities of TCP/IP over wireless in chapter 6 is priceless), and is supported with graphs and diagrams that a developer should carefully go over before writing a single line of code.

   Because of my focus in QA and SQA I thought chapter 14 on testing was particularly strong. Again, this is something that developers need to fully understand (as well as the rest of a project team), and the information provided in this chapter fills a large gap in the testing body of knowledge.

   In response to previous comments about this book: (1) Although the content on the CD ROM is out of date, the author's web site contains up-to-date artifacts and URLs. (2) I contacted the author directly (contact information is provided in the book) about the missing test documents cited on the cover of the book and found out that last minute copyright issues prevented their inclusion on the CD ROM. He sent me to where these documents could be obtained (for free) and they were well worth the effort. (3) The book is anything but basic - it gets into some low-level details such as timing and state diagrams that are essential for *properly* developing wireless applications.

   The author has a talent for packing an incredible amount of information into a paragraph and still holding your interest. He also comes across as authoritative and manages to cover a wide spectrum of issues and facts without compromising on details needed by developers and architects (or anyone who wants to update their knowledge on the latest wireless technologies).




3. I started this book with the yearning to know about all of these technologies: Bluetooth, 3G, GPRS, UMTS, CDPD, HSCSD, Location-based services, and TDMA/CDMA/etc. I really have a decent understanding after this reading this book.

   It gets to the details of how handoffs between GPRS base stations and stuff like that. Things you might not need to know, but its the details that get you places. I'd recommend this book to anyone wanting to know about the general gamut of wireless technologies.




4. As mobile internet becomes increasingly rampant and soon to be a household word, it's vital for the individuals who are on the design and sales forefront to educate themselves on this evolving technology. I recommend for all of our sales and marketing staff to familiarize themselves with Andersson's Professional Developer's Guide. Andersson's book can assist even the novice wireless hopeful with fundamental terms and concepts vital to surviving in this era of cutting edge wireless technology.



5. Emzone develops state of art mobile applications for Sales Force Automation (SFA) . The Book iscomprehensive and helps for GPRS application develoment. It isvery helpful in Emzone current development.

5 comments about Gender Inclusive Game Design: Expanding The Market (Advances in Computer Graphics and Game Development Series).

1. It is ironic that a book on gender inclusion would be so insulting to the gender of its target demographic.
   
   Several anecdotes throughout the book cast men as crude, immature, and violent neanderthals. At the same time, it portrays women as nurturing, mature, and sophisticated. If the target market were embittered women with a bone to pick with the opposite gender, the author's approach would be appropriate. Unfortunately, I find myself disgusted rather than convinced.
   
   I admit that there is some interesting and eye-opening information in the book. However, this information is infested with insulting material and poorly handled and delivered scholarship. In reading the text it becomes obvious how unwieldly good information is when placed into the wrong hands.
   
   The title may as well be: "Catching Flies with Vinegar: How Ugly, Brutish Men Can at Least Appear More Sympathetic to Women in the Sexist, Violent Games They Make."
   
   The book states that women are more comfortable with indirect communication than direct confrontation. If we are to take that into account, what motivates a book that is titled "Gender Inclusive Game Design" and proceeds to insult the male gender again and again comes into direct focus.
   
   A personal account revealing directly the motivations of the author's feelings and intentions would have been honest and understandable. I would have sympathized. What we get, however, smacks of vendetta while it pretends to objectivity.
   
   Noticing this, indirection then becomes underdstood as a euphemism for lying to both oneself and others.



2. So many books on game design slide into relatively useless territory: They fail to give the reader concrete things they can do to make better games. Not so this book. It's got plenty of examples (backed up by research) that can be used when you sit down with your tools and try to make a new world. I think her viewpoint is quite refreshingly mercenary. There's no femenist rhetoric here. The author is trying to figure out a way for the game industry to reach beyond the traditional male market and thus make more money. Very pragmatic.
   
   The scary thing is that most of the changes she's proposing to games are relatively non-intrusive and easy to make, as long as designers are involved in the games from the beginning. Good read. Opened my eyes a bit to some issues I never considered before. What if the player is female, indeed.



3. I have spent quite some time in the industry, designing games - as well as playing them. During my time in the industry, most of the women I worked with were in HR; very few were in game development.
   
   Which made arguing my point with the men I worked with rather challenging, since the ratio of men to women at work was so much greater, and I was frequently told, "women just don't play games." Which I knew to be patently false, as there were and still are several online forums and sites run by women gamers. There just weren't that MANY of them at the time, so no one was interested in giving a player a choice in gender.
   
   Times have changed, and many games offer up male and female characters, so it's rather easy for a woman to play a decent, strong, female character. I believe that there are more female gamers today than there were, say, 10 years ago. Perhaps that is because the younger female generation is getting turned onto computers instead of make up, clothes and popularity contests like they were in my generation. Then again, perhaps I'm just reflecting upon my own personal experience here.
   
