No comments about XLIB Reference Manual R5 (Definitive Guides to the X Window System).

5 comments about Best of Ruby Quiz (Pragmatic Programmers).

1. Picking up the basics of a new programming language such as Ruby can be enjoyable, but if you can't apply what you've learned quickly that knowledge may be fleeting. "Best of Ruby Quiz" can help out. "Best of Ruby Quiz" contains twenty-five fun programming challenges ("quizzes") that are excellent for exercising your new Ruby chops. The quizzes vary in difficulty and each includes in-depth discussions covering multiple solutions. More importantly, the quizzes really are fun!
   
   The quizzes in "Best of Ruby Quiz" are excerpted from the author's web site "Ruby Quiz" so while you could certainly save yourself a few bucks and just visit the site, the book is a much more polished product. Also, I believe that the immediacy of the book with its superior layout really enhances the learning experience when compared to the web site.
   
   This book makes a great companion to the Pickaxe and the two books form an effective one-two punch for learning Ruby. So go ahead and sit down with a copy of this book, fire up the code editor of your choice, pick a quiz and start coding. Not only will you learn a thing or two about Ruby, you'll have a good time doing it.



2. Do you want to master Ruby? Do you own the PickAxe2 but you still have some doubts here and there? Are you worried you do not understand some obscure features of Ruby?
   
   If you answered 'yes' to the above questions, then it's your lucky day: Best of Ruby Quiz will lead you from Ruby-newbieness to Ruby-mastery. Buy it. You'll love it. It's worth each and every dollar!



3. James Gray is a seasoned Ruby veteran who has been adding value to the community for a long time. One of his major contributions is the Ruby Quiz - a competition modeled after the Perl Quiz - each week a new challenge is posted and people are encouraged to contribute solutions. In the end of the week, James analyzes the most interesting solutions and presents a summary on the website (and the mailing list).
   
   This book is a digest of the 25 most interesting quizzes and their solutions carefully collected by James and released in one volume (using some very pretty typesetting, I must add). It's basically a printed version of the website, with only very little content added - like additional exercises after each quiz.
   
   And this is where the problem of this book lays, in my opinion. To experienced programmers it won't be particularly interesting, since looking at the quiz website itself and participating in the lively discussion on the maling list is much more interesting.
   
   This book could be excellent for newbies, but unfortunately it's not meant for those unfamiliar with the language. So even here, the website is just far more useful. The only real advantage of this book is its dead-tree format, which may be nice for people who have difficulty reading from the computer screen, or for people temporarily without internet access.



4. I can't count the number of times I've been learning a language only to find that I don't have a project to work on. Best of Ruby Quiz is a wonderful solution to this problem. Filled with interesting problems and well documented solutions there is certain to be a quiz that fits your fancy and you _will_ learn something very cool.
   
   Ruby Quiz is online, but the best of book has distilled the free-for-all online atmosphere into a polished collection with the answer (or answers) that the author were most useful and complete.
   
   Great way to learn about the hacker culture too as the answers often include tidbits about why an answer was done the way it was (ie: I had never heard of programmer golf before reading this book)



5. This book is a collection of 25 challenges from the ruby quiz website, with a substantial discussion of various solutions. Lots of word and number games abound. Some examples will give you an idea of what to expect: generating crosswords layouts, ranking poker hands, building (and solving) mazes, generating and cracking ciphers. You could check out a lot of this from the website, but the dead-tree format is more readable, and the discussion is much expanded.
   
   Up to date books on Ruby (rather than Rails) are scarce, so we should cherish this publication. Good as the Pickaxe is, it lacks examples of fully-working programs. There are plenty here, packed full of Ruby idioms - I learnt an immense amount from the quizzes. You will want to either be taking copious notes while reading this, or be sat in front of the computer, so you can fire up irb and play with the language features you don't understand. Of course, as a collection of idioms, one could imagine the material being organised more efficiently, but it would also be a lot drier.
   
   So much for the Ruby, what about the Quiz? I must say that I was less enamoured of the book as a collection of puzzles. I didn't find the problems themselves that exciting, although that's probably just me. You probably already know if you're likely to find this sort of thing fun. What was more disappointing was that the discussion of the solutions is tilted towards presenting a solution in chunks of code, and then explaining what each bit of syntax was doing. There is much less emphasis on analysing the problems, or weighing up the solutions. This is not to say that the book is bereft of such analysis, but it is sporadic and specific to the exact form of the problem. I understood all the solutions, but did not feel that I had gained any insight into the generalities of how to classify problems and identify solutions. This is not really what the book is about, but the blurb does highlight algorithm selection and problem analysis as one of its selling points, so one might be justified in being a little disappointed.
   
