Standards Books

Mr Spurgeon has a way of going deeper into the Scriptures and pulling out meaning that helps us in our spiritual growth, a wonderful devotion.

i don't even like devotionals, but Spurgeon packs so much truth into one paragraph in each one. it's just a really great blessing.

If you love Spurgeon, you will love this new edition. I love his writings and his words, but often I have to re-read his works for clear comprehension. But this new edition keeps the deep relevance and the heart piercing truth while using vocabulary that is more modern making the words jump off the page with lighening speed.
If you are new to Spurgeon, this is the book for you. It will whet your appetite for more of this deep thinker's insights into God's mighty Word.
Buy the book today and enjoy it for years to come!

This is a wonderful resource. The Original is a masterpiece. The problem is that the type size in the hardbound edition is Very Small. Not suitable for anyone with less than perfect vision and a lot of light. I am Very disappointed. This publisher, Crosswayd doesn't seem to pay attention to these details.

This is an excellent devotional book, a single page for morning and a single page for evening each day. It draws the reader into a deeper appreciation of Christ and what we have in Him. Often the entries are convicting, but only in a way that tends to lead toward greater -- and happier -- submission to the Lord. Reflections on short Scriptural excerpts are deep and insightful. I've been using it for four years and never find it old or unfruitful.

I love this book. I would recommend this to any mom, young or not so young!

Great read!!! Not only is this full of scriptures, but it has wonderful ideas to put into action for your family. My only problem is that sometimes the author assumes all of the readers are married with children, thus leaving out us single moms, but I still got a lot out of the book.

This is a wonderful book. A most read for all moms who want to encourage their children to be positive and to live a Christan life. It is an easy read and very uplifting!

There were some good things in this one. I did keep it after I was done reading it but it wasn't as deep as I had hoped it would be.

This was our first book we read for our newly formed Bible Study/ Women's Book club at our church. It was a hit and everybody thoroughly enjoyed it. There was a chapter or two that was just "ok", but the rest of it made a lot of sense. Our book club is mostly new moms or moms with younger children.

I was skeptical about buying a book this old, but I just finished it and am still slightly amazed at how little has changed in multicast technology in ~8 years. I have read Doyle's multicast coverage, listened to InternetworkExpert's excellent "class on demand" (CoD) on the topic many times, and worked through over half of their 20 CCIE lab scenarios, all of which have multicast sections. This doesn't make me an expert by any means, but I know enough now to recognize that the material in this book is still worth reading.

The differences between this book and Doyle's (2004) are:
- Williamson dedicates a lot more effort to explaining the mroute table. This was my single biggest stumbling block in multicast routing
- Doyle, IMO, gives IGMP a better treatment
- Doyle goes over mtrace and mstat
- Williamson spreads the information out over more pages via liberal usage of config snips and diagrams, often one per page. This allows him to go into *brutal, painful and excruciating* detail about every line in the mroute table, every flag, every state transition, etc.
- Williamson does a more thorough job of explaining exactly what happens in PIM-SM networks (100+ pages to Doyle's ~25)
- Doyle goes over Anycast RP and gives a better explanation of MSDN, which appears to have been rather cutting edge when Williamson put finger to keyboard

I finished the book in about a week of serious effort, but I skipped the following chapters (Cisco has not put much effort into the technologies described), leaving me with about 400 pages of groovyness:
DVMRP
CBT
MOSPF
Connecting to DVMRP Networks
and several sections of other chapters

To be sure, some things have changed. I didn't see any mention of the "ip pim autorp listener" command, which negates the need for sparse-dense mode when configuring Auto-RP (can't recall if Doyle mentioned that either). Also, in current versions of IOS one *does* need to specify the RP on the RP itself, whereas Williamson (and Doyle) explicitly say this is not the case (they were both right at the time of print, Cisco has changed this). Overall however, I would say that easily >95% of the material is solid here.

So which book to buy? Well if you're serious about the CCIE and/or running a multicast network you'll get both, and read them both several times. I do hope Williamson updates the book though, as he alludes to several draft proposals, and gives a "state of the multicast internet" address that I would like to know more about without digging through two dozen RFCs. Also, the few things that have changed would be a boon to the book.

I come from a routing shop - never having a customer need for Multicast. This book brought me up to speed very quickly on the both the beauty and ease of Multicast. As a tool for my CCIE studies, I felt the first 200 pages were of immense value at helping my studies. I felt Chapter 5 (on DVMRP) was not nearly as valuable as Chapters 6 and 7 (on PIM-DM and PIM-SM).

