Software Development Books

A couple of years ago, I got Podcast Solutions and was really impressed with its' overall content. For its' time. Of course, with everything on the web, practically everything changes and thus, a new edition of this book had to be released. And it's still probably the best book out there. Lots of updated information on how to create, edit and upload podcasts and for the most part, do it on the cheap since if you're really looking to make a million bucks doing this, keep looking. Lots more stuff on video which has truly taken off thanks to YouTube and similar sites and newer ways to promote and get advertisers to your site. You'll also learn how to use WordPress and similar blogs and create a podcast site as a result. That's what I did with one of my clients. Not as thick as the Bibles out there but at least you won't get a hernia trying to lift it. You should be getting ideas for your own (or your clients own) podcasts within minutes of surfing thru this book.

Yes that's right, this is the perfect book for any and all podcasters. If you are a podcaster, or want to be one or just want to find out what it's all about buy this book.

The title says it all; Podcast Solutions. Chock full of info, written concisely, humorously, intelligently, informatively and in language that anyone can understand (even me) this is the one book to buy on the subject. It takes you step by step down the road to conceiving, creating, recording, producing and profiting from your show idea. This book covers every nook and cranny of the considerable field of information on both podcasts and vodcasts.

I personally have used both editions of this book to help me get my podcast going as well as optimizing it once it was up and running. What I really enjoyed about this book is how the authors explain things so that not only do you know what to do next but also why it works. Not only that there are many highlighted sections where the authors share a personal experience that really drives a point home. This brings the whole process into very sharp focus.

And their personal experience goes way beyond the technical aspects of podcasting and vodcasting. On page 85, for example, they share a tip that is critical to anyone who really wants to make effective communication with their material. And that is this; "speak as if you are speaking to one person". That one piece of advice can turn a blah and lifeless presentation into one with depth and impact. This book is loaded with tips like that.

I can't say enough good about this book. Without it I may not have gotten my podcast going. The two guys who wrote it have been doing this since it began and they know all the tricks. Don't think about, just buy the book. You'll thank me and more importantly you'll thank the authors Dan Klass and Michael W. Geoghegan.

Geoffrey Leigh Tozer
Producer - Sly Crooner

Instead of wasting your time having you build applications you'll never use, this book gets you into real Powerbuilder code. It takes time to explain some of the basics, but it is a well-written reference for intermediate to expert PB5 programmers. Excellent coverage of the new PB5 features and great help in migrating from 4.0! I recommend any PB developer to add this book to their library.

One of the best book I read on powerbuilder. it is a good learning book for the intermediate & expert PB5 programmer.

"The Practical Guide to Defect Prevention" was written for software developers and testers, but many techniques presented can be applied to improve quality in other products as well. I'm in the midst of a career change into software development after 2 decades of working with office automation hardware, and have referred to this book during a current project, as well as passed along suggestions straight from this book to former colleagues in a much different career field. When I saw the title of this book, I was afraid I'd be reading advice that wasn't much more than common sense, or a rehash of material learned in programming or intro software testing. Wrong! Realizing how naïve I was, I picked up 2 other texts in the field of defect prevention and root cause analysis. I found this book to be more readable. The clear taxonomy, the complete explanations of various methods (with multiple examples and references) and the humor (!) held my interest enough to where I learned and understood the techniques presented, as well as broadened my understanding of what quality software development really entails.

As a previous reviewer pointed out, this book is useful to everyone from the tester who wants to catch errors, through the executive wanting a successful business. And, I suppose this sounds like I'm laying it on with a trowel, but I have to say it: Although I'm a voracious reader, I keep only a few dozen books on my shelves at home; this is one of them, and I suspect that I'll continue referring to it for quite some time. Thanks to the authors Ross, Marc, Bob, Dan, David, Lori, and Josh for taking the time and putting forth such a great effort!