   Nonetheless, I still give this book 4 stars, for the wealth of Ruby action contained within. Maybe future releases will supplant it, but for now, book-starved newcomers to Ruby, having finished the Pickaxe, should consider this book as a must-read source of idioms and example programs, with a fun practical bent as a bonus. Well worth your money.

4 comments about SQLite (Developer's Library).

1. My impression was that PHP and MySQL were de facto two sides of the same coin. Many websites using PHP deploy MySQL on the backend. Indeed, there have been several books written about implementing this combination. But Newman offers a simple alternative. A stripped down SQL database that he claims will suffice for many websites. Indeed, he points out that SQLite has proved persuasive enough that PHP5 ships with it.
   
   Going over its syntax, the book shows much of SQLite to be generic SQL. Given that whatever database you choose, you should probably stick to standard SQL as much as possible, then SQLite suffers from no particular deficiency here.
   
   What is distinctive is that its data resides in just one file. Greatly eases administration. Plus, other databases are often implemented as client-server, so as to service queries coming in from the Net. It is indeed a disadvantage that SQLite cannot do this. But in return, by eliminating a network layer, it can be twice as fast as MySQL. Wow.
   
   Cautiously, I'd say it may be attractive to some websites.



2. I was not aware that Adobe did not have an ebook reader for Linux. And since you can not print it, or copy/paste selections from this book (I use VMWare to run Windows apps), this book loses its usefulness altogether.
   
   SQLite is a fine and simple database, with many advantages for developers of single-user software. But you (and SQLite) would be best served by buying the paperback edition.



3. As far as I know, this is the first book on SQLite and for that Chris Newman deserves a compliment.
   Beyond that, this book is not very useful though:
   1) It explains some basic SQL syntax but I didn't buy this book to learn SQL.
   2) Very little information about the specifics and pitfalls of SQLite syntax, I rarely find what I'm looking for.
   3) Being a PHP developer I don't need the chapters on C++, Perl, TCL and Python (about 25% of the book).



4. This is an old book, and doesn't cover the newer SQLite 3.x information.

5 comments about Sams Teach Yourself Data Structures and Algorithms in 24 Hours.

1. I consider myself a "technician level" programmer.. in other words, my main job title is somewhere in the realm of "make this electronic device functional" and "the network died.. fix it", with the responsibility for the odd bit of utility programming now and then. Considering this, I use this book as basically a brush-up on elementary algorithms and data structures that come into play when doing that bit of utility code. Computer science types will likely consider this book "Data Structures and Algorithms Lite" as it eschews the grinding proofs and NP discussions in favor of actual code in more of a cook book style. Not a bad book for technicians, though I would have preferred some pseucocode and less language specific stuff, but I suppose that defies the nature of this type of book in the first place.



2. A while ago, I told a more experienced programmer friend of mine that I wanted to study algorithms,he laughed at me. He also gave me a book to read. After the first chapter I realized why he laughed. This is definitely not an easy subject.But when I came across TYS DS and Algorithms I finally got a chance to understand the topic. I have a lot of algorithms books but if you have no experience and need to learn the subject in a short time, then this is the book for you. I am a self taught programmer and I needed to learn about algorithms real fast.This book put me on the right track.Now I think I am ready for the more difficult books.



3. As always, Robert Lafore has written a book which is always to be kept in one's library. This book has two qualities; 1) written by Robert Lafore, and 2) published by SAMS.

   The best quality of Robert Lafore is that he answers the questions exactly the same time when they are rising in your mind.

   SAMS has a history of publishing books for novices, making them experts.




4. This is a very good & easy to understand Data Structure & Algorithm book in C++. Lafore does a very good job by explaining difficult concepts of Stacks & Linked Lists in as simple as possible manner. Though the book says you need not know C++ to understand these concepts, I strongly disagree. You must have a GOOD C++ background to understand these difficult concepts specially for the first timers peeking into Data Structure & Algorithm. The accompanying CD is excellent. It steps you through the inner workings of the concepts discussed in the book. First try out these Appletes as instructed, see the inner workings, then go through the book. If you are new to C++ programming, get hold of a good C++ begining book then buy this book.



5. The easiest and quickest way to learn data strcutures and algorithms! A really great book, friendly, easy to understand, and greeaatly helpful in understanding the underlying concepts. The data structures and algorithms are very well described and very well explained. Robert Lafore like his great book "Object Oriented Programming in C++" greatly excels here too. He is a great author indeed, with full understanding of what the reader wants to know, when, and how to tell him the in most straightforward and convincing way.
   