Some typos I was able to pick out:
page 144 - 2nd line from bottom should read "...it too sends a Graft message to Router C" - not Router D.

page 168 - 3rd line on the 1st paragraph should read "...SPT to pull the (S2, G) traffic down to the RP..." - not (S1, G).

There are some other typos, but they are few and far between (but I'm not an expert on multicast!). I have heard of this book being talked about as the 'bible' for multicast - I can see why.

I give this book 5 pings out of 5:
!!!!!

Multicast has for several years been used in LAN environments to easily exchange information among users, especially in educational and academic research environments. The advent of audio and video conferencing has increased its use in these environments, and it is now making its presence known in WAN and Internet environments. This book gives an overview of the how to implement IP multicast on Cisco devices, and does a good job in that regard. Readers with a general knowledge of networks, even those who have not administered Cisco devices explicitly, can gain much from the book. This reviewer was not interested in the actual implementation of Cisco multicast networks, which is covered in Part 3 of the book, and so this review will concentrate on the other three parts of the book. These parts are mostly descriptive, but they do discuss some of the performance issues involved with the deployment of IP multicast, although nowhere in the book are test cases discussed, even though their inclusion would have been extremely helpful. Multicasting by itself is not a complicated phenomena to understand and use, but when it is deployed over Layer 2 or when coupled with QoS some interesting issues can arise. This reviewer was mostly interested in traffic engineering in multicast environments, and the author spends an entire chapter on this topic.

The book begins with a history of multicast and the MBone, the latter of which is a collection of Internet routers and hosts that are interconnected and are able to forward IP multicast traffic. IP multicast is of course an unreliable transmission mechanism, based as it is on UDP. Along with stating the assigned scope of the multicast addresses over IP, the author also reviews the scheme for multicast MAC addressing. The MAC address mapping will cause a CPU performance hit though since the CPU will have to be interrupted in order to deal with all 32 of the IP multicast groups. This arises since the IP multicast address information cannot be mapped into the available space of the MAC address space. There is a 32:1 address ambiguity when an IP multicast address is mapped to a MAC address.

One can summarize the properties of the multicast routing protocols discussed in the book straightforwardly:

PIM (Protocol Independent Multicasting) can run in three different modes, namely Dense (DM), Sparse (SM) and Sparse-Dense. A router will always forward multicast traffic on a dense mode interface unless all the PIM neighbors of the interface prune themselves from the multicast tree. Multicast traffic will be forwarded on a sparse mode interface only if at least one of the PIM neighbors explicitly joins the multicast tree. In sparse-dense mode, the interface can be running in sparse mode for some groups and dense mode for others. There is a "hello interval" for PIM multicast which is the frequency at which the router will send PIM query messages, the latter of which are used for selecting a PIM designated router. The PIM designated router is responsible for sending IGMP (v1) queries. Bootstrap messages can be forwarded from an interface in PIMv2. This allows all PIM-SM routers in a domain to dynamically learn all Group-to-RP mappings.In PIM-DM, the multicast traffic is periodically forwarded even on pruned interfaces of a source-based distribution tree. This allows the learning of membership changes. This 'state-refresh interval' can be configured on the first-hop routers of the multicast source, allowing the interface to periodically send a state refresh control message down the source-based distribution tree. When doing multicast in an NBMA (NonBroadcast MultiAccess) network, a router will replicate multicast packets for all neighbors configured for broadcast (actually pseudobroadcast to use the author's characterization). To avoid this, one can configure the router in NBMA mode, which will then only allow the replication of packets for PIM neighbors. NBMA mode is only supported by Cisco for SM networks.

DVMRP (Distance Vector Multicast Routing Protocol) does neighbor discovery, where network routing information is exchanged between neighbors. This information consists of Route Report messages that advertise a source network and a hop-count. DVMRP generates two routing tables, one is a multicast routing table to the receivers and a unicast routing table to the sources. When forwarding, a DVMRP router will use the unicast table for RPF (Reverse Path Forwarding) checks and the multicast table for forwarding multicast packets. When doing unicast routing, the router will use the unicast table for the RPF check, but will use a different multicast routing protocol for forwarding multicast packets. There is a metric value associated with a DVMRP unicast route, which is the sum of the interface metrics of a route between the router originating the report and the router in the source network.

