Information Systems Books - Page 6

Network+ Study Guide: Exam N10-003, Deluxe, 2nd Edition

David Groth, Toby Skandier, Todd Lammle, William Tedder

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 104 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Barely passed exam 3 out of 5 stars.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful.

I just took the Network+ exam today and barely passed. The book has lots of good information, however it does not tell you everything you need to know for the 2007 exam! This book was written for the 2005 exam. Maybe if I took the 2005 exam I would have done much better, but I studied this front to back thoroughly and barely passed. There were many questions I had no clue on, because the book never spoke about it.

If you get this book, consider it a foundation, and then get something else that focuses on the 2007 exam. The book has very good information, just keep in mind that you will need to continue further than it gives you.

Editorial Review:

CompTIA's popular Network+ certification will soon be upgraded to cover advances in networking technology. Here is the only self-study package for the Network+ exam that combines comprehensive instructional material with sophisticated network and operating system simulation software. And it comes to you at a tremendous value (less than the retail value of the simulation software alone)! With this premium product, you get the leading CAQC approved Network+ Study Guide which provides in-depth coverage of all official objectives plus two valuable CDs. One CD includes advanced testing software with four bonus exams, electronic flashcards for PCs, Pocket PCs, and Palm devices, plus the entire book in PDF. The other CD contains a fully functional Virtual Lab that simulates a lab environment with Windows, NetWare, Linux and Unix servers, hosts, and clients, and includes over 30 hands-on labs and dozens of additional review exercises and practice questions.

Time Management for System Administrators

Thomas Limoncelli

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 36 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Time is a precious commodity, especially if you're a system administrator. No other job pulls people in so many directions at once. Users interrupt you constantly with requests, preventing you from getting anything done. Your managers want you to get long-term projects done but flood you with requests for quick-fixes that prevent you from ever getting to those long-term projects. But the pressure is on you to produce and it only increases with time. What do you do?

The answer is time management. And not just any time management theory--you want Time Management for System Administrators, to be exact. With keen insights into the challenges you face as a sys admin, bestselling author Thomas Limoncelli has put together a collection of tips and techniques that will help you cultivate the time management skills you need to flourish as a system administrator.

Time Management for System Administrators understands that an Sys Admin often has competing goals: the concurrent responsibilities of working on large projects and taking care of a user's needs. That's why it focuses on strategies that help you work through daily tasks, yet still allow you to handle critical situations that inevitably arise.

Among other skills, you'll learn how to:

• Manage interruptions
• Eliminate timewasters
• Keep an effective calendar
• Develop routines for things that occur regularly
• Use your brain only for what you're currently working on
• Prioritize based on customer expectations
• Document and automate processes for faster execution

What's more, the book doesn't confine itself to just the work environment, either. It also offers tips on how to apply these time management tools to your social life. It's the first step to a more productive, happier you.

ActionScript 3.0 for Adobe Flash CS4 Professional Classroom in a Book

Adobe Creative Team

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Editorial Review:

The fastest, easiest, most comprehensive way to learn ActionScript® 3.0 for Adobe Flash CS4 Professional

ActionScript® 3.0 for Adobe Flash CS4 Professional Classroom in a Book contains 14 lessons. The book covers the basics of learning ActionScript and provides countless tips and techniques to help you become more productive. You can follow the book from start to finish or choose only those lessons that interest you.

Learn to add interactivity to Flash files using ActionScript 3.0: Control timelines and animation, write event-handling functions, and control loading of and interaction with data, text, video, sound, and images.

“The Classroom in a Book series is by far the best training material on the market. Everything you need to master the software is included: clear explanations of each lesson, step-by-step instructions, and the project files for the students.” —Barbara Binder, Adobe Certified Instructor, Rocky Mountain Training

Classroom in a Book®, the best-selling series of hands-on software training workbooks, helps you learn the features of Adobe software quickly and easily. Classroom in a Book offers what no other book or training program does—an official training series from Adobe Systems Incorporated, developed with the support of Adobe product experts.