This is the first review I have performed and here it goes... I work in software development and have for the last 11 years. As a Quality Assurance Professional, I think "The Practical Guide to Defect Prevention" should be on everyone's book shelf. Everyone in the industry or those contemplating a start-up in the industry should read this book to get an understanding of what quality means and how to achieve it. This is a fun book filled with real world experiences and enough technical knowledge to implement the many quality systems and is most beneficial read from end to end, but is also designed to be a reference. "The Practical Guide to Defect Prevention" does a great job of giving a strong foundation for those wanting to develop quality in their processes.
Who can really benefit from this book?
* The executive wanting to know what it takes to have a successful software business
* The manager wanting to know how to improve the product
* The product designer who wants to provide enhancements to existing features and determine what features to add
* The developer wanting to gauge the effectiveness of the implementation
* The tester that wants to catch all of the errors
Sure, we could talk about all the content and implementation issues, including; Root Cause Analysis, Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA), Fault Tree Analysis (FTA) or Failure Modeling, but my favorite aspect of this book is the real world examples and pitfalls described.
Many great related quotes are included to illustrate some aspect of the material to be presented. My favorite was in chapter 12, "Adapting Processes" where there was a quote from Mark Twain "A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way". This quote illustrates the reason you need to read this book and keep it on your bookshelf.
Arne
The Practical Guide to Defect Prevention (Best Practices)

I bought this book with a sense of unease. ... This book is well worth it. Whether youare a beginner, or advanced in the subject matter, I feel this book is worth the investment. It takes through basic concepts, to design strategies, all the way to execution. If I had to say one bad thing about this book, or if I could have a wish list for future editions, it would be that I felt the treatment of software should have been more complete. Delving into the pros and cons more. Don't get me wrong, there was an excellent chapter on software. I just walked away wishing there was more. Other than that, this book is excellent.

This book is well organized and offers a large number of very practical suggestions that will benefit an existing multimedia development or that will lead the beginner down the correct road. This is a thin book that offers exercises and case studies. Additionally, it is full of pictures that demonstrate well the practical application of the suggestions they offer. This book is a must have.

The title of this book says it all, meaning that the book should be 'practical' in every way it is just that. Years ago (or should I say in the eighties) I worked with some very bright guys in software engineering who kept on telling me the delights and greatness of SSADM and how it could help me in 'Quality Assurance' I recoiled saying that this methodology is a 'software engineering' methodology but I was wrong! After reading this book I was smitten by the simplicity and common sense approach. If you look at the British Standard for SSADM it specifies and makes the methodology 'standard' and also shows some practical examples. This book goes beyond the standard and clearly demonstrates SSADM in 'action', explaining and graphically showing great examples which help to understand how SSADM really works! After reading this book the system of application remains with you. I am a Quality Assurance professional and use SSADM principles to both analyse systems and graphically display them to view interfaces; inputs; outputs. This is performed as-is and then SSADM is used to design a better more improved system, it will show the gaps and lack of control, highlight problems. This is not only applicable to software systems but 'tangible' paper systems too. I really recommend this book, I am always making reference to it, it can be used for the whole company enterprise including ALL systems from the top down.

This is the book I keep on my desk to aid my memory for SSADM techniques and products. It also helps me with planning projects as the contents are in the order of the techniques and products one might use through a project. A quick glance through and I have my plan of action.

Practical WAP lives up to its title. The author writes in a lively style that makes it easy to understand the many aspects of WAP. Before dipping into the technical aspects of the different WAP standards, the book sets the stage with an Applications chapter that address what makes a good WAP applciation and a Tools chapter that gives the reader numerous pointers to how to begin developing for WAP.
At the core of the book is a practical discussion of how to use WML (the Wireless Markup Language)and WMLScript. There is a very useful step by step tutorial that takes you through the construction of a working WAP application.
The last section of the book provides useful information on design and architectural issues that impact WAP deployment. There is an important section on interfaces as well as a discussion of how WAP can be integrated with Java Enterprise servers. I expect that as wireless becomes more and more a part of the total enterprise picture, the integration of WAP with server tools will become even more important.
Overall, this well-written book is a must for anyone looking to work in the area of WAP development.

In my 5 years of information technology experience, both in the private sector and within academia, I have not read a better contextualized presentation of technical material than this book. Chapters 1 through 4 provide an excellent overview of important topics and set the context for the more technical information to follow. The WML language chapters (5,6) and the WMLScript chapter are perhaps the best synthesized language reference chapters I have read in a book not singularly devoted to the teaching of a particular programming language.

The practical nature of the book is a refreshing approach to technical writing. The sections on design, architectural and testing considerations are straightforward and usable by both a detailed-oriented audience (e.g. those who implement) and to a higher-level audience (e.g. solution specialists and those who manage). Additionally, the application development case study suits is very clear and well organized and builds very well upon the chapters that preceded it. I highly recommend this book for those who are either implementing WAP-enabled services or who wish to upgrade their knowledge on the WAP front.

We have been using offshore (both captive and outsourced) capacity for over six years. I wish I had stumbled across this gem of a guide six years ago! The author knows what he is talking about, and has obviously been-there and done-that. The knowledge is shared in simple, usable nuggets of wisdom. This is just a great, great read.

