Applications Books

Today there are many books for pro (GPU Gems, ShaderX etc), many for beginners (superbible, redbook, orange book etc), but practically no for intermediate level. This is one of them. It's well written and tells the basics of advanced 3D algorithms: batching, env mapping, bump mapping etc.
Disadvantages are:
-too short articles on difficult topics
-too much (for me) about CADs
-somewhat old (using pbuffers instead of FBOs)
P. S.
The link for source codes from the book doesn't work, use the following one: [...]

Since its first release in 1992, OpenGL has been rapidly adopted as the graphics API of choice for real-time interactive 3D graphics applications. The OpenGL state machine is easy to understand, but its simplicity and orthogonality enable a multitude of interesting effects that require more room than can be accommodated in the OpenGL "Red Book". The objective of this book is to demonstrate how to generate more satisfying images using OpenGL in general, and how to achieve some sophisticated results in particular. There are three general areas of discussion: basic OpenGL concepts, basic techniques, and advanced techniques.
The first part of the book goes over some of the more basic OpenGL material - 3D transformations, color, shading, and lighting. Although the second part of the book - basic techniques - may look old hat at first, it does cover some interesting subjects such as deferred shading and image processing techniques that you don't normally think of as wedded to computer graphics. The best part of the book, to me, is part 3 on advanced techniques. In particular the chapters on scene realism, natural detail, illustration and artistic techniques, and scientific visualization have very unique material on them that reveal algorithmic details along with enlightening illustrations and pseudocode. The reader of this book should already be familiar with performing computer graphics using OpenGL and also be somewhat mathematically sophisticated considering that mathematics is heavily used in this book. All of the code for the methods and effects used at this book are in a zipfile at the book's website. I highly recommend this book to anyone who has gone through the "OpenGL Programming Guide" and wants to take their computer graphics skills to the next level.
One of the authors of this book does have an extensive tutorial freely available on the web that is an older subset of this book, so you might want to check it out and see if you like his writing style before you purchase. Type "Advanced Graphics Programming Techniques Using OpenGL" into Google and the first address listed should be the author's tutorial. It is no longer on OpenGL.org as far as I can tell.

I posted a review before, but I decided again to change it. Everything I said I will repeat more or less.

There is a paper on OpenGL.org written by an author, and much of that paper's info is in the book. It is not a direct reprint though. I was disappointed because I had an immediate impression it was just a total reprint of a free document. Also, the book is not hand-on at all, you really have to know your way around OpenGL to implement the techniques. It's not a quick teach-yourself-OpenGL book.

Now, I came back to update my review, because the first few chapters are crammed full of info that is really, really good. Well worth the money for the book. If you really want to know OpenGL on the inside... this book is it. It's just alot of reading, and very little hands-on. And some info in here you can find on OpenGL.org, but much newer techniques are covered to.

So I bumped it back to 5 stars, and it is an honest review. It is really worth it for these deep chapters, not for code techniques. Don't buy it unless you really already have a good handle on GL you will not be able to figure much out.

I've been collecting shells for many years but i never thought of the complexity and perfection of their patterns! This book describes in a simple way the mechanisms that produce the surface decorations of shells. It takes reader in a fascinating trip in a world of algorithmic shapes and colors!

I came across this book at the Rhode Island School of Design library. As an artist I found it surprising that what I had considered to be just a beautiful pattern was actually an imprint of the pressure and movement of the waves upon the seashell. This insight was very thought provoking for me. Perhaps to biologists this is a normal and natural thing - but for an artist this kind of scientific approach with beautifully illustrated pages is a deeply moving experience. This book will definitely make you think twice about the objects that you take for granted - whether it's visually or scientifically. I strongly recommend this book for those who like intellectual challenges and who like to look at the world with fresh new eyes.

This book describes, using a computer, The geometry involved in the building of seashells and in particular the surface features. It shows the how and why of surface decorations found on several species of Mollusks. This is probably the only book to treat this subject and do so extensively expertly and comprahensively.

The book covers more than the Amazon APIs so I recommend it if you are interested in mashups in general. I'm very keen on JSON right now and was pleased to find that covered as well. I think the author is a very good programmer who has many clever ideas like using XSL to transform XML into JSON (although using Yahoo! Pipes is easier). I'd have to say that this is one of the few programming books I've read that presented some really ingenious solutions and creative project ideas. Most books just provide uninspiring "Hello World" examples.