Systems Analysis and Design

Gary B. Shelly, Thomas J. Cashman, Harry J. Rosenblatt

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Subjects -> Computers & Internet -> Hardware -> Microprocessors & System Design -> Computer Design
Subjects -> Computers & Internet -> Programming -> Software Design, Testing & Engineering -> Logic

Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 12 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

Comprehensive Introduction 4 out of 5 stars.
15 of 18 people found this review helpful.

Ok, firstly this book has excellent presentation and pedagogy. Somebody took some serious care to ensure this book is visually pleasing and well organized. It contains a CD-rom with summaries of each chapter as well as well as weblinks, glossaries of each chapter and chapter outlines. There are no design tools CASE tools however.

Content: This book is a very good introduction to systems analysis and design: the operative word being INTRODUCTION. It paints a very broad picture in reasonable detail. There are enough examples and explanation to be able to extrapolate how to do very basic structured systems analysis. Object oriented analysis on the other hand while covered, is done so in a fairly rudimentary manner (in a toolkit- ie. appendix- rather than in the body of the book). This book is less about the mechanics of how and more about the why and why not and what you're likely to need before you do do some systems analysis. Personally I think the book by WHitten (isbn 0072552360) provides more bang for your buck in that it covers functional decomposition, functional primitives, decision tables, databases, ERDs, prototyping, OO analysis and design in greater depth and with more reality and for significantly less money. WHitten is far less accessible though, the price of being far more technical than this one- and it is fairly old now. This book is very accessible, but that comes at the cost of content. If you want deeper how-to, try Whitten...if you want a easier overview then try this. However the price is quite significant for this book.

Pedagogy wise, this book is very good. Lots of pratical examples and expositions of real life situations, review questions (no answers) directions to a web site to chase down further understanding and knowledge. A case study permeates the book which makes it very accessible because the case study I found was interesting and quite 'likely'. The toolkits (ie. appendices) are quite interesting, if somewhat 'lite'. To me, they seemed more of a checklist and point of reference than a substantive learning source.

So, in all, a nice, neat book, if rather expensive though. Look at it if you're looking for a broad overview and/or a jumping off point for systems analysis and design. ELsewhere may provide you with work of a more concrete, down to brass-tacks (leveling) nature. It can also serve as a reasonable adjunct to a more technical text, to clarify concepts and provide a philosophical overview of systems analysis and design as well as clarifying some concepts in a clear, concise way. It probably won't teach you 'deep thought' systems analysis and design however.

Editorial Review:

Building on the proven pedagogy of its predecessors, Systems Analysis and Design, Sixth Edition presents a clear introduction to systems analysis and design. Students will find concepts easy-to-understand through the clear writing style and full-color figures that illustrated current technology and trends.

Photoshop Masking & Compositing (VOICES)

Katrin Eismann

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 79 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Designers, photographers, and artists are using Photoshop to create fantastic and realistic images for illustrations, fine art, and editorial content. Whether they're landscape or portrait photographers, illustrators or fine artists, masking and compositing are essential skills to master for combining images to the extent that it is impossible to tell where one image stops and the other one begins.

Photoshop artist and educator Katrin Eismann takes readers through numerous step-by-step examples, highlighting the tools and techniques used for masking and combining images. Featuring work by leading artists and photographers, this book focuses on the techniques used to create compelling compositions, including making fast and accurate selections, mastering Photoshop's masking tools, and implementing the concept and photography from start to finish. The book addresses working with Photoshop's selection tools; selecting and maintaining fine details and edges; working with difficult image elements, such as cloth, hair, or translucent objects; and green-screen techniques. Katrin also addresses the creative aspects of image compositing, including how to start with a concept, plan and execute the photography, and seamlessly assemble the image. Combining technical direction and inspiration, this book will expand readers' imaginations, so they can fluidly and professionally create images with Photoshop.

Security Engineering: A Guide to Building Dependable Distributed Systems

Ross J. Anderson, Ross Anderson

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 28 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Should read if ... 4 out of 5 stars.
2 of 3 people found this review helpful.

Nutshell review - You should read this book if you have anything to do with information security. Chapters are topic specific and can be easily used as a reference. Well written, easy to follow, great book.