For multicast traffic, one can control bandwidth with: 1. Aggregate rate limiting, which sets an upper bound for all multicast traffic being sent on an interface. 2. Mroute table entries wherein each individual multicast stream is set to a maximum rate. 3. `Scoped zones' and multicast boundaries, which prevent multicast traffic with a high rate from traveling outside the provisioned regions. Doing actual multicast traffic engineering is complicated do to the need for calculating the proper RPF (Reverse Path Forwarding) interface (and not the destination IP address). The author discusses in detail some of the techniques that can be used, such as GRE tunnels and `pseudo load-sharing.' GRE tunnels are used to do load-splitting of multicast traffic, which cannot be done otherwise since multicast is allowed only one incoming interface. He also describes how to do traffic conversion between broadcast and multicast, this being allowed for Cisco IOS 11.1 or later. This is a useful capability for networks where the source or the receivers, or both, do not support IP multicast.

Multicasting is truly a technology solution in search of a problem. Excepting highly specialized conferencing applications (a few of which are mentioned here) it is difficult to see how multicasting can be a money-making service for carriers and providers, and the protocols have yet to really penetrate to wide deployment. That said, knowledge of this separate realm of IP networking is a must for any professional in the telecom space.

I'm glad to say that this book rewards determined scrutiny. As a technical writer supporting a very complex product line that has recently added PIM-SM to its bag of tricks, I've found this book painstaking and tremendously informative. You will need to understand IP networking before approaching this title; on the assumption that you do, you will fully understand shared trees, SPTs, and their combination in PIM to an absolute fare-thee-well. My focus when reading this book was on IGMP and PIM-SM, so I have not read absolutely every page of this title. However, Williamson breaks the processes down packet-by-packet for each protocol in the multicasting suite in almost excruciating detail. Advanced coverage of topics such as registration, pruning, and Rendezvous Point behavior means that you will have complete mastery of Cisco multicasting, and for any platform that conforms to the standards, by the time you are finished.

This is an excellent, excellent effort in what I think is a consistently solid networking series.

This is the best multicast book on the market. It is a must have whether you are preparing for the CCIE Lab or just want to understand multicast.

The explanation was simple and clear. There are tons of configuration examples covering pretty much all kinds of scenarios. The author actually explained every single line of the configurations.

I bought this book for my Lab exam, and after two days of reading, 99.99% of my questions were answered (the only one I still have is I actually made PIM-DM work in a hub-spoke frame relay network. The prune message from one spoke was actually seen by the other spoke, I don't know why the hub would forward it out).

I have to admit this is one of the best books I've read for a long time. Just like Jeff Doyle's TCP/IP Routing is the Bible of IGP, this book is the Bible of Multicast.

During Bible studies, it is a real plus to have different translations available. This fine volume has eight translations on facing pages; it makes it so much easier to compare passages without having to flip through multiple Bibles.

I rated this text as four stars because the print is extremely small and does require some concentration for those of us with less than perfect vision. Further, due to its size, it would have been helpful if the book had been thumb indexed. While it is easy enough to purchase tabs at any Christian book store, I find that they will tear off. This is almost a given with this book because the paper is so thin.

I would love to see some publisher compile a similar Old Testament volume in both Contemporary and Precise Parallel versions. Yes, Guidepost does have something like that, but it only contains four translations.

The only draw back is that it doesn't have the Old Testement. However, if it did the book might be to large to cary around. Great reference that allows you to compare 8 different translations side by side.

This is an extraordinary New Testament (because it is eight New Testament translations). While it is probably peerless as a convenient reference resource, and for personal or group study, it is not a good New Testament for casual reading. Because it is eight parallel New Testaments, it is necessarily bulky and can be mildly confusing since the reader must find his/her place every time a page is turned, as will happen every ten verses or so if one is simply reading any given version. This does not amount to a deficiency in this NT, or even to a complaint on my part; it is difficult to image how eight New Testament translations could be presented in parallel in a more reader-friendly format. It is a unique volume; highly recommended for the serious student of the New Testament.

Any translation from one language to another must compromise due to the nuances of communication in one language or culture vs another. This is especially true when dealing with an ancient language such as NT Greek. For one that does not know Greek, the best way to find the true meaning of the original writer is to compare translations and sift out the real kernels. There are many parallel bibles on the market today, but this is the best for the New Testament that I have found. With the 8 most respected translations on the same page, comparisons are very easy. The layout of the translations on the pages is also very well thought out. With the NCV and CEV side by side, the NIV over the NKJV, the KJV next to the NASB, and the NLT over the Message, the most literal are ggouped in one area with the paraphrases at the other end and the more balanced versions in the center. One thing that I had trouble finding out before I ordered was the exact layout, so here it is: Top row KJV, NASB, NIV, NLT and bottom row NCV, CEV, NKJV, MSG.