If you or your company is thinking about outsourcing, this is a down to earth, straightforward guide on what you should do. Includes useful tools to make outsourcing more productive and less expensive too!

If you are in the market for a book that clearly, concisely, and, oft-times, humorously describes the sometimes daunting task of developing ASP.NET-based websites - your search may be over.

Mr. Homer has crafted a book, that by no means covers all of the bases, but provides the reader with a wealth of useful, and more importantly, USEABLE information. If you're looking for esoteric discussions of the variegated server controls, "best practices" for web designers, how to best tune an application's performance, et al - you would behoove both yourself, and the author by looking elsewhere.

This is a "down-and-dirty," "real-world" application development book. If you want to know how to build a web-based application, aren't afraid to get your hands dirty, and are at least conversant with the technologies covered, this is the book for you. Mr. Homer's writing style is conversational, and seldom does he "talk over one's head," or make assumptions about the reader's level of expertise as sometimes tends to be the case with technical, and help-book writers.

In summary, Mr. Homer has written an excellent guidebook to the world of ASP.NET web design. Each chapter builds on the previous one, and at the end of the book, you have a working model of a well thought out website. One area I would recommend that Mr. Homer rethink is in his decision to create two separate sites for cookieless and cookie-enabled navigation, but ultimately, that is a matter for the reader to decide.

I would highly recommend Mr. Homer's "Pro ASP.NET Web Form Techniques" for any beginner to intermediate level ASP.NET programmer.

Mr. Homer has produced that rarity in a serious programming book, quality with clarity. The examples individually and as a whole are all very well done, and any ASP.NET programmer from intermediate level up will find something useful in here. One other note, I had a specific question and e-mailed Mr. Homer, and his response was quick, cordial, and solved my problem on the first try.....many software companies should do so well.

The complete application presented is easy to understand, but at the same time filled with features that display information in a visually superb manner. I have learned a lot from this book, and refer to it frequently.

Yes, it's on the high-end price wise, but I feel every penny was well spent. You won't go wrong with this one.

This book is one of my most-used referenced books. I've done a LOT of work using the BO XI SDK to build utility programs to help administer our system and I regularly use it to look up details.

Carl's explanations of the many of the intricacies of using the SDK and the query language are straight-forward and easy to understand. He includes many tips about undocumented and little-known features along with information about things to watch out for where the software may not behave like you would expect it to.

In addition to the SDK, there is a good overview of the admin tools that are supplied with the BusinessObjects Enterprise software and there is a full chapter on the security model.

I highly recommend this book for anyone who wants to enhance the capabilities of their BusinessObjects system.

The company I work for started a Crystal Enterprise project several months ago. I can honestly say that we would have been unable to complete the project if we did not have this book. It really takes you step-by-step in an easily readable format through what needs to be done. Also, the examples used all worked properly (a problem with many other computer books) and were extremely relevant. There are few people with Crystal Entreprise experience out there today so this book is really needed. We also find ourselves using it as a reference guide occasionally. If you are working with Crystal Enterprise or planning to implement CE I would strongly recommend this book.

For understanding EDI processing in 2006 R2 this is a great material. It has all forms for processing like EDI, AS2 etc. The Book gives a brief description about all these Architectures and then comes the good part, the samples created and Tested which you can test at your machine.

The samples are so easy to deploy with minimum pre-requisites and test them thoroughly along with a book to understand what we have done. We can download the samples from a web page directed in the Book.

Even if you are newly introduced to EDI processing through Biztalk, there is no worry. All you need is a little hands on how Biztalk translates the EDI data. From there the book has all the techniques involved in resolving the data, retrieving and mapping the information and Orchestrate the message for processing as you wish.

The Book also briefs about the deployment and production support considerations and reporting updates with the new Server. In a nutshell this is the perfect material for understanding EDI processing in 2006 R2 environment.

While EDI is straight forward in concept to understand it can be difficult to implement. This book is targeted towards the developer and architect tasked with crafting a B2B EDI solution and does a great job at detailing what needs to happen to make this task possible on the BizTalk 2006 R2 platform.

This book does not focus on the business specifics around EDI, but rather immediately jumps into detailed and concrete examples that can easily be extended into the real world. There are many EDI features with BizTalk 2006 R2 that can only be understood after working with the product across many projects. This book will reduce the time required experimenting with the tool just to understand the new features. I recommend this book to anyone working with EDI and BizTalk 2006 R2.