Editorial Review:

The first quick reference guide to the do's and don'ts of creating high quality security systems.
Ross Anderson, widely recognized as one of the world's foremost authorities on security engineering, presents a comprehensive design tutorial that covers a wide range of applications. Designed for today's programmers who need to build systems that withstand malice as well as error (but have no time to go do a PhD in security), this book illustrates basic concepts through many real-world system design successes and failures. Topics range from firewalls, through phone phreaking and copyright protection, to frauds against e-businesses. Anderson's book shows how to use a wide range of tools, from cryptology through smartcards to applied psychology. As everything from burglar alarms through heart monitors to bus ticket dispensers starts talking IP, the techniques taught in this book will become vital to everyone who wants to build systems that are secure, dependable and manageable.

Mastering AutoCAD Civil 3D 2009 (Mastering)

James P.E. Wedding, Dana Probert

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

AutoCAD 2009 Civil 3D Book 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 1 people found this review helpful.

The price for the book was better than any other that I looked at. The service and shipping was quick. The book will meet the needs that I have at this time. Thanks.

Good introductory book 3 out of 5 stars.
0 of 1 people found this review helpful.

The book is good for someone just starting out, but it would be so much more helpful if it included more ways of solving problems you run into in real world and also identifying some of the software glitches that seem to be inherent with new software that hasn't been proven.

Editorial Review:

If you already possess some background in Civil 3D but want to broaden your understanding of this popular civil engineering software, Mastering AutoCAD Civil 3D 2009 will provide you with detailed coverage of advanced topics like surveying, LandXML and LDT Project Transfer, cross-sections, pipe networks, visualization, project management, and data shortcuts. Many of the featured topics and techniques, directly applicable to the civil engineering profession, are previously undocumented. Practical tutorials, tips, tricks, real-world examples and easy-to-follow explanations detail all aspects of a civil engineering project.

New New Thing

Michael Lewis

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 215 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

A distorted view of Silicon Valley technology startups 3 out of 5 stars.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful.

"The New New Thing" tells two stories. The first is the story of Jim Clark, a technical entrepreneur who founded three companies -- Silicon Graphics, Netscape, and Healtheon -- that achieved phenomenal heights during the Internet boom of the 1990's. Clark is, to say the least, an interesting character; at least two of Clark's business associates are quoted in the book calling him a "maniac". Clark is driven almost entirely by an unending greed, so for me at least, he quickly became an unsympathetic character around which to hang an entire book. Another criticism I have is that far too many pages of the book are spent on Clark's quest to build and debug Hyperion, the world's largest computer-controlled sailboat. These sections were a distraction from the rest of the narrative. (By the way, it's pretty clear that although they may have been smart, the people writing the software for Hyperion -- including Clark himself -- were all pretty lousy software engineers.)

The second story is that of Silicon Valley, and it doesn't come off looking much better than Clark. Lewis seems to have been granted incredible access to Clark's life, which included the ability to interview and attend meetings with the Valley's top movers and shakers -- the engineers, senior managers, and venture capitalists who fund them. As a computer scientist who has lived and worked in the Valley since 1991, I found this material to be enlightening, and certainly the strongest part of the book. Perhaps most fascinating is the way the decisions of the venture capital (VC) firms and investment banks are based so much on perception rather than sound reasoning. For example, one minute the VCs are writing off their Healtheon investments as a total loss, but the next minute -- when Clark offers to invest $40M of his own money in the failing venture -- they all clamor to invest more in it. Sadly, during the "irrational exuberance" of the late 1990's, this was actually a winning strategy.

One danger in writing a book about the new new thing -- at the height of the Internet bubble no less -- is that it can quickly become old. And this book has not aged well. Yes, Jim Clark was the first person in Silicon Valley to have founded three companies with a market capitalization exceeding $1 billion, and yes, he made himself and many others around him obscenely rich. But most of the companies he started have not been lasting successes: as of this writing in 2007, Silicon Graphics is dying, having lost tens to hundreds of millions of dollars in each of the last four fiscal years; Netscape was acquired by AOL, whose subsequent acquisition by Time Warner nearly killed the latter company; Healtheon merged with WebMD, whose business model is substantially less ambitious than Clark's original concept for the company; and myCFO, the newest new enterprise mentioned at the end of the book, morphed into a company that offered illegal tax shelters to wealthy clients, came under investigation by the IRS, and was eventually sold for only one third of the original money poured into it. Toward the end of the book, Lewis also wryly mocks John Doerr's VC firm Kleiner Perkins for paying $25M for a 33% stake in Google, which he writes "consisted of a pair of Stanford graduate students who had a piece of software that might or might not make it easier to search the Internet." Poor Kleiner Perkins. Their Google investment was obviously a terrible mistake.