If you want to learn the various ways in which you can use Amazon's Web Services, this is an excellent starting point. Shanahan goes beyond "mashups" in the strict Web 2.0 sense of the term; he looks at the various ways of supporting wireless devices, and the use of the S3 storage service. The only nits (so far - I'm still working through some of the material) are that he assumes the use of Microsoft tools, and he identifies the term "JSON" with one particular style of mashup using script retrieval. (JSON is a serialization scheme which can be used for many different use cases, including RESTful interactions.) But these are minor points; this is an excellent book - and a lot of fun, too.

If you want to build applications and mashups using the Amazon E-commerce and S3 APIs this book from Francis Shanahan is a great place to start. It begins with a good overview of the ECS services and then covers useful topics like XSLT, Ajax, JSON, and mobile. Good coverage of both the Amazon SOAP and REST APIs. Includes mashup examples using primarily Microsoft tools like C# that mix with Yahoo Maps, eBay, and YouTube.

One thing you'll get here but not in a lot of other comparable books are architecture diagrams for each project. This is particularly helpful for mashups where there's often lots of integration happening at multiple layers. The illustrations help solidly conceptualize what happens where.

I can't believe I waited so long to read this book -- it truly is a classic. This is the way AI should be done: by focusing on the right level of abstraction, situated above the level of neuroscience but below the level of simple input-output function mapping. Finally, a computer model that makes those first steps towards doing the same thing that people do.

True believers in those original goals of artificial intelligence take heart -- this book gives new hope to a field that has come to be dominated by engineering approaches that only work in special cases like the logic behind the cruise control switch in a car. Mitchell's model provides the fluidity and flexibility that is lacking from classical machine learning techniques.

Melanie Mitchell's analogy-making as perception is a remarkably original book. It documents an artificial intelligence project known as copycat, which was implemented as the author's PhD project under Douglas Hofstadter.

Copycat is unlike anything in artificial intelligence. It is not a symbolic system, neither a connectionist one. The major goal of the project is to study the nature of concepts. Concepts, as we all know, are flexible, context-sensitive creatures. For instance, DNA has nothing to do with a computer program, but there is a sense on which we can see DNA as a computer program that guides embrionary development. DNA can also be seen as a zipper, as it "zips down" in two parts (for cell reproduction). Still another view would be DNA as a will, for it carries valuable hereditary "property". Now, DNA is in truth just a molecule, and nothing else. The question is, how can we see the same thing (such as DNA) as so many different things? Moreover, how can these fluid context-sensitive concepts be implemented in rigid, rule-obeying computers?

To which the answer is: what we view is the abstract roles that DNA plays in embrionary development, cell division, and in individual reproduction. And this is the very idea of "Analogy-making as perception".

Well, not so fast. The copycat project is not designed to grasp such extremely complex subjects as DNA, but, on the other hand, it presents a computational architecture that suggests what the nature of concepts is like, and how flexible concepts may emerge from inflexible mechanisms.

Copycat can solve analogy problems such as abc->abd:ijk-> ?. But it is not restricted to trivial ones. Consider the following analogy: abc ->abd:xyz->?. How would you solve it? How do you think that copycat solves it?

Obviously, this project doesn't fit in very easily in classical artificial intelligence, as it attacks some of the most pervasive ideas of the field, such as the separation of perception and cognition. In fact, I think this book redefines the major questions of artificial intelligence (and although Mitchell does not state it, I think the copycat model does not fall prey to either the frame problem or to the symbol grounding problem).

It is very unfortunate that this is not one of the best-selling books in AI. But I believe that it will ultimately make its mark on the History of the field, if for no other reason than it simply is the right approach to genuine intelligence and authentic understanding.

Should one day Amazon.com let me give a 6-star to a book, but charge me a dollar for giving it, this is one that would definitely deserve to be such a 6-star.

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PS. I would also recommend Hofstadter's Fluid Concepts and Creative Analogies; and Robert French's Subtlety of Sameness.

Since AI researchers are generally engineers, they historically did what engineers do: they broke up the mind in very clear-cut divisions, one for the perception of the things out there in the world, and another, symbolically, to do "abstract cogitation".

For deep reasons, this was an invalid move, but only a few could see it. Melanie surely could, for her highly original copycat project exhibits some of the best insights in Artificial Intelligence ever.

AI is still so much pervaded with the wrong ideas that this book will need to take some time to make its definitive mark on the history of the field.

