Industrial Books

I have previously given great praise to this book under the pen name of statman13. To add to my previous reviews I should say that Little and Rubin continue to be the top researchers in this field and Don Rubin often consults with the FDA, the pharmaceutical industry and statistical review boards. He is an eloquent speaker and writer as is also his co-author Rod Little. The development of the model classifications MAR, MCAR and MNAR (or nonignorable missingness)is due to Rubin and is quite common these days in the thinking of researchers involved with missing data in their analyses. In the cases where the missing mechanism is not ignorable pattern mixture models, that Little had a major role in developing, are given. All this wonderful work is spelled out in this book. This second edition has added much discussion of Bayesian methods using the current computational advantages of Gibbs sampling. Also some specific techniques have software implementation in SAS or SPlus and this is pointe dout by the authors when it comes up. I think that rather than searching through the index to find where sofware is mentioned it would be nice to have a section of the book devoted to it. oddly the software tool SOLAS that Rubin had a part in aiding the development does not appear to be mentioned in the book. Perhaps the authors will expand upon the discussion of software in the next edition. Also new to this edition is more detailed coverage of multiple imputation. Resampling techniques are also discussed in the context of getting sensible estimates of the standard deviation of the estimated parameters in the face of imputing some of the data.

I love this book as one of fundamental books on missing data problem.
For EM algorithm, we can refer other books.
However, we always need to take missing data mechanisms into account, when we do analyze incomplete data.

Now this honorable book has its second edition.
It is fully revised and updated.

I'm working with data sets where up to 15% of measurements are unusable. If I'm going to get any results at all, I have to get them despite the lost values.

This book provides a huge library of techniques for working around the holes, as well as techniques for filling them in. This is not a cut-and-paste text for programmers - it gives the basic theory and algorithms for each technique. Still, the presentation is quite readable and fairly easy to put into practice.

The book's emphasis is on imputation - filling in values so that analysis can move forward. This is something to approach with real caution, though. The imputed (synthesized) values must not perturb the analysis, so the imputation must differ according to the analysis being performed. The authors present a variety of imputation techniques, as well as bootstrap, jacknife, and other techniques for measuring the quality of the results.

The authors also dedicate chapters to approaches that work only with available data, and to cases where missing data can not simply be ignored.

This is the most thorough and practical guide I know to handling missing data. In an ideal world, experiments would all produce usable results and surveys would all have every question answered. When you have to deal with reality, though, this is the book.

Don Rubin developed much of the current theory on missing data. He and Rod Little have written eloquently on an important and difficult topic. This is the best available reference on missing data. Multiple imputation has been a highly successful technique. It was developed by Rubin and it gets good coverage here. If you are particularly interested in multiple imputation Rubin has another text devoted solely to it. The only drawback to the text is that standard software to handle the new methods was not available in 1987. So there is no coverage of software packages. However, Rubin has worked with Statistical Solutions to get imputation and particularly multiple imputation techniques into a software package called Solas. With Rubin's books and the Solas manual you will be ready to do imputation and more importantly you will understand the modeling assumptions that the methods hinge on.

This is the standard reference for statistics of missing data. Anyone working in the field will find it indispensable. The new edition is updated to cover a number of recent developments in the field.

This book has great material on least squares filtering and spectral estimation techniques. And with Hayes providing the Matlab code to implement the formulas, it is a great help to the student in being able to run the code and see what the outputs should look like. The book reads well and is very easy to use. But it is not a substitute for an intro DSP book like Oppenheim/Schafer or Proakis.

This book very clearly explains advanced topics in DSP. The notation is consistent and very clean, as well as the book layout and the writing. The examples are useful and the review section is very helpful. This is how a technical book should be written.

I used this book to learn nearly all the topics covered in a hurry, in order to take the prelim exam at Berkeley. While it was a humbling experience, it made me truly learn to appreciate and love this book, and its great presentation and organization.

It starts off with a very good introduction to linear algebra and probability theory for engineers, which should give you a taste of the effective way that this book is laid out. The format is excellent, and the important points clearly highlighted. This is a real joy to read!

The magic doesn't wear off into the later chapters, which include topics in signal modeling, least-squares methods, MMSE estimation, Levinson algorithm, spectral estimation, and adaptive filters.

I find this book to be a great source for both learning and reference, and as a bonus it includes Matlab codes for all the algorithms mentioned here.

One complain is that there are certain topics that could be covered more effectively. For example, the relationship between the different signal models and filtering is not mentioned, and this could help understand the motivation of the different signal models in the first place.

Anyway, once you get past Oppenheim/Schafer, Proakis/Manolakis and Lyons' material this can be a great way to start your journey into the more advanced topics in signal processing.

Clear examples, clean derivations, and easy to understand style has Monson Hayes' his signature written all over it. I have his schaum's outline on DSP, and its just as good. I haven't finish perusing this book; i am currently on signal modeling (ch.3, i think) where pade, shank and other methods are derived, and i've already found plenty of application to work on.

homework problems include both mathematical and computer (matlab) exercises that help cement understanding the material at the end of each chapter.

applicable, yet theoretically appealing, this book is best for those who has had an introductory DSP course, although it is very much self-contained - the author starts with a comprehensive review of linear algebra and random processes - it will serve the serious student with an interest on statistical description of signals and system very well.