Who *really* needs 8 versions of the New Testament? I certainly didn't! But I *did* want 5 of the popular versions, and this was a very easy and effective way to get them. Here's a listing of all 8, from my very favorite to least...

1. NIV- New International Version '84: Accurate & readable- thank God for the NIV! I might not be a Christian today if it weren't for this version. It was the first time for me that the Bible truly came alive. It's *still* my favorite version!
*Matthew 5:13- You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.
2. NLT- New Living Translation '96: *VERY* readable- & still pretty accurate. It's not word-for-word, but I like it! This and the NIV together make for very profitable reading. Add the NASB or NKJV to the mix for *real* rock-solid study.
*Matthew 5:13- You are the salt of the earth. But what good is salt if it has lost its flavor? Can you make it useful again? It will be thrown out and trampled underfoot as worthless.
3. NKJV- New King James Version '82: Great blend between accuracy, tradition & readability! A word-for-word translation, it retains the popular feel of the KJV. I like it! Many evangelicals insist that the NASB is more accurate, but I'll take the NKJV over NASB any day of the week. It's not that I'm a *fanatic* or anything- it's purely personal preference.
*Matthew 5:13- You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men.
4. NASB- New American Standard Bible '95: Extremely accurate. Extremely word-for-word. Extremely evangelical!
*Matthew 5:13- You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt has become tasteless, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled under foot by men.
5. KJV- King James Version: 1611 Authorized Version. Amazing impact on history. Still valuable today.
*Matthew 5:13- Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.

6. CEV- Contemporary English Version '95: *Very* pleasant surprise. This might actually grow on me. Maybe!
*Matthew 5:13- You are like salt for everyone on earth. But if salt no longer tastes like salt, how can it make food salty? All it is good for is to be thrown out and walked on.
7. NCV- New Century Version '91: Kinda plain vanilla. Not necessarily a bad version, but really- how *many* do we need?
*Matthew 5:13- You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its salty taste, it cannot be made salty again. It is good for nothing, except to be thrown out and walked on.
8. TM- The Message '95: Goodness gracious alive! What book am I reading? Actually, it's really pretty interesting. :)
*Matthew 5:13- Let me tell you why you are here. You're here to be salt-seasoning that brings out the God-flavors of this earth. If you lose your saltiness, how will people taste godliness? You've lost your usefulness and will end up in the garbage.

Ever wondered how to call certain character qualities out in your daughter? This book is full of ideas that will prompt your thinking. Having had a dad that recognized these things in my life and as a mom of 2 little girls, I would love for these things to be passed on through the generations....that little girls of all ages would be valued for the character seen in their lives and not just what is seen on the outside.

My husband reads this to our daughter and her face just lights up. She knows she's a princess! Not only is she daddy's little princess, but she's God's little princess as well.

This is what I would call a Just for fun book. It has scripture listed but really doesn't teach a big lesson except for that you are specially made by God. Which hopefully by now my children now this. It is a fun book for daddies to read to their little girls.

My husband loves to read this book to his little princess! The Christian message in this story is wonderful, and I love giving this book as a gift.

I'd Be Your Princess: A Royal tale of Godly Character was written by Kathryn O'rien and illustrated by Michael Garland. It has earned the Gold Medallion Book Award in recognition of excellence in evangelical Christian literature. The illustrations fill the pages with color and tender details.

The book tells of a little girl and her father who imagine what life would be like were he a king and she his princess. The little girl dreams of jewels, castles, fancy balls and royal adventures. At each turn her father highlights opportunities for godly character -- even as a princess. He talks of good manners, bravery, generosity and kindness, just to name a few. Each characteristic is supported with Scripture. The wording is encouraging, enchanting and challenging for young girls.

What I Like: I love this book! And so does my daughter. She, like most three-year-olds, is obsessed with princesses. This book is a perfect way to endulge that fantasy while teaching about godly character. The story is so positive. Rather than reprimanding a daughter who dreams of being higher than all others, the father teaches her wonderful ways to exhibit royal character as a child of God. This is a wonderful book for parents to read to their children and for first readers to read themselves.

What I Dislike: Absolutely nothing.

Overall Rating: Excellent!

Tanya -- Christian Children's Book Review

Real 802.11 Security is a very well written book and gives the reader a very good background about Wifi security. It perfectly explains why WEP is not a good protocol and shows how WPA and RSN works.