   The performance characterisitics (Big Oh) of data structures and algorithms are clealrly specified. The last chapter describes when to use which data structure or algorithm, together with the Big Oh for algorithms and data structures summarized in tables. This makes it really helpful particularly for a quick revision. The companion CD has great stuff itself, to understand how data structures and algorithms work with the visual aid.
   
   Highly recommended!
   
   (Note: as the title suggests this book is only for novice/beginners, not for advanced readers)

5 comments about Internet & World Wide Web How to Program (1st Edition).

1. I am using "Internet and World Wide Web How to Program", in a couple of classes I teach at a local college. It is fine text for teaching or self studying web programming. I strongly recommend it to everyone!



2. I've read the Deitel Java, VB and C++ books prior to this. All of these books were marred by poor color choices (text and background), errors in the code and the fact that you needed a teacher to explain the book to you. This is not the case with this book. It's seems the Old guy and the Young guy have learned a thing or two about what students require in a learning guide. This book is for Internet Explorer ONLY. No examples of cross browser code is here. This book alone will NOT make you a web developer but what it will do is start you down that path. I do have some complaints though. This book, like the others, is designed for the classroom. That being said you will get the most from it in a classroom setting with a competant teacher. My recommendation to the Guys is to have a public book available that has the answers to the questions in an appendix along with the complete chapter ending projects on a CD. Keep a separate edition for the classroom use.



3. Easy to read and to understand. I garanty that you will be following without any problems.Like their other books, there are helpful 'tips' and 'common programming errors' sections that bring the objective of writing functional well-written programs into sharp focus.



4. The university that I attend to highly recommends this book and it's been used for the past 5 years. This book has helped many students and myself achieve high grades. It's easy explainable plus a great introduction to ASP and XML which is so demanding in the job market today. I urge everyone to check this book out!!



5. When I decided that I wanted to learn a new computer language, I decided that HTML was the one I wanted to learn. When I started doing a research about the HTML books, I bumped with this book, and even though it's cover design wasn't all that professional, I love it, so I bought it. When I started reading and applying the content, I was so excited because it was so easy and effective. After having the book with me for about one month, I was already making programs with JavaScript and VBScript. This book allowed me to do things so fast that I was stunned of what I could do in so little time. This book is the must have book for those beginners who want to learn to program in HTML. But then again, it's a Deitel Deitel book, what else can you expect of Deitel Deitel but the best programming books.
   Note: Once you buy this book, you WILL want the other editions. BELIEVE ME!

No comments about Pro Visual Studio Team System with Team Edition for Database Professionals, Second Edition (Pro).

2 comments about Level of Detail for 3D Graphics (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Computer Graphics).

1. This is clearly one of the most outstanding Level-of-Detail-for-3D-Graphics-algorithm-survey books currently in print. However I find Luebke, et al.'s choice of a subtitle puzzling. Clearly it should be "Level of Detail for 3D Graphics: Theory and Application", rather than "Level of Detail for 3D Graphics: Application and Theory". If Luebke, et. al. wanted to emphasize the applied nature of their work, it would've been more appropriate to title it "Level of Detail for 3D Graphics: Application, then Theory, and finally some more Application".

   Frankly this oversight ruined the whole experience for me.




2. This book gives an excellent overview of the problems and solutions to level-of-detail rendering. Few books in the computer graphics field are this well written.

   A few things to note:

   - Though there's plenty of material on simplification of polygonal meshes, there doesn't seem to be much on volume (tetrahedral) simplification. My impression is that volume simplification is kind of hairy, though, and might require its own textbook.

   - If you wish to do your own level of detail rendering, you may end up reading the papers referred to in the book. Most of those papers are available online (try google).

   - The terrain chapter is great, and even deals with real-world issues (geospatial file formats, terrain data on the web, what a geoid is, etc) in addition to an overview of different approaches to terrain simplification.

   If you're doing level-of-detail stuff, it is basically your duty to buy this book. I only wish I'd bought it eariler.

5 comments about Operating System Design: The XINU Approach.

1. Xinu is a beautiful OS and this book is a very
   readable description of Xinu. Xinu with its threads
   and micro kernel architecture is very suitable for
   embedded applications and it has TCP/IP stack too.
   Xinu is not a toy OS or even merely an
   educational OS. I personally ported Xinu to an R3041
   (MIPS) based board for an industrial application and
   it worked very well. Hats off to Comer and others at
   Purdue for giving Xinu to the world.