The book is beautiful, really neat. It contains all the essential topics that you will expect in a Spectral Analysis book. I stumbled across it in library and was impressed with the treatment that the author gave this subject. I now have a copy of my own. The topics range from basic to advanced including a few topics on adaptive filter theory.

Each treatment is almost immediately followed by an example, simple but powerful way to introduce you to this topic. I found this one feauture made the topics covered really enjoyable. Linear algebra review captures the essence of the style of this book. It is a welcome addition to this area in DSP. The one by Stocia is too mathematical to be called an introductory book. This one is way much above Stocia's mathematical nightmare.

Author Sandy Polishuk reflects the determined efforts of her subject Julia Ruuttila - people who fight for their beliefs with little reward but the satisfaction gained from doing something right. The plight of working people is keenly felt as Ruuttila recounts the suffering at the hands of mill owners and indifferent public officials. Some things don't change. Whether you're a logger whose job is gone because companies decided to overcut forests, a tech employee whose job has gone overseas, or a retiree whose lost savings filled the pockets of self-serving CEOs, we all have lessons to learn from Polishuk's book and Ruuttila's story. It's a startling insight into our past, and a sober vision of our future. This is oral history at its best and most respectful.

Sticking to the Union is a delight! Ms. Polishuk definitely has a gift for making Julia Ruuttila's words sing, and I very much appreciate her journalistic attention to detail with respect to the places where the oral history diverges from recorded history. Viewing the immensely important Pacific Northwest labor movement through Julia's eyes with Sandy Polishuk as a guide is like a well-crafted gourmet meal. Delicious, satisfying, nourishing, and extremely educational!

Julia Ruuttila's life was amazing! And Sandy Polishuk has done a great job bringing her life to the page. The best part is the book is it's totally engaging and then you realize you've learned a ton of history about twentieth century activism (peace, labor, civil rights, birth control, women's rights etc.)at the same time.
While this book was written for adults, my teenage son read it too and loved it! He couldn't resist it because I was raving about it almost from the first page.

Julia Ruuttila was never scared of "Sticking to the Union". She lived her life sticking up for the underdog and protesting what she saw wrong in the system. Small, spunky Julia told her own version of events. Sandy Polishuk carefully and respectfully corrects the stories. "The transcript of the interview [with the FBI] reveals that Julia's responses during the interview were less heroic than her recollection." Ms. Polishuk offers enlightening context, real knowledge of radicals and clear, concise writing. This book is a fascinating account of a radical woman willing to protest. What a wonderful way for a reader to learn history. I highly recommend "Sticking to the Union".

If you've ever wondered whether "just one person" could have an impact on history, read the story of Julia Ruuttila. Her lifelong activism shaped and changed the lives of many people in the Pacific Northwest and her personal courage in the face of hardship is truly inspiring. The author lets Julia's voice speak out from the pages, while also offering the reader helpful background information to understand the context of each situation. This is a truly fascinating book.

Excellent depiction of what truly environmentally conscious companies and individuals can and should do to help ensure sustainability of our planet for future generations. Stonyfield Farms and their CEO Gary Hirshberg provide an ever improving benchmark for making ecologically-minded decisions while achieving business success. Highly recommended.

Historically and at present, every school curriculum, be it at regular school or college level stresses the importance of getting and spending, about materialism, about maximizing profits and return on investment, all with good intention, but nowhere are we thought about living in harmony with nature, about sustainability and preservation of the environment, every class in business emphasis maximum profit, but not one of them
teaches us about the impact to the environment and at what cost it is to Mother Nature.
We are taught about making short term profits but not about the long term impact to the environment, this practice is going to cause untold misery and suffering for future generations.
We as custodians of the environment, nature, the animal and plant world, supposedly of a higher intelligence are suppose to safeguard and protect it, but we are all guilty of abusing it.
Industrialization and modernization has certainly given us a more comfortable lifestyle, but at what price? As a species, we human beings have consumed, exploited, and destroyed more of the earth's resources in the past fifty years than all of the previous years human existence combined.
Besides the reduction of carbon emissions and finding alternative energy sources, one of the other solutions is to change textbooks to factor in climate and environmental issues into the business equation, as well as to change our mindsets as to how we impact the environment in our daily lives.
No other news item, activity or event is going to dominate our lives in the future more than Global Warming, the climate and the environment.
If we don't reverse this trend or stop it, generations of people in the future will be facing a life of hardship and suffering to difficult to fathom, for a preview of this view the movies "Mad Max" and "Waterworld".

Hirshberg has proven that businees can work in harmony with nature and still make profit, this book should be read by the CEO's of all companies so that they can drive the changes from the top, like what Lee Scott of Walmart is doing. Let's hope that Hirshberg's predictions for the year 2028 will materialize (chapter 8). The Green Revoluion has to start now, or else it may be to late, history will be the judge.

A Great Read, highly recommended!

Bharat Vala Patel
Lenasia, SA
Cincinnati, US

this is a great book because it shatters one of the big myths and that is that there, somehow, is a disconnect between being successful in business and doing something right for the earth

the stories about Timberland, Patagonia, and even Wal-Mart are really interesting and it's very interesting read - especially for a business book, something I rarely read

plus there are about $10 in coupons in the back for Stonyfield products :)

Gary Hirshberg is the CE-Yo (I'm not making that up) of Stonyfield Farms where they make great yogurt. I love it because it's good. It is also organic. For me, the yogurt eater, that is mostly irrelevant.