If genuine understanding is ever to be built into a machine, understanding of the kind that Searle's gang will be forever denying, then it will come from an architecture similar to that proposed in this book.

Then again, I could turn out to be wrong. But let us let History decide on this issue.

It provides wide range of practical applications, with plain English, colorful pages, step by step from basic to advanced approach. It has got answers at the back. I recommend it`s Instructor`s solutions manual as well...

The strength of this book is its organization. The reader is first introduced to the relation of arc length, radius, and angle. Then degrees and radians are learned. Then the unit circle is introduced. This is one of the best ways to learn trig.

The textbook presents the theory in a clear way that is easy to follow. If you were to read the chapter, you know enough to answer any of the problems. And if you were decided between texts, the layout of the problems of this text would be the reason to choose it. That is because of the science and real world applications of the problems. This is not "plug and chug." It is applying what was learned.

For me this book and the class in which it was used formed the foundation of all my latter math courses. This book has some pre-calculus problems, but that isn't its focus. Calculus has its advantages, but I always found trig to be more visual than most things in calculus. It is easier to picture what is actually going on in the math problem. But if you can relate your newly learned problem solving skills when approaching calculus problems, you will have no trouble.

One of my favorite problems in this book, which was included in the sixth edition on page 281, problem 71, is about an arched doorway. I don't know if the current versions have this problem. However it is worth researching. On my website (see my profile), I discuss this problem. And the excellent problems is what make this the best trig book I've seen.

one of the best trig books in the world. the same goes for algebra and trig (right triangle)by beecher and bittinger:1993 edition.

Well structured and excellent all round book on hosted applications covering: the motivations for outsourcing; what application service providers (ASPs) are all about; ASP types, services and techologies used. Also good sections on ASP security and strategic analysis of ASP types. Writing quality is good. The author knows his subject and text is well edited. Overall, a very useful guide to what the ASPs are all about and a comprehensive introduction into the challenging world of the ASPs.

A wonderfully thorough examination on one of the most important themes facing tech-companies today! This book has it all; economics, strategic marketing processes, lucid observations and an incredibly learned analysis. I am stunned. Factor is hands down the world leader in ASP knowledge and a prophet in sizing up its future importance in the tech world. Read it!

This book is essential reading for all stakeholders in an ASP scenario: providers, clients, and investors/venture capitalists. The reasons for this bold statement are:

- PROVIDERS: Chapters 3 (Understanding ASP), 5 (Network Computing and ASP Architectures), 8 (ASP Security Services), and 10 (ASP Enabling: Requirements and Fulfillment) cover the critical success factors that the ASP needs to ensure, as well as gives a good overview of what it takes to frame a value proposition to potential clients.

- CLIENTS: Chapters 2 (Why Companies Outsource), 3 (Understanding ASP), 6 (ASP Types and Services), and 7 (Managing ASPs) show what to expect from an ASP, how to determine if outsourcing to one makes business sense, and how to effectively manage an ASP after the contract is signed.

- INVESTORS/VCs: Chapters 1 (The History and Evolution of Outsourcing and ASP), 2 (Why Companies Outsource), 4 (Taxonomy for ASP Economies), 9 (Strategic Analysis of ASP Types), and 11 (The Future of ASP) make a compelling case in favor of investing in an ASP, and how to properly evaluate proposed business models.

To be sure there is a lot of overlap of material that will be of interest between and among the stakeholders cited above, but the chapters I cited will be the ones that each should read first. What makes this book so valuable is the panoramic view of the ASP industry, and the level of detail that each topic is given. The author knows his stuff, and, more importantly, knows how to clearly communicate it.

If you are among the stakeholder groups cited above this is the single most informative book on the topic to date.

Great book for designer and technical architect, the presentation of the book is very good, it go through the guidelines, implementation examples and case studies in nice and simple way support by good charts, graphs and tables. That is one of few books in the market which cover all the phases of software life cycle including analysis, application architectures and design... Its easy to read and understand, but hard to find in the books stores, my guess its one of the great books I had in my library from couple of years.

Great book for designer and technical architect, the presentation of the book is very good, it go through the guidelines, implementation examples and case studies in nice and simple way support by good charts, graphs and tables. That is one of few books in the market which cover all the phases of software life cycle including analysis, application architectures and design... Its easy to read and understand, but hard to find in the books stores, my guess its one of the great books I had in my library from couple of years.