Edney tackles quite a broad topic, but does well with remaining focused and developing the topic from a novice understanding of wireless security to in-depth discussions down to the packet level. With the range of the topic, the book could have easily been written *only* for the novice or specifially for the computer professional, but Edney manages to hit both audiences; not a small feat when writing a computer-related book.

I would definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in understanding why wi-fi networks are vulnerable (more so than traditional wired networks) and in learning more about wi-fi security solutions.

Hello,

I am reading this book and it is helping me a lot with my certification towards the CWNA, the material is very good, explanations are clear and the author has a very easy way to control the reader and explain the things that are sometimes hard to see. This book is a very good reading, i would suggest for whoever is starting on Security to read it, it even makes some humoristics comments during the book. Awesome, 5 stars material !
thanks a lot,

The author really knows what he is talking about. The layout of content shows his strong logical reasoning. He answers almost all questions a curious engineer would have.

Outstanding book, not just for wireless security but for encryption in general. Very clear explanations, chapter on why WEP failed is the best explanation I have read. Also very clear on how EAP, TLS, TKIP, WAP and the rest of the protocol soup relate to each other. I even appreciated the attempts at humor - my style, a bit dry.

I got this book well before I thought I was going to and it was in amazing condition :)

If I had to keep but one reference book on my shelf as a Professional Interior Designer, this would be the book. It contains in-depth and well-formatted information on virtually every subject in the field, and the graphics are outstanding. One of the authors, Maryrose McGowan, is a powerhouse and has done a remarkable job with this guide and I hope she comes out with many other useful books to advance the profession. This book has quickly replaced several books I previously owned that attempted to do what this book has done with great simplicity, completeness, and accuracy.

The chapters are well-organized, the graphics are abundant, clear, and easy-to-understand, and they contain information from all ends of the spectrum. The price tag of the book is steep, but well worth the investment. Save your pennies and make a point of buying this book, or look for used versions as they come available on Amazon.com. You will be glad to have this book in your collection!

This book is very helpful for upcoming designers. It gives you standard codes for everything you could imagine. Very helpful when doing my design projects.

If your an Interior Designer or practicing to be one this book should be amongst the many in your personal library. The details are well written and displayed.

I've purchased this book for 2 companies that I've worked for and for myself as well. I am an Interior Designer and find Interior Graphic Standards to be extremly resourceful and helpful when it comes to design & planning. It covers a wide range of topics such as basic electrical, mechanical, accessibility standards, plumbing fixture considerations; material finish's, door frames/types, acoustics, etc. and provides enough information on each subject so that you understand what is required to plan. My only complaint is that in many cases, measurements and dimensions are not shown where you would think they should exist. That being said, I highly recommend the book for people of all levels in this industry.

Looking for a key word or phrase and/or having writers block? "2600 Phrases for Effective Writing" really comes in handy. Being in the military and writing performance reports on a daily basis, this book has helped me out all the time. Not only does it help for the good reports, it also does for the bad.

I just love this book. I use it a lot, as a guide to give feedback to my employees. Also, i've found it useful as an appraisal guide. I selected some of the phrases that reflect the needs of our company, and made a test. I've used as a 360º feedback. I love the consistency of its concepts.

Reviewing this book2600 Phrases for Effective Performance Reviews: Ready-to-Use Words and Phrases That Really Get Results, I found it to be a useful resource for ideas when writing performance reviews. I have twenty reviews to write every quarter! Guess what? Sometimes I run out of ideas and ways to state something intriguing about each team member. If you are the type of person that gets 'blocked' when under pressure to get a report out, try this book. It will prompt you with phrases and catchy words that will jumpstart your brain. If you need support in writing an effective review, I think you will find that this is the book to try; I know I found it helpufl and will keep it for a resource on my shelf.

As a current director of human resources for a F-500 company, I can honestly say this is one of the most useful books I have bought. My only regret is that I didn't have this great little book years ago as I struggled to find the correct word or phrase.

The quality of your written communication is critical to one's overall career or the lack thereof. Furthermore, I have found through the years that your written communication can often make or break you in a court of law. In essence, we are not simply talking about making our jobs easier with this book, indeed, we could be talking about profitability or loss.

I highly recommend this book for everyone in management.

Michael L. Gooch, SPHR - Author of Wingtips with Spurs

Communication & Cooperation
* Regularly displays constructive information
* Asks well thought out questions
* Explains complicated issues clearly

Excellent reference. I used this in my Six Sigma Black Belt course. I referenced it many times. I could not have passed the test without it. Some of the chapters (e.g. quality in foriegn countries) did not interest me, but seemed to be well written -- such is the case anyway with references. I heard Dr. Godfrey speak at a national conference -- he is a real champion for Six Sigma.