Hirshberg titled his book, Stirring It Up: How to Make Money and Save the World. The subtitle should be a clue that there are two kinds of material in this book.

There are the places where Hirshberg writes as if he's trying to pass some sort of environmentalist purity test. These are mostly long expository sections that may be of great interest to you. If so, read them. I found them stupifyingly boring most of the time.

If you're reading this as a business book, you may be tempted to write Gary Hirshberg off as a nut case. But consider the following.

His company makes a great product. The only limit on his production is the number of organically certified cows he can get to supply his farm and meet his standards. And his company makes a lot of money. That's why you want to pay attention to the other parts of the book.

The other parts of the book are where Hirshberg tells the story of his business and several other businesses including Timberlake and Patagonia. He tells about how Wal-Mart is making "environmentally friendly" changes to its operations because those changes are good business.

Those were the parts of interest to me. They are written in a less formal style. They are mostly stories. And there are a lot of lessons in them about business, business practices, and what both successful businesses and Mother Nature might have to teach us about them.

Here's an overview of the book.

The first chapter, Natural Profits, begins with the simple, but profound, observation that nature does not produce waste. When nature is functioning naturally, everything thrown off by one process is used by another. Hirshberg suggests that following that principle with business practices will make things more efficient and, thus, more profitable.

He tells us the story of how he wound up at Stonyfield Farms. There's info on the early stages of the company and how many of his principles about how to live on the planet also helped his company survive and grow. The story of Stonyfield Farms runs through the book.

Mission Control gets us into the mission statement for Hirshberg's company. Frankly, this is as good a chapter on mission statements as I've seen anywhere.

Hirshberg says that a mission statement, in addition to guiding operations, should be simple and enduring. He also points out that Exxon's mission statement at one time only cited "increasing return to shareholders" as a guiding principle and he describes how that informed the company's response to the Exxon Valdez oil spill.

Hirshberg makes the point that if you have only one purpose, as Exxon did, it's relatively easy to make decisions and to be blind to other concerns. But if you have several sub-missions or groups of stakeholders to consider, things get more nuanced. The main story in this chapter is about Patagonia, whose CEO, Yvon Chouinard, says: "Profit is what happens when you do everything else right."

From CO2 to COno is about Stonyfield's efforts to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide. There's excellent material on doing analysis of a problem, seeking solutions and using metrics to gauge success or lack of it. This chapter includes the stories of Timberland, Wal-Mart's recent changes and Adobe's efforts to make its campus carbon neutral. Hirshberg describes cost-saving benefits to the corporations.

Hands Across the Aisle has a lot of excellent material on Hirshberg's marketing methods. In the beginning there was no money for marketing so Stonyfield had to be creative. They were. They also developed the idea of marketing as making a "handshake connection" with everyone. He has important things to say about how the quality of the product is important because that's what gets customers to come back.

The Delicious Revolution includes the story of Honest Tea. In 1998, Seth Goldman left his job at the Calvert Group of "socially responsible" mutual funds to join Barry Nalebuff and found Honest Tea. Nalebuff was Goldman's professor at Yale, where Nalebuff is known as an expert on business strategy and game theory. You may know him for his books such as Co-Opetition : A Revolution Mindset That Combines Competition and Cooperation : The Game Theory Strategy That's Changing the Game of Business and Thinking Strategically: The Competitive Edge in Business, Politics, and Everyday Life.

No Such Place as Away is all about recycling and re-using and planning in ways that leave you with less to transport somewhere else. A lot of this sounds new, but it's not. There was a time when Henry Ford demanded that suppliers of engines for his cars pack their engines in boxes made of boards of a particular size. Ford then took the crates apart and used the wood to make floorboards for his cars.

A real strength of this chapter is the description of Interface Carpet. Interface Carpet is two things. It is the world's largest manufacturer of carpet tiles, a publicly traded company worth almost a billion dollars. It's also a company with a commitment to sustainability.

Nurturing Those Who Nourish the Earth is about Stonyfield's dealing with suppliers. There's good material here about the importance of relationships along the supply chain. Stonyfield Farms may be an "organic" business, but when Hirshberg talks about thinks like marketing and cost analysis, and supply chain relationships, the lessons are solid business.

Future Perfect is Hirshberg's vision of an ideal future. Since it's a true "Utopia" or "nowhere" he feels free to let his inner zealot run free. This chapter is awash in unexamined and unsupported assumptions.

Worse, from my perspective, is that Hirshberg tends to present only his own favored solution or technique. So you don't get any discussion of whether offsets, for example, are actually a good idea or how to make them work better. There are no alternatives in this chapter.

Zealots are often insufferable. Practical zealots have the capacity to change the world. Gary Hirshberg is definitely a zealot, but because he's also both practical and successful, you will find a lot of good business advice in this book.

FDR once said ""We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics."

The flipside of this is that not only is running your business with the environment in mind is not only good morals, it is good business, and Hirshberg, who has made millions incorporating earth-friendly practices into his business is proof, and this is a great, entertaining book that shows how he and others are lining their pockets and saving the planet at the same time. Kudos.

Although I haven't purchased this book, I have read a copy that I borrowed from a library.

This is a very practical book. It is nice to know that there is a way in which suburbanites can become less car-dependent, and that you don't have to live in a city's downtown core to become less car-dependent! I also like the idea of suburbs becoming more like traditional towns surrounding each big city. If suburbs were like traditional towns, they would be much more pleasant and more interesting places to live in.