Michael Lewis is a great writer, but I enjoyed two of his other books far more: Liar's Poker: Rising Through the Wreckage on Wall Street and Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game.

All in all, "The New New Thing" does a good job of exposing the underbelly of Silicon Valley capitalism. But its focus on Clark and companies born out of the Internet bubble gives a distorted picture of the challenges in founding and running a technical startup. For a more accurate depiction, I recommend Startup: A Silicon Valley Adventure.

Editorial Review:

The author of this book sets out to find the most important technology entrepreneur. He finds Jim Clark, the billionaire who founded Netscape and Silicon Graphics and who aims to turn the healthcare industry around with his new project.

Implementing SAP ERP Sales & Distribution

Glynn C. Williams

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Editorial Review:

Your Hands-On Guide to SAP ERP Sales & Distribution  

Written by senior SAP consultant Glynn Williams, Implementing SAP ERP Sales & Distribution is packed with tested, time-saving tips and advice. Learn how to use SAP ERP Central Component 5.0 and 6.0 to create sales documents and contracts, control material and customer master data, schedule deliveries, and automate billing. You'll also find out how to deliver robust financial and transactional reports, track customer and credit information, and interoperate with other SAP modules.

• Configure and manage the SAP ERP SD module
• Track sales, shipping, and payment status using master records
• Create multi-level sales documents and item proposals
• Develop contracts and rebate agreements
• Deliver materials and services requirements to the supply chain
• Plan deliveries, routes, and packaging using Logistics Execution
• Perform resource-related, collective, and self billing
• Generate pricing reports, incompletion logs, and hierarchies
• Handle credit limits, payment guarantees, and customer blocks
• Integrate user exits, third-party add-ons, and data sharing
• Configure pricing procedures and complex pricing condition types

Perfect Digital Photography

Jay Dickman, Jay Kinghorn

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 35 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Good Information 5 out of 5 stars.
6 of 9 people found this review helpful.

First off, this is written for the more "serious" amateur. It does, therefore, figure that you are probably something of a photographer to begin with. He refers to f/stops and other "more technical" photographic terms. I am just beginning to get into photography, so some of what he was talking about was above my head. This is not a bad thing. While I may not use all this information at this stage (I only have a Point & Shoot Kodak), if I decide to get into this more and get a true SLR or DSLR, this will come in handy.

Having said that, there is a lot of good information for a lowly beginner such as myself. It is written in a fairly easy to understand way so even us true amateurs can understand. The addition of the section on Photoshop is also a wonderful thing. One may as well learn to use all of the 'tools' of the trade. Some may see Photoshop as a crutch; I feel it is a good way to perfect the picture you took to get it to be more of what you saw when you first snapped it. Why suffer with a picture that is less than perfect when you did everything correctly when you can contrast it better or sharpen it up?

All in all, this is a book very worth picking up, whether you are a true beginner, a harder core amateur, or a total professional. It will teach everyone something, regardless of skill level.

Editorial Review:

Written by photography experts--including a Pulitzer-Prize winning National Geographic photographer--this full-color book is a must-have for amateur photographers serious about improving both the quality of their photographs and their proficiency in the digital darkroom. The book is the perfect combination of a technical treatise on digital imaging and an artistic exploration of light, composition, and form, allowing you to glean the essential techniques needed for digital photography without losing sight of the artistic and aesthetic aspects of the craft. Using an easy-to-follow approach, the authors explain the image conceptualization process through shooting, editing, and image correction to finished print. In addition, top photographers from a variety of disciplines offer real-world advice on how they use digital photography to create compelling images for high-profile magazine articles, advertising campaigns, and fine art prints.