For decades Joseph Juran has been a famous name in the quality movement. He formed his own institute for quality and has for many years edited an extensive volume on methods for improving quality in manufacturing processes. This Quality Handbook, now in its fifth edition has long been the basic reference for quality engineers and statistician alike. To honor Juran, the fifth edition is titled Juran's Quality Handbook. The volume is now over 900 pages and consists of 48 chapters and 5 appendices. There are 53 authors including Juran himself and his colleague and co-editor Blanton Godfrey. Many other well-known persons have contributed. It includes a chapter on government services by Vice President Al Gore. Prominent statisticians who have contributed include Don Marquardt, Stu Hunter, Bill Meeker, Luis Escobar, Gerry Hahn, Ed Schilling, Ed Dudewicz and Necip Doganaksoy.
As a statistician, I particularly like having a wealth of practical statistical information and tables in one source. Dudewicz provides the introductory statistical material necessary to understand the four other statistical chapters that follow it (SPC by Wadsworth, Acceptance Sampling by Schilling, Design and Analysis of Experiments by Hunter and Reliability Concepts and Data Analysis by Meeker, Escobar, Doganaksoy and Hahn). These are all distinguished authors who are excellent writers and several have written whole text books on these subjects. This edition is up-to-date with the latest advances in quality techniques. Statistical advances in robust design (Taguchi methods), bootstrap methods, process control and capability are all included. Juran and Deming had major practical impact on the quality movement because they both emphasized the need for proper process management. This can be seen in many of the non-statistical chapters that deal with successful management techniques such as six sigma.

This edition is even better than the previous editions and is indeed worthy of the title of bible. Despite the high cost this book is prominent on my bookshelf. I recommend it to anyone heavily involved in product reliability, even if they own copies of previous editions!

"Juran's Quality Handbook" is an excellent book on Quality by one of the most well known quality gurus. The book gives a comprehensive coverage of the subject of quality management. It includes the latest techniques on quality as well as quality theories.

This is a very useful book for those who are interested in producing quality goods and services in a customer focused organization. This huge tome is of immense value to all those involved with the quality profession and is an excellent reference book that covers the wide range of topics and subjects pertaining to quality.

This is a well written book that is very useful for all businesses where quality matters (that is, all businesses). This should be essential reading for quality specialists such as control and quality assurance personnel.

Excellent reference..........Oh man the language and the content rocks. You need to read other books to appreciate this book more.
Quality pro's..........you need to have one of this for sure.

Warning: Not a best choice for "just preparing for a certification exam". It is too much of content for a "small goal of exam". Primer seems to do a good job

The most complete quality reference available.
The fifth edition includes new material on ISO 9000, benchmarking, the Baldrige and other awards, adoption of Strategic Quality Planning and TQM, management leadership for quality, self-directing teams, quality function deployment, and Tuguchi Methods.

If you've ever bought an NT TCP/IP book and wished it had more advanced troubleshooting material in it, buy this book. Take the advice of an MCP working in a Fortune 500 7x24 helpdesk, buy this book. It has very helpful sections on NetBIOS, WINS, DNS, and the whole book stresses analysis and troubleshooting.

This book takes you step by step through how and why a packet travels your network. From the first time your workstation issues a command to the individual proceedures your packets take while traveling the wire.

In depth and detailed, the chapters are stuffed with valuable information presented in a personable and easy to understand format.

Excellent!

I have nothing else to add to the other reviews. I have read dozens (honest!) of NT books. This one ranks as one of the best.

Without a doubt one of the best networking and NT-centric networking books I have read. Tony covers all the bases, with an emphasis on NT relevant areas, and uncovers a number of gothcha's in NT that can save you from losts of frustration. Even with Windows2000 this book will be useful as a great primer on Windows TCP/IP networking.

I had occasion to go through portions of this book again recently and could not help but be amazed, again, at how complete and information packed it is. Not only does it cover everything you REALLY need to know about NT networking but Tony writes in a wonderfully easy style that makes digesting all the deep tidbits--and there are a lot of those--easy.

The previous reviewer who said that this book is not long enough is right on. When you finish the book you will be amazed at what you did NOT know and want the author to keep telling you.

We can only hope Tony revamps this book for Windows 2000. If you run NT networks this book is a must have. It is also an excellent companion to studying for many of the MCSE tests because you'll disocver how things REALLY work.