2. For the most part this book is informative. If you have no idea of how a basic Operating System functions, or what it's responsibilities are, then this book will definitely clue you in. However, this book seemed to fall short of what the writers promised. For example, the version of XINU described in this book boots from DOS. I am suspicious of any operating system that boots from another operating system and then uses the services of it...it reminds me of Microsoft Windows 3.1. The OS also uses and relies on some of the PC's BIOS routines and services. While that technique makes the OS portable on different PCs, it limits its use only to PCs and hides a lot of operations that (in my opinion) should be shown. After reading it a few times, I found that the book was quite helpful after all. The OS has been ported to many other CPU's. The full source code can be found on the internet. The OS is quite powerful but still is simple (I was able to port the code to run on a 68010 project of mine; seeing the ported versions and the book's theory was enough to guide me). A decent book, it doesn't describe an operating system 'from the ground up', but comes close to it. Sure there are other operating systems out there with open source, but how many of those tell you what each function of the code does and what role these functions play in a OS?



3. This book focuses exclusively on XINU, the OS written mainly by Comer. I will say this book is useful in the time when there was no open source, decent OS, however with the advent of Linux, I can't see any reason to study XINU anymore. Although XINU has most of the functions a modern OS should possess, there is essentially NO application written for this OS and it is only used by a handful of universities in their OS courses(for example, Purdue University, WL). If you really want to learn OS, I would recommend you to learn Linux which has relatively superior documentations(and is far more useful and stable than XINU). Some universities also used other experimental OSs like Nachos. I know nothing much on these OSs, therefore I make no comments.
   
   Some people might argue Linux is far too complex and intimidating for beginners to study, well this is true in view of the current Linux kernel, however the instructor should be able to remove the superfluous components in the kernel. The basic kernel is not hard to comprehend at all.



4. Embedded processor are becoming more powerfull and popular. Even a small embedded processor can compete with the first PC's. Because of this, there is a great demand for OS's for these processors. This is were Xinu comes in (Full multitasking kernel, filesystem, semaphores, timers, device drivers...) and best of all, it is not resource hungry (<12k flash with a minimum of 4K ram).
   
   Bottom line is that this is an excellent book to teach you the basic's of OS's. This book is worth having..



5. The text provides insight into the structure of many OS's, which can easily be used to understand other systems. It's clear and simple to understand, even though it's circa 1983! A must have for anyone working with embedded OS. Search the web for full source, which is readily available. The section on drivers and interfacing is especially usefull.

No comments about Desktop GIS: Mapping the Planet with Open Source Tools.

5 comments about Programming with Managed Extensions for Microsoft Visual C++ .NET--Version 2003 (Pro-Developer).

1. A bit dissapointing.
   This book is more about what not to do than about what to do or how to do it right. With the recently released new 2003 version of Visual Studio's the C++ compiler for the NET, it might, even, be a bit outdated.
   If what you're looking for is a kind of tutorial book on managed extensions( such as myself) this isn't the right book.
   Later, I got "Microsoft Visual C++ NET professional projects" and this is it. more than 1000 pages of practical advice, consistent and easy advice C++ and the .NET.
   Maybe, after i get to know C++ more deeply "Programming with Managed Extensions for Microsoft Visual C++ .NET" would become an interesting reading.



2. I cannot say it better than another reviewer "This book is typical of Grimes work...focused, lucid, and complete". This is a great book for learning Managed Extensions for Microsoft Visual C++.Net.



3. I have most of Richard Grime's books and have been a fan of his for some time. However, his last couple of books have been of extremely poor quality. It's as though the author simply took the Managed Extensions documentation and rushed out a book just to have a book on the subject. For example, there are less than 20 pages on multi-threading while there are 70 pages on interop! Since there are already tons of material on interop why so much material devoted to this - especially when 25 pages are PInvoke?! The book is very uneven and really provides almost nothing beyond what you can find in any MC++ literature. I would recommend instead MS Press' Visual C++ Step By Step or APress' Essential Guide to Managed Extensions as they are much more in touch with delivering unique content.



4. The organization of this book is terrible. It is full of forward references to topics not yet discussed, information is presented without any proper structure.
   
   I will trust the judgement of others who know c++.NET better and say that the content is technically sound (I personally will reserve my opinion). As far as I am concerned, it all goes to waste due to its unreadable and incoherent organization and presentation.
   
   It should have been titled "Random thoughts on managed c++".



5. This book is a mess. Really disorganized. Nothing is clear. Important information is thrown together haphazardly in places it doesn't belong. It makes you wonder what other tidbits he left out, or what he hid somewhere that you didn't notice. There's no way to use it as a reference, and it's certainly not an entertaining read.