Desktop Books