The author made no assumptions regarding the reader's technical knowledge. Thus, he provides a comprehensive guide beginning with the fundamentals of application re-engineering to the technical details of Web development; e.g., CGI and JAVA. Experienced architects will rejoice, because finally someone put all the information needed in one book. Those who are inexperienced with architectures or re-engineering can sit down and learn how all the different pieces fit together. This is the only book I have ever seen that puts all the pieces of application architecture and system design together tjat is easy to read, easy to understand, and steps through each part of the process. Well done!

The book does an execellent job of explaining and showing how to use a difficult Pro/E module. The documentation from PTC is weak!! I highly recommend this book to all level users. It is hard to fine a good book. This is a good book.

This is a fantastic book! I learned Pro-Sheetmetal from scratch with the help of this book.

You will have the best book that you can buy on the market. It will give you not only tutorial of commands of sheetmetal module but also some others design methods required to be a good designer.

This book has been a very helpful tool; it has helped me by giving me easy to follow sample programs. Having these examples to follow has given me the opportunity to find out what my mistakes were and correct them with less hassle. This book is a great tool for any student programming in more than one language. It teaches by examples, giving a hands-on approach to each example. Out of all of the books that I had to use to complete my project, this one book is the one that I constantly came back to look up any problems that occurred. With out this book my research this summer would have been a very difficult task, but with the sample coding to guide me through, I have produced a great project.

This is a terrific interfacing program book so far I have found in this site. The book provides a thorough description and detailed illustrations in interfacing programming between different languages with a lot of hands-on examples. As everybody knows, the easiest way to learn a programming language is via examples. I found that this book is an example-oriented one, and it combines theoretical knowledge with the practical programming techniques together to show me how to develop interfacing programs step by step.

Besides the interfacing technology, the author seems to have a deep understanding for each programming language. I found that in chapters, the author provides some useful hands-on technologies, such as the pseudo-components in the Visual Basic to access the
Database, recovering the developed program codes in VisualWorks in Smalltalk and developing a DLL in MATLAB. I cannot find those hands-on technologies from any other textbooks or professional language reference books in the market.

Finally, this book provides me an easy-to-learn style, which means that each example in the book starts from the fundamental level, and little by little, it gradually adds more complicated components and finally I can get a finished program that contains the completed parts I need to interface to codes developed in other language.

This book takes the theoretical ideas that are present in other programming books and makes it a reality. With easy to follow, practical examples, it guides the reader through techniques to communicate between different programming languages. Finally, there is a book that makes understanding how to relate information across the languages barriers a simple task. And with seven different languages, it is the only comprehensive work to do so. It was very helpful to me, because I needed to be able to send messages between two different pieces of code that I didn't have the time to rewrite. The thorough examples allowed me to quickly learn how to use the techniques and expand upon them so that it would do that which I needed it to. I learned a lot of things from this book that, previously, I didn't know were possible.

First, let me preface this by saying my review is based on the FIRST EDITION of the book. Also, I have not read the entire thing, but much of it. I had no idea what a Lie Group was before picking this book up and found it to be an excellent introduction to a very fascinating subject.

The autor gives a fairly rigorous explication of the fundamentals of manifolds and groups in the first chapter, skipping proofs of harder facts. He then spends the rest of the book focusing on how to find symmetry groups of differential equations and their interpretation. He goes through detailed calculations and provides many helpful examples, without which I would have no chance of understanding the book. He gives very readable and easily applicable formulas for prolongation of group actions and vector fields, and supplies the heavy-handed theorems relating subvarieties of the prolonged group actions to symmetry groups of the DE's.

Algebraists will find the book lacking in details and probably fairly myopic in scope. Applied people such as myself will find it indispensible as a resource for actual computation. The focus of the book is consistent with the original formulations by Lie and Noether and is still relevant and largely untaught in standard courses. Reading this book, I have learned some very helpful TECHNIQUES, and I suspect if that's what you're looking for this book will be a Godsend.

Not proper for first contact with the subject ,but as bibliographical resource, this is a realy good one.

Application of symmetries and Lie groups to differential equations (primarily PDE's) is a hot issue in contemporary Mathematics and Physics. Unfortunately, only few textbooks are available on this area.

The book is one of the best attempts to put this topic into an ordered, easy to studying form, despite of its being a rapidly developing and thus hard to teaching issue. It survived two editions, and I am sure this is not the last.

I am also sure that anyone who is involved in the area, will need to read this book, or have already read it.