To inject life, fun and spontanaeity into North American suburbs will not be easy. Many neighbourhoods were built after WW II, when land and resources such as electricity and gasoline were plentiful and cheap; developers, government and the public were not very conscious of there being limits to, or issues with, creating vast car-centric suburbs. Now, many of us live in an energy-inefficient home on a long, straight street that forms one line in a grid that is populated by far more motor vehicles than pedestrians. Here, we easily grow fat and sedentary, often not knowing who lives one or two doors away.
In Superbia!, the authors prescribe 31 steps to transform neighborhoods into places where there is a true sense of community, and where hard resources (e.g. cars, washing machines) can ultimately be shared by groups of families, and consumable resources (electricity, gasoline) are used in more environmentally responsible ways.
The encouraging news is that neighborhoods in the USA, Europe and elsewhere have implemented these 31 steps. It often took a lot of persuasion of local politicians and bureaucrats to, for example, tear up existing streets to make them narrower, for the purpose of calming traffic. While the authors, to their credit, indicate that some of the 31 steps are plainly challenging to implement, and ential people changing their mental models, the authors at times neglect to address the role and response of some key stakeholders as neighborhoods transform themselves. For example, as I read the steps about removing fences between people's yards, and subsequent encouragement of kids in the neighborhood to congregate in certain areas of this newly-created 'open' space, I visualized the trepidation that the insurance companies covering these homes might have; what happens when you encourage everyone onto your property, and then someone gets hurt? In general terms, I felt that the book could at times have been more rigorous in tipping off the reader as to what to expect from other stakeholders relevant to the transformation process.
I support what the authors propose. The main message I got from the book is: don't wait for politicians or developers to be the ones to build or retrofit neighborhoods that are environmentally sustainable, and offer building structures and juxtapositions to foster social cohesiveness; rather, strike out on your own, with the modest first step being to organize a potluck supper for your immediate neighbors. From there, transformation events can evolve; the authors have demonstrated, through numerous anecdotes, that this process can indeed work.

Superbia! 31 Ways to Create Sustainable Neighborhoods is a "self-help" book for urban and suburban neighborhoods. The suburbs are often car-dependent, land-hungry, strictly residential neighborhoods that are often isolated from schools, workplaces and civic centers. They often lack convenient links to parks and mass transportation and are typically not developed in ways conducive to meeting people.

But, these challenges provide numerous opportunities for positive change! People can reinvent their neighborhoods based on economic, environmental, and social values. Superbia! provides a checklist of Easy, Bolder, and Boldest Steps that can lead to safer, friendlier, livelier, healthier, more productive, diverse and vibrant neighborhoods. Neighbors can chose the steps they think will create a stronger sense of place and connection to people, nature, and culture.

Easy Steps include sponsoring community dinners, establishing a community newsletter, and creating car and van pools for work commutes. Some neighbors have started book and investment clubs. For example, the Hillcrest Neighborhood Association in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, sponsors a book club where neighbors "get together with fellow book enthusiasts to converse, discuss, and debate current bestsellers and classics," according to the group's website. Superbia! describes how there are hundreds of potential links between people within neighborhoods - links that can reduce time, human energy, and money spent by individuals on tight schedules as well as tight budgets. Easy Steps help people know one another better helping them discover links that lead to Bolder Steps.

Planting a community garden or orchard is a Bolder Step. A composting project can serve the community garden and individual yards. Planting shade trees and windbreaks reduces energy costs, provides wildlife habitat, and increases property values. The Highlands Neighborhood in Littleton, Colorado, took a Bolder Step by tearing down fences. There was already a neighborhood tradition of parties in backyards, but neighbors decided to go a step further and took down their six-foot fences and opened the space to the neighbors creating a better sense of community.

Boldest Steps include creating a community energy system and creating a common house and community-shared office. A Boldest Step was taken by New York's Darrow School when the failure of a conventional wastewater system provided an opportunity to install a Living Machine - a greenhouse-contained biological waste treatment facility that uses natural methods rather than harmful chemicals to recycle human waste. This system is also used as a hands-on laboratory for a variety of classes including science, chemistry, mathematics, and even art.

With a history of how the suburbs came to be, 31 ways to make the suburbs better, examples of people who have created more sustainable neighborhoods, and a Resource Guide, readers can actively transform their suburbia into Superbia!

Authors Chiras and Wann walk their talk. Chiras built and lives in a sustainable, solar home, and Dave Wann helped develop and lives in Harmony Village co-housing. They are also co-directors of the Sustainable Futures Society's Sustainable Suburbs project. Visit www.sustainablecolorado.org to learn more.

Susan Bilo is an energy and resource conservation consultant with Sustainable By Design, LLC.

Superbia! is a strikingly simple book, proposing that neighbors can create
friendlier and healthier neighborhoods by getting to know each other and
working together. The beginning Steps it suggests are easy - things like
having neighborhood potlucks and baby-sitting coops - but the advanced steps
will take some real teamwork. You and your neighbors won't set up a
neighborhood energy system or buy a house for use as a common building until
a high level of trust is established. By the time the advanced steps are
taken on, the neighborhood will be like an extended family, with all its
benefits -- as well as liabilities.

But Chiras and Wann argue that the benefits far outweigh the liabilities.
For example, they don't propose a loss of privacy, but rather an increase in
options and flexibility. What do we do when the car won't start, we go on
vacation and the plants need watering, or we just need someone to talk to?
Call a neighbor.

