Computer Science Books

The correspondence between this work and that of Alan Cooper (The Inmates Are Running the Asylum: Why High Tech Products Drive Us Crazy and How to Restore the Sanity and About Face 3: The Essentials of Interaction Design) are staggering. Dr. Endsley and her co-writers rail about how a technology focus leads to poor user interfaces, and recommend a user-centered design approach including "Goal-directed Task Analysis." Alan Cooper rails about how a technology focus leads to poor user interfaces and recommends a user-focused approach he calls "Goal-Directed Design." The difference between this book and Cooper's books is the wealth of dramatic examples and underlying research in Designing for Situation Awareness.

Situation Awareness refers to the OO of the OODA loop - getting input from the environment - Observing - and understanding the significance of that input now and in the future - Orienting. It is a concept used widely in aviation, medicine, and the military - areas where life and death decisions are routinely made based on situation awareness.

One study cited in this book identifies flawed situation awareness as the root cause of 88% of aircraft crashes due to human error. In the remaining 12% the wrong decision was made or there was a problem with execution. With these sobering figures, this book lays out design guidelines to enhance situation awareness.

A formal situation awareness design approach would involve realistic prototyping and rigorous testing as you'd expect for anything related to aviation or medicine. This book provides 50 concrete design principles in six different areas to assist this formal design cycle, but as the book says: "These principles can be applied to a wide range of systems from a variety of domains where achieving and maintaining SA [Situation Awareness] is challenging."

Anyone designing interfaces to support situation awareness or quick comprehension - like performance dashboards - can learn from this book. Unlike software design examples, the examples in this book contain flight numbers and phrases like "killing all aboard" that underscore how very critical situation awareness is, and how driven the authors are to help raise the standards of design.

The only minor criticism I can level is a feeling that this book was rushed together; but with the critical importance of the topic I can see why. I look forward to the recently announced second edition.

This is a Should Read for anyone involved with the design of information technology to support complex problem-solving and decision-making in any setting. It's a Must Read for anyone working with highly dynamic situations or critical situation management, including emergency and disaster response. Dr. Endsley and her co-authors not only lay out a very thorough explanation of the design challenges imposed by human cognitive behaviors and limitations, but also review in depth the research that reveals these behaviors and limitations. They then present a very comprehensive set of guidelines for addressing these challenges in design.

Chapter 4 should be required reading for all user interface design practitioners and students. In this chapter, Dr. Endsley (who comes from the human factors and ergonomics field) and her colleagues lay out a much better description of the process of designing and developing user interface software than any I have seen anywhere in the human-computer interaction or software engineering literature.

This book is the result of years of exhaustive research that sets a gold standard for use-inspired basic research. It is useful to researchers as well as practitioners. I am in awe of the quality of the work and the quality of the results.

I'm researching systems-development related topics at the moment and this book is one of the few I've encountered that gives an abundant amount of carefully considered information. Most books, it seems, can be summarized in a sentence or two. Dillon's work, on the other hand, is one of the most detailed--and purposeful--I've seen. I'd recommend this book not only to text designers but anyone interested in user-centered design. Its implications for users (who are often scanners, not readers!) are broad and significant, encompassing motivations (why people read, or why they visit websites and what they expect to get out of their experience) and navigation and wayfinding issues. Another useful component of the book is its discussion of using models and frameworks as a tool to faciliate structured research and development. Many thanks to Dillon for providing a first rate book on a pervasive, yet largely ignored topic. I look forward to seeing more of his work in the future.

This is by far the best analysis of reading of electronic text that I have seen. He provides an excellent insight as to what is, what might be, and what is not important for on-screen reading.

He does not limit text to just fiction/non-fiction categories, but instead discusses: WHY it is read professional/personal reasons, to learn or not, out of interest/need, etc. WHAT type of information it contains technical or non-technical, subject matter, general or specific, textual or graphic, etc. HOW it is read serially or non-serially, once or repeatedly, browsed or studied in depth, etc.

His book suggests to me that text should alter its format to the meet the users - Why, What, and How. Possible examples: switch to all caps when searching for words or phrases, turn off hyperlink indicators for linear reading, ...

He points out that there have been many studies on editing text, but few on reading text. A good fraction of the book deals with on-screen reading.

Screen reading was better with: high resolution characters, increased space between lines (leading), proportional font, limiting the number of characters on a line, and not splitting a sentence across a page boundary.

He indicates that users preferred on-screen reading over paper reading for some tasks when the screens had enough improvements.

Screen reading might be improved with: landmarks/navigation, serif fonts, full left/right justification, ...

Screen reading was no different than paper reading for: orientation of the media, flicker rate, screen dynamics, and visual angles (< 36 degrees).

I am a college professor migrating into the "new" world of teaching online. If I had to recommend a book for "How To" this is it. A must read for anyone attempting to go there!

This is a comprehensive, easy-read that brings every aspect of online curriculum development into focus before it marches into the details of practical, successful class management. Through it all, Lynnette's constant thread is defining the role of the teacher in creating an online community that works. She is an excellent guide. Whether your target is an online class or a curriculum, read this one. For the technically challenged, it covers all the tools. For the technology-savy, it draws attention to the human element. Even if you're already involved with online education, you'll find fresh ideas here.

This book is absolutely amazing. Before I read it, I hadn't a clue about what so-called "XIE" was or what you could do with it. Now, after reading this masterpiece of a work, I still don't know much about it, but I'm developing my very own imaging applications and making a lot of money -- in little time! Thanks Syd Logan!

