Distributed Computing Books

Dr. Sapaty describes some very far out and very powerful technologies that are coming on line for organizational management of dynamic distributed systems. The Internet will no longer be just for sending emails and basic e-commerce in the very near future. I see WAVE as a general solver to a multitude of distributed systems. WAVE is a new methodology and technology enabling the solution of any reasonable, and some that may not be currently reasonable, problem in distributed computer networks, with code mobility being a key principle. The technology allows for the problem description on a semantic level, shifting traditional coordination, synchronization, and data or agent exchange to automatic implementation, making application programming very compact and simple.

This WAVE paradigm looks very powerful: One issue with it is that it is so radically new and improved from what is currently being done, that it will take a while for people to actually believe it is real! I do, and now I want - no, need - to help convince others...The fact that you are reading this review indicates that you have interest in this field. As such, I recommend that you purchase this book, as well as his new book that discusses advances in the spatial programming of distributed dynamic worlds (which is due to be released soon) and judge for yourself. You will not be disappointed.

Larry M. Deschaine, PE / Systems Optimization Design Engineer / Fortune 500 Company / MIT '84

This book have the basics of neural networks (NN) treated at undergraduate level adequated to students of physics, mathematics or engineering. The relevant concepts are all explained and it recquires no previous knowledge in the area from the reader. It is a perfect introduction to the theory of neural networks for those who are iniciating in the field and have no experience with NN.

Excellent book. I agree with much of the editorial review. I have found this book very useful for my work in distributed computation. The authors are thorough and exact in their work and rely heavily on matrix and probabilistic methods for their results. If you are into parallel and distributed algorithms, then this is a must have book.

El libro lo lleva de la mano en el aprendizaje de Power Builder, inclusive aun mejor que los propios manuales integrados al paquete original, es muy recomendable para quien se inicia y quiere construir una aplicación totalmente funcional desde el principio

I ordered this book to help prepare our entry in next year's competition. It looks like we are not going to make it, but I am still glad I ordered RoboCup. Almost 800 pages of robot know-how plus tons of illustrations - it just keeps on giving! This has been and will continue to be a great source of information for my other robotics projects. The RoboCup books are one of the best-kept secrets to success in amateur robotics.

This three section collection of papers is for advanced architects who are exploring contemporary security strategies. The collection is divided into foundation material, concepts and implementation. The book has a fourth section, but it's an appendix that lists the author bios.

The papers in this book are based on presentations given at two ECOOP'98 workshops: the Workshop on Distributed Object Security and the Workshop on Mobility: Secure Internet Mobile Computation. Unlike many books that are based on workshops and lecture notes, this one is more practical than academic. I like the fact that XML and Java are covered, and found the papers that deal with access controls filled with useful information. The paper by Blaze, Feigenbaum, Ioannidis, and Keromytis on the role of trust management in distributed systems, and Roth's paper on mutual protection of cooperating agents gave information that me and my team used to solve a design problem.

Like most collections of computer science lecture notes the writing is vastly different from more popular books, but the information is there if you're willing to dig through dry writing. Also, this book is not for programmers who either don't have a computer science degree or are not familiar with computer science and software engineering.

The book reviews the use of artificial life techniques in solving a wide range of problems in high performance computing and mobile computing.
The approaches are an interesting and fresh look at how new solution methodologies can be applied to deal with complex
problems in the areas of parallel and mobile computing.

I would highly recommend the book to any researcher who is
interested in experimenting with new ideas and probably contemplating the use of a-life methods.

Siciliano and Khatib have assembled a massive and comprehensive tome on robotics, circa 2008. Sections of the book can be read by a diverse audience of undergraduate and graduate students, researchers and even the general public. Spanning any field associated with the subject.

There is considerable maths in the modelling of robots. Often to understand and control an arm. The multiple degrees of freedom of joints are wonderful for dexterity. But these often give an excursion into advanced linear algebra and control systems theory. Several chapters go into the necessary maths. You probably need at least 2 years of undergraduate engineering maths as preparation.

The myriad applications in which robots have been deployed is amply surveyed in Part F, Field and Service Robotics. In the household, there is of course the floor cleaning Roomba. A cute little gizmo, but it is not a toy; a genuine robot in its own right. The chapter mentioning it also describes an entire genre of competitors; mostly lesser known to the public.

Another chapter on agriculture and forestry talks about using robots for tasks like harvesting. Usually more successful when the terrain is flat and well defined; ie. having only one crop present. While the general case of a robot in hilly, wooded terrain with multiple obstacles and different species of trees is much harder to program.

I also ran into something in this chapter from my past, and it impressed me as to the book's comprehensiveness. At the University of Western Australia, there was a long running program to devise a robot sheep shearer. It started in the 70s and I met several of its researchers. I lost track of it after 1983, but I'd wondered whatever became of it. The book takes up the thread, explaining that the program took on the name Shear Magic, and was ultimately discontinued because it was never fast enough. But even in failure, this robotic application had a side effect. The demonstration of the technology was used by farmers to browbeat human shearers into moderating their wage claims, by playing off longstanding fears of workers about being replaced by machines. Of course, whether or not this was desirable may be a function of your political leanings.

To me, the most interesting section of the entire book concerned mirror neurons. This was a fundamental recent discovery in biology. The relevance to robotics is still perhaps speculative. Several robotics researchers have attempted to use it as inspiration for teaching a robot via its visual input and processing system. This contrasts greatly with the traditional teaching use of rule based formal logic, often involving the predicate calculus. The results described in the text are early but promising.

One slight curiosity is the relative deprecating of military applications. These are numerous and scattered throughout various chapters. Covering uses like landmine detectors, or the aerial Predator and its relatives that have seen much recent use in Iraq and Afghanistan for surveillance and attack. But at the top level of the Contents, there is no section on the military. And if you go to the Index, "military" is absent, while, for example, "mind reading" gets 2 entries. The downplaying of the military is especially puzzling given the historically prominent role of the US military in funding advanced robotics research.

With the blast of a 12 guague point blank. His work comes straight off the street, undiluted by romanticism or the glorification of violence. Its an attempt to convey the life of a beat coop without cliche or comedy. Mahoneys poetry is a self defense reaction against the unbearable senslessness of suffering. He cannot save souls, he can only catch the bodies

If you only have one reference for SQL 7..this is it.

I have not read this book cover to cover, nor could I. This book is a very good reference book (although I wish DTS was covered), but not exciting reading material. If you are a SQL Server programmer,I would definitely recommend you have this book on you shelf.

I have not read this book cover to cover, nor could I. This book is a very good reference book (although I wish DTS was covered), but not exciting reading material. If you are a SQL Server programmer,I would definitely recommend you have this book on you shelf.

In my opinion, SQL Server 7.0 is one of the finest software products ever written. This book compliments Microsoft's effort. It is ideal for developers who need an understanding of the specifics of the database engine OF THIS PRODUCT, not other databases. It presents a very informative section on the nuts-and-bolts of the product and then moves on to SQL programming. Although not used very much, the chapter on cursors explains how to properly implement a cursor solution and how to keep cursors from degrading system performance. This book is not a step-by-step instruction manual on learning SQL Server, but rather a guide for professional developers who work with the product regularly in a production environment.

I purchased three things to help me prepare for the 70-029 exam: This book, the Exam Cram Book, and Transcender. The Exam Cram is garbage, but this book consistently presents the material in an accurate and logical fashion. It fully explains the concepts to the degree that fosters understanding as well as retention. Concept explanations are followed up by numerous examples and it's written in a way that makes a relatively dry subject interesting. It's impossible to go wrong with this book either as a reference or as a study guide.