This book is well-researched, documenting how neighborhoods took the shape
they did, with wide streets, huge lawns, and barricade-like garage doors.
The 50 million suburban homes in the U.S. (and all their associated
infrastructure) are then seen in the book as ingredients for cooking up a
better neighborhood. As the authors suggest, why can't we create common
areas for the kids and a community garden by donating parcels of our
backyards and creating a pathway where alleys used to be? Why can't we
establish a neighborhood recycling system, a carpooling and even car-sharing
system? Why shouldn't part of our yards also become low-maintenance, "edible
landscapes" that provide cherries and grapes rather than just grass
clippings?

As the book compellingly asks, Why can't we work together to save time,
money, and human energy, and in the process, have some fun? In the median
income U.S. household budget, $3,000 a year could be saved if our costs for
food, energy, entertainment, health, and transportation were reduced through
neighborhood efforts that also meet an often- expressed need for a sense of
community, and a sense of place.

What Superbia! is about is basic improvements in the quality of our
lifestyles. Less of an emphasis on buying our lives, and more on just living
our lives. Far from being just a Utopia-like dream, the book's ideas are
already being implemented in neighborhoods across the country, and several
chapters in the book are dedicated to case studies of each Step - where and
how it was implemented. Another series of chapters presents a fictitious
neighborhood that walks the reader through the evolution of the Fox Run
neighborhood, from suburbia to Superbia!

If your neighborhood association needs a spark of energy, get a copy of this
book and form a discussion group around it. At the very least, you'll
emerge with a roster of neighbors and a fresh perspective on what a
neighborhood can be.

"Researchers have demonstrated that a feeling of community reduces suburban depression."

The first pictures I observed upon opening this book were of a lovely neighborhood in much need of comfort and the beautiful results after the streets had been lined with trees. Sidewalks had also been created and pathways up to each front porch created a very inviting environment. The trees shaded the walkways and people enjoyed riding their bikes down the streets. The contrast was eye opening and the results very comforting. You can imagine the people living in this area finally feeling like they were home.

The contents include:

The Changing Face of Suburbia
Reinventing Our Neighborhoods for Health, Profit, and Community
Imagining a Sustainable Neighborhood
How to Remodel a Neighborhood
Germination: First Steps
Leafing Out: Bolder Ideas
Your Neighborhood Blossoms: Boldest Steps
Suburban Revitalization I: Can This Dream Become a Reality?
Suburban Revitalization II: Making Bold Dreams Come True
Taking Care in the Neighborhood

This book helps to emphasize the isolation of the typical suburban house and shows how the community design seems to emphasize private space instead of community. This promotes a lack of connection. Could the way we live promote depression and a lack of friendships? Could the way we build communities lessen domestic violence, encourage community interaction and promote a general feeling of well-being?

Like Feng Shui, this book gives ideas for building or restoring neighborhoods to promote happiness and to reduce stress. While some say we are not a product of our environment, it only takes a little research to find out that where there is more hope and a greater sense of community, humans seem to thrive.

"...research reveals that in a closely knit community, levels of serotonin (a natural anti-depressant) are higher, so the neighborhood is collectively more optimistic and energetic." ~pg. 26

The transformations in communities is revealed in pictures that explore the role of nature in our comfort level. Would you rather live behind high brick walls or enjoy a more peaceful and serene landscape of short fences and flowered walkways? In one section, an alleyway between living spaces is transformed into a little piece of heaven.

Some of the features include:

Ten Basic Design Principles for Remodeling Neighborhoods
How to Sponsor Community Dinners
Neighborhood Clubs
Organic Gardens
Replacing asphalt with porous pavers - to reduce heat absorption

As a child, I remember two types of homes. One with a backyard, tightly fenced in, and another with wide-open spaces and easy access to walking through community spaces. I can tell you, I preferred the latter.

This book is filled with wisdom and great advice for city planners and I've seen the idea of producing an edible landscape work efficiently in some areas. As a child we used to pick fruit off trees on the walk home from school. It is a dream that can come true and this book has many ideas that once implemented will improve the lives of everyone in the community. By reading this book, you may also decide to move to a location that values these ideas.

~The Rebecca Review
Currently living in an area without fences and lovely tree-lined walkways

I am the network manager at a mid-size Chicago company and have been tasked with the job of developing a formal security infrastructure for our organization. I have read many of Mandy's InfoWorld articles and eagerly awaited the release of this book. Needless to say, I was not disappointed. Surviving Security is a great resource for understanding the components of a security infrastructure, how they fit together, and how to analyze and select the best approach for your environment. She covers all the basics (security policies, firewalls, IDS, remote access, OS hardening, network architecture, etc.)

In addition, there's a great chapter on authentication techniques. She also discusses the issues most people forget or do not really think about until it is too late: keeping up-to-date with patches, monitoring systems and logs, creating incident response teams, developing secure applications, etc. Most sections have "For More Information" boxes that give resources (books, websites, etc.) where you can go for more detailed information. I thought these were a great feature. She provides insightful information and commentary based on her experiences and then refers you to places where you can find more information. This book does not try to be all things for all people.

The companion website is a great way to keep the content up-to-date. As long as the author keeps the information and links current, this will be a good resource for security information. The product reviews give an independent, third-party opinion that is sometimes hard to find.