   I'm not sure I believe the 70% ratio (women to men) where "causal online gamers" are concerned. I am still quite a gamer, and do not experience that ratio in any of the MMOGs that I play. I feel that the number is more like maybe 15% F/M, as that is what I've experienced over the years - I'm being generous here, too. (Does that percentage include Pop Cap games, perhaps? Online card games? If so, that's a completely different beast.)
   
   All in all, I do feel it is important for there to be games that allow both genders to play strong characters of both sexes. There are girls out there who game, and they deserve to have games available that allow them to create and play what may very well become a strong role model for them - as for many of us, our characters are simply an extension of ourselves.



4. Graner Ray raises an important topic: how game designers can create games that appeal to women as well as men. Unfortunately, her advice is simplistic and poorly motivated. This is a summary of what I take to be the most important suggestions the book has to offer:
   
   - Don't use stereotype or hypersexualized avatars
   - Provide a well-designed tutorial
   - Don't force the player to resort to confrontational resolution of conflicts, provide non-confrontational options
   - Females only respond physically to emotional and tactile input, males only by visual input - so include an engaging back-story in the game
   - Males prefer punishment for errors in a game, females prefer forgiveness
   - Females want non-zero-sum (mutually benefitial) game designs
   - Males want to conquer the computer, females want to work with the machine - so don't include hidden benefits that you have to "explore" the interaction space to uncover (e.g., hidden combos in fighting games)
   
   The research results quoted are, when not of questionable quality, often taken out of context. Graner Ray also has a tendency to generalize from isolated anecdotes, which doesn't help. Another problem is that much of the research is dated: some of the games research quoted is from the 1980s and is surely not relevant today! Because of its publication in 2004, the book does not foresee the cross-gender success of titles such as World of Warcraft, and it only consideres the North American market: Europe and Japan are ignored altogether.
   
   Game designers that wish to expand the market for their products to include women probably won't have much to gain by reading this book. Since they already have the necessary motivation, they will acquire more relevant information from well-executed market research and focus group testing than from this book. The book may be an eye-opener for game designers who have never considered women as potential buyers, though.



5. I loved this book. I learned how to write a game proposal.
   There were a lot of thought provoking ideas on how to make a
   game that isn't just geared to pre-teen boys.

5 comments about J2EE: The complete Reference.

1. I have purchased this book after reading the excelent Java 2: The Complete Reference, by Herbert Schildt.

   This book has lots of chapters covering many subjects but none of them goes deep enough to let you really learn what that thing means.

   There are chapters about HTML, XML and SQL that I really think that are not needed in that kind of book and the chapters about JSP and EJB are so small and poor in content that I had to go through the J2EE 1.4 tutorial provided by Sun to get the point on these techs.

   The most part of the book is waste on tables listing methods of classes, but it's just that: The author gives a table with a list of methods and a small sentence stating what it does. No code sample, no usage... If I was searching for list of classes and methods, the Sun documentation available online is more than good.

   I have not yet seen a really good J2EE book, even because I haven't read so many, but the Sun's tutorial looks very good.




2. Don't even think of buying this book! It is positively one of the worst technical books ever produced. I primarily bought this book because of the seemingly excellent reviews. However, take a closer look at some of these positive reviews - you can see that many of them are similar in style, tone, content, and length. Moreover, many of them were submitted on the same day! This is absolutely despicable behavior by the publisher/author/party - those interested in selling more copies of this book. I've reported these customer reviews to Amazon - hopefully, they will take action against those involved and at least remove those reviews. I've learned my lesson - I'll examine the reviews more closely next time. [...]

   In terms of the book, the writing style is actually decent. However, the severe deficiencies of the book come from its lack of depth and inappropriate focus on SQL, XML, and the like. There was only a single chapter on EJBs and very little on servlets/JSPs. There was absolutely no depth on those two topics.

   Don't waste your money - if you want to learn about EJBs, buy "Head First EJB." If you want to learn about the rest of J2EE, I would suggest you buy something else...




3. Borrowed this from a colleague more out of interest to see if it measures up at all, but I am afraid the 1 star reviews are on the spot. No need to explain why, the previous reviewers explain why. Shame on the author and publisher for the fake 5 star reviews.



4. I don't usually write reviews but this book seems to have collected some unwarrented high reviews.
   
   If you expect to learn J2EE, buy something else. The JSP and Servlet sections (which I already have experience) are incomplete enough to mislead you in the wrong direction. As for the EJB section (I have no experience), I know I will not be able to use this manual to learn.
   
   When I purchased this I was in a hurry. I now regret my haste. Do yourself a favour and by something else.



5. A technical book can't get worse than this. Even an amateur would write a better book. It even doesn't deserve a single star!!