This book is Fantastic with a capital F! Before I picked up this book, I had no idea what this so-called "XIE" was or what it could do. Now, having read this book, I'm considered the local X(ie)Pert (get it?), the imaging applications that I'm developing are bringing in tons of cash - in little time! Thanks Syd Logan!

ddc is a very useful classification scheme.about 98%libraries through out the world uses this scheme.so i recommended this scheme for all kind of libraries.

As a Library Assistant studying for my Library Technician degree this set of books became my best friend. While most colleges or universities will have copies for loan, I found that I oftened added things to the book, thus the importance of having your own copy.

The first volume covers the rules for using and assigning DDC numbers.

The second and third volumes contain the schedules / summaries for actually assigning the DDC number.

The fourth contains the Relative Index (a Library Tech's best friend), which assists in locating appropriate numbers.


I know its a lot of money, but it is well worth it if you are serious about working in this field.

I took Dr. Greenstein's class several years ago at Kellogg when completing my MBA. I had picked up the book as I still find myself going back to some his teachings (even after so many years). The book contains a series of essays written in an easy to understand manner and deliver some very interesting economic perspectives on technology markets. The essays are organized in eight sections:
Part I: Musings
Part II: Observations, fleeting, and otherwise
Part III: Developing the digital world
Part IV: Internet boom and bust
Part V: Prices, productivity, and growth
Part VI: Enterprise Computing
Part VII: Microsoft, from the sublime to the serious
Part VIII: Platforms and Standards

A must read for every technology entrepreneur...

Dr. Greenstein has taken on complex issues and provided an entertaining, yet informative analysis of modern markets. This group of essays provide a practical starting point for the analysis of diverse economic systems.

Most of my students have purchased the 7th Edition. They say, this Dictionary is very good and comes in handy for class and homework assignments.
The definitions used are clear enough for new computer enthusiasts; as well as the more advanced student. I like it.

A wonderful reference book as you muddle through the jorgon of the computer world. This book offers short and concise explainations needed to understand the growing technology surrounding computers. A must for any home or business computer.

The second edition of the book has more text than the first edition. It is an excellent book which is recommended for all science students especilly those in the USA where Imperial units are still in use.
In the second edition you'll see the address of the author's website site which should also be available by mid September.
[...]

This book is ideal for preparing questions for a trivia quiz on SI (metric) units. It's also a good resource for teachers to illustrate the use of prefixes in maths, also spelling and language work in this subject.

Clear and concise defintions of everything-you wanted-to-know about object technology but did not know who to ask. I've been using OT for well over ten years now and I think this book will be useful for both the newbie and experienced practitioner. Recommended.

This dictionary should be on the desk of anyone seriously into object technology. It is an essential reference that allows the reader to use the correct terms when refering to certain meanings in different object languages.

When this book appeared in 1995, I had a look at it, but I did not buy it. Why not ?

Wirth describes the basics of modern circuit design without going too much into the electrical details. After a short look at transistors (bipolar and FET) he goes to gates (NAND/NOR/NOT) and shows how to create building blocks like multiplexers, ROM and RAM with them. This presentation culminates in the description of a simple microprocessor core. But it looked a bit too elementary at first sight.

Nevertheless, 3 years later I bought the book, started reading it and still enjoy reading it. Why this change of view ? What I overlooked at first sight was the HDL that Wirth introduces after the presentation of the building blocks in chapter 7. This language is called Lola (Logic Language) and is much simpler than VHDL, Verilog and even simpler than Abel. Lola looks a bit like the other languages Wirth created (Pascal, Modula, Oberon). In the second half of the book, he uses this language to specify his processor design and some peripherals (like a UART). These readable and concise designs together with the unique approach to circuit design are the main reasons why I can recommend this book.

Warning: If you want to learn a HDL that is widely accepted in the industry, learn VHDL, Verilog or Abel. Lola is the outgrowth of an academic project and will not enable you to earn much money in the industry. But I like it and the book.

This is an unusual little book that addresses a specific need: the first introduction to hardware how and why for someone who's already a competent programmer. That audience has very different needs than those of electrical engineering students learning logic design, but I know of no other book intended for that audience.

The pace is brisk. It starts at the level of bipolar transistors, and shows the differences between a CMOS and TTL totem pole. Before page 100, the student has seen combinational logic, registers, RAM and ROM, and the Lola hardware design language, and is designing a CPU. By the time the book ends, the student has seen bit-slice controllers, microprocessors and IO systems, and the inner workings of a UART.

This is not idle play. 99% of all processors these days do not run Windows or Unix. Instead, they're inside of sewing machines, fuel injectors, implanted defibrillators, and anti-lock brakes. Schools do little, if anything at all, to prepare students for working in an environment where software and hardware are interchangeable. In those worlds, a programmer is often called upon to specify and debug hardware, at least as one member of a mixed development team. They may even need to understand how to create logic circuits that perform computing tasks. Silicon Graphics and Cray have both released main-stream processors that have programmable logic strapped onto their CPUs, and someone has to make that logic work.

Because of its unique direction, this book skips nearly all of what a "logic design" book would address. There is no Karnaugh mapping, state minimization, or mention of logic hazards (though the student does get a look at some kinds of transient glitches). There is bare mention of asynchronous design, a bugbear of logic design students and now relegated to narrow niches. There are, however, schematics and part lists for a CPU built from MSI logc, for a microprocessor-based computer, and for the gate-array logic design of a small CPU.

An EE might poo-poo this book as "logic lite," because it doesn't teach all that manly circuit stuff. Well, it wasn't meant to. The student who studies this book carefully, however, will be ready to deal with ground bounce, spec sheets, and a wide range of problems from the analog level on up.

Wirth's dense but readable book is my choice for a programmer's first look inside the hardware. I just wish there were an edition newer than the 1995 printing.

//wiredweird