For those looking to develop a complete security infrastructure, this is the book to read. Surviving Security gives you an excellent "big picture" look at security that I have found lacking in other security books I have looked at.

Surviving Security is a really good book for someone needing a thorough introduction to information security.

The book covers all of the most important security technologies and processes. After completing the book, the reader will come out with a good understanding the components of an information systems security infrastructure.

All of the chapters contain loads of valuable information. Two extremely valuable sections are (Page 358) ýSample Audit Checklistý and (Page 399) ýAssessing Your Needsý.

The Sample Audit Checklist contains over 30 pages of technology items that require security. Assessing Your Needs details all of the items required for an effective incident response team....

For those people needing an effective and easily readable reference about computer security, Surviving Security is an excellent resource.

Thousands of years ago, a geometry teacher informed his royal subject and student that there was no royal road or shortcut to the understanding of geometry. That statement also holds true for computer system security. Like the steps in a geometric proof, any shortcut taken in security has the potential for invalidating the entire structure. Furthermore, developing a sound security policy requires that many of our deeply held social and legal attitudes be set aside.
In the American legal structure, any person is entitled to the presumption of innocence until their guilt is proven. However, to create and maintain an adequate computer security policy, everyone must be assumed untrustworthy until it has been proven otherwise. This creates an enormous potential for hard feelings, leading some to bypass the controls as a form of protest. Sound security policies also erects barriers that often reduce the efficiency of everyone accessing the system, creating an ongoing dent in the company bottom line. With all of this social, technical and economic baggage, it would appear that constructing an effective security system would be impossible. While constructing an impenetrable system is impossible, one can always reach a best possible level, and you see how to do it in this book.
All of the problems in computer security, from the initial meeting to regular audits are covered in this book. As the title implies, the emphasis is on the integration of the many parts that interact to build a secure system. Knowledge of human psychology is important, as the users must be treated with an iron fist wrapped inside a fuzzy velvet glove. The coverage is thorough in the broad sense, but shallow in the depth sense. This is not a criticism, just a statement of fact. Each section has links to resources that provide the depth of explanation that may be needed.
Security puts another level of complexity on top of the very difficult task of writing software that works. In the past, getting software to work took priority over getting it to work in a secure manner. Those days are gone and it is very difficult to conceive of any scenario where that will change. No one knows when it occurred, but several years ago, the cost of paying for security fell below the cost of repairing the damage caused by lax security practices. To get on the right side of this critical curve, read this book and follow the advice.

One of the few technology books that is actually under-priced based on the value you'll get from it. Content is very good and it's an easy read. You don't have to already be a security wiz to understand. There is also some unique treatment to process issues that I haven't seen elsewhere... Highly recommended.

I have been an information assurance professional for over 40-years. This is the only book that ties it all together and provides so many additonal bonuses that you cannot go wrong for the price.

What I found best about the book:
1. Great price for all the pertinent and up-to-date information, including references and URL's,
2. Complete, concise, focused; no wandering down memory lane,
3. A great study reference guide in preparation for the CISSP examination (I used it, I took the exam, I am now certified as an Information System Security Professional),
4. The book will be a solid reference for years to come,
5. The author knows her subject and presents it in such a logical manner that it is impossible not to grasp the concepts presented.
6. Can use the author's web site for this book so that you maintain your currency (who else offers this?),
7. If your on the security profession career path this book is mandatory, and
8. Where in the hell (heck) was this book 10-15 years ago.

This is an important book. One often hears about the need for companies to `balance' social, environmental and financial concerns, but Chris Laszlo takes these concepts to the next level. He demonstrates convincingly that these three areas are all integral part of doing business. Ignoring a company's environmental or social impact not only puts financial interests at risk; doing so also means missing key opportunities for innovation, profits and sustainability. As Unilever CEO Cescau says in the foreward, "it's not just matter of doing well - it's about doing better by doing good." Laszlo proves his points in several ways - with a fable based on actual observation, several case studies of top companies, and finally, with an 8 step approach to making it happen in your small or large company. What if you're convinced of these things already ? Think seriously about giving this book to somebody who isn't - especially if you work for a large company as I do.

Chris Laszlo has written an excellent, timely and useful book, especially for business leaders. Sustainability is rapidly becoming a mainstream business issue, primarily because environmental and social issues are having growing financial impacts on firms. To an increasing degree, business success in essentially all sectors will require sustainability leadership. Sustainable Value provides the specific business case language, tools and case studies needed to implement a leading edge sustainability strategy. Business is the most powerful force in the world. It can play a major role in addressing complex environmental and social challenges. By adopting the approaches laid out in Sustainable Value, companies will benefit society while improving financial and competitive performance.

If you're looking for a framework to build sustainability into your business and solid case studies to support that logic, look no further. Laszlo's extensively researched book draws on real-world experience to demonstrate the sometimes surprising value forward-looking businesses can create by integrating sustainability considerations into their operations and their mindsets. This is a practical and very welcome resource in the field, from someone who has not only worked in the trenches, but also spent a lot of time analyzing from a 30,000 foot view. Valuable for managers, consultants, students, and outside observers alike.

Sustainable Value is a refreshing addition to the increasing literature on "green" which often focuses on the ethical and emotional reasons for sustainability but does not make any suggestions for how businesses can actually implement sustainability. The book provides a practical framework as well as examples for business leaders so that they can integrate sustainability into the strategy and daily practices of their business. The key word is "integrate"... Most employees on a personal level probably agree that we need to take care of our our planet but when it comes to their work, they see sustainability as an addition to the their work, which is increasingly becoming demanding and full of stress. Unless sustainability can help them achieve their business goals, most people will not get around to implementing sustainability. Laszlo's book explains in compelling and easy to understand language how sustainability can truly be what helps a business become a leading star.

This book provides new, valuable content in several areas not found in other books on sustainability. First, it provides a management fable which brings sustainable value to life beyond the theory. Second, it provides some excellent case studies including superb insight into the Wal-Mart story. Finally, it provides tools in the last third of the book to help managers create sustainable value in their own companies. Since it is essentially three books in one, its title speaks also to the value to the reader.

Composed by NASA historian and international authority on aviation Richard P. Hallion, Taking Flight: Inventing The Aerial Age From Antiquity Through The First World War combines primary sources such as journals, diaries, and memoirs of aviation pioneers, with a scholarly and meticulous recounting of the evolution of aviation technology. Black-and-white photographs and keen attention to detail distinguish this recommended trove of an informed and informative history which is especially recommended for aviation buffs and an invaluable addition to academic and community library Aviation History reference collections.

Richard Hallion's TAKING FLIGHT is a literary and historical tour-de-force. Hallion writes with grace, style, and consumate skill. He weaves an incredibly rich tale of remarkable individuals who, over the centuries, brought the gift of flight to the world. With a thoroughness and solid grounding that is evident in the rich range of sources he has examined, Hallion shatters myths and reexamines the invention of flight. This places the work of the Wrights and other pioneers in a historical context sadly lacking in most other books on the subject. Not content--wisely so--to limit his text just to the events surrounding the Wrights, Hallion transports the reader from the early kite and rocket-firing pioneers of China, to the churches of medieval Europe, and on to the Renaissance and Baroque eras when technologists first conceived balloons and studied winged flight. He details the early flights of balloonists and airship enthusiasts, and the slow, painful progress towards inventing the airplane. Intriguingly, he explores why America succeeded in this race--but then let Europe speed rapidly past it. Perhaps most remarkably, Hallion succeeds in presenting this detailed story without either drowning the general reader with jargon-laden prose, or boring the technical specialist with a "dumbed-down" text. TAKING FLIGHT has received plaudits from many reviewers, and it left this reader eager to read any successor volume that Hallion might write taking the story to the present. If you buy just one book on the invention of flight during this 100th anniversary year, this is the one!

Richard Hallion's Taking Flight is wonderful. It's clearly written and extremely engaging. I didn't know much about flight pre-Wright brothers, and this book weaves the story of man's obsession with the skies from ancient times to the Wrights. It contains much more social and political history than I thought it would--making it the story of man and technology through the lens of flight. I think it's a great complement to all the Wright brothers books out in this anniversary year. I didn't read the notes in the back (there were simply too many) but you needn't read them. A great summer reading.

This work offers an encyclopedic overview of the history of flight from the earliest legends through the First World War. Though his focus is on heavier-than-air flight, he also includes extensive coverage of the development of lighter-than-air craft and how it influenced aeronautical development. Throughout this book, Hallion demonstrates both an impressive range of knowledge and a welcome capacity for explaining some of the more technical details of aerodynamics - one that is especially welcome when it comes to explaining why so many of the Wrights' predecessors failed in their attempts to master flight.

The portrait Hallion paints is a fascinating one. He conveys the extent to which the Wright brothers built upon the achievements of both their predecessors and their contemporaries. Developments were reaching a critical mass, which - as Hallion repeatedly asserts - would almost certainly have led to heavier-than-air flight by 1910 (with the first flight most likely taking place in France). Nevertheless, the author does not underrate the Wrights' considerable accomplishment and its contribution to our history. Even after Europeans were first taking to the air in heavier-than-air craft, the Wrights' Flyer was still considerably superior to its counterparts on the other side of the Atlantic - as Wilbur Wright himself demonstrated in his 1908 tour of Europe.

As Hallion shows, however, Wilbur's tour represented the pinnacle of the Wrights' achievement. He describes the year 1909 as the year when the invention of flight ended and its refinement begins. In this phase the Europeans had a considerable advantage, for as the Wrights were pioneering flight the Europeans were focusing more on the scientific study of aerodynamics, something which Hallion sees as integral to the shift in aeronautical advancement from the New World back to the Old. Wedded to an increasingly obsolescent (and inherently dangerous) design, the Wrights no longer represented the leading edge of airplane development, one that was moving forward at a dramatic rate. Before the First World War ended, airplanes were already demonstrating speed, endurance, and applications that most people take for granted today but which almost none of the early pioneers had imagined were possible.

Yet while Hallion's book is one of the best histories of its subject, it has a number of annoying flaws. Foremost is the fact that this is very much a book of its time. The author constantly endeavors to make connections to modern concepts, with these portions - such as the conversion of currency amounts to their 2001 equivalents, or his repeated references to the events of September 11 - are likely to diminish the book's usefulness in the years to come. At times the encyclopedic nature of his account is almost annoyingly so (I have yet to find the trivia contest that required knowing that the commander of Germany's Zeppelin division was shot down by a plane which had taken off from the same city that had been a target of the first Zeppelin raid over England). Finally, he overemphasizes the historical impact of the airplane, especially in the First World War. He implies, for example, that the course of events at the battles of Tannenberg and the Marne was altered because of the use of airplanes, yet he offers no evidence to substantiate this claim beyond stressing the role the planes played as scouts while understating the other sources of information available to the commanders. Such claims are impossible to prove, of course, and only undermine the veracity of the author's historical judgment. Nevertheless, these problems should not detract from the overall value of this book in understanding both the long journey to flight and how it impacts us today.

The reason I give "Taking Flight" 5 stars is because there's no rating for 10. This is a masterful treatment of an extremely complex subject, and while the entire history of human flight is probably beyond any single volume, Hallion's tome approaches the definitive.
Apart from a thorough assessment of flight in myth, legend, and actuality, "Taking Flight" also assesses the cultral influences leading to Kitty Hawk and beyond. In these PC days it's refreshing to see an iron-clad argument as to why only western civilization could have produced powered flight. The progression from kites to balloons, dirigibles, and airplanes is rendered with authority and style.
In another 100 years, Dick Hallion's book will still be cited.

That's a great book, it has all essential data that a a medical student/Intern/Resident is expected to know (or to "carry everywhere"). This is like a small pharmacological memory chip that's always in my shirt pocket. It often helped me to save patients' life right in that moment, before I can find any other larger reference books around... So, just get it!
(Warning: this book has a kind of addicting potential - once you use it, you are gonna use it daily).

This is THE most essential, and most used book I own. I get a new one every year because it's so worn out by the end of a year from the use.

A friend and I were talking about this book. "Obviously," he said, "it was written by a clinician." This is extremely high praise.

I discovered this book several years ago. Now, I don't go to work without it. I can look up any drug in the world within seconds (the index helpfully tells you whether the listing is at the top, middle or bottom of the page) and find out basically everything I need to know: what class of drug, what it's used for in clinical practice, how it's metabolized, can you give it to pregnant women, can you give it to breastfeeding women, what's the relative cost, what's the usual dosage and route, what's the DEA classification . . . and also read a sentence or two along the lines of "One or two things you should know about this drug:" for example, terazosin: "First dose at bedtime to avoid orthostatic hypotension."

To compress the entire PDR into 127 pages that fit into your shirt pocket is a truly impressive work of scholarship. Saunders comes in a close second, and the Washington Manual a distant third. The Tarascon Pocket Pharmacopoeia is, in my opinion, the most useful medical book ever published.

As an internal medicine resident this book is absolutly vital to my life and practice. In nearly three years I have not once gone to work without it in my pocket. The book is small enough to carry anywhere, well organized, full of useful information and contains every drug you will be perscribing on a regular basis. Whether you are a medical student or a resident, you need this book!

As a resident I have found this book to an invaluable tool for physicians, 3rd and 4th year medical students. It packs an incredible amount of information into such a small package. The book includes every medication, dosage, formulation you'll ever need. It includes a number of obscure drugs as well as off label indications, which come up quite often, not included in epocrates. I had to dig up this classic after being left high and dry by epocrates a number of times. There are a number of charts such as BSA, ACLS, safe drugs during pregnancy that are great as well. Overall this book is definitely worth the pocket space.

I ordered my book and received excellent service. Got it in perfect time as well! Thank you Amazon ~ keep up the good work!

It was required for a class, but it turns out it very good.

The Pocket Guide is an excellent, affordable resource for all administrators as well as teachers. It is easy to use and offers guidelines to stay out legal difficulties. The price is right and content parallels his textbook "School Law and the Public Schools".

Nathan Essex has written a succinct, easy-to-understand guide that all teachers need to read to become "legalese savvy" in today's litigious educational climate. From understanding the procedures required for a legal search and seizure to knowing teachers' rights, "A Teacher's Pocket Guide to School Law" is a must read for educators at all grade levels. The book is exceptionally readable and covers the areas of school law that teachers find themselves mired in most. After reading Essex's book, I know that being apprised of the legal ramifications of what I do in the classroom is critical for my own safety as well as the safety of my students.

As others have said, this is an excellent book. I picked it as a quick reference/study guide for my Education Law class. Law has always been interesting for me, but I don't get much use out of books that say things like 'X decision rendered in (year) was a landmark, upholding X principle (insert legal jargon). A couple of my roommates in college were were law students, and I understand that junk, because I helped them study sometimes, and we talked about interesting cases they were studying, etc.
BUT, when I sit down to read about it, that's not what I want to know. I want to know what the court fight was about, what the court decision was, what it means, and how it affects my school and the classroom. That's exactly what Essex does in this book.
The chapters are mostly 10-15 pages long, cover approximately 5 essential concepts or factors, including all the major cases or a description of the key ideas, identify which law is relevant (usually state or federal, though district or school board policies often come into play), a summary of the key players, roles, principles, or components of the concept being discussed. If an actual court case is discussed, it ends with a summary of the argument, the courts' decisions, and the final result. And each 1-3 pages section finishes with a section called 'Guides' which provides a list of important things to consider, when addressing the policy or issue covered (Essex is usually very conservative with his recommendations, but at least you have an idea what needs to be considered).
It also includes handy things like a good index, a separate list of all the court cases discussed, appendices that include relevant sections of the Constitution, selected federal statutes, and descriptions of major organizations and how they can impact a teacher.
And finally, Essex is a good writer who makes the topics interesting by minimizing the jargon and focusing on why things are important. Several times, I've found myself reading for a while, after I looked something up, just because he makes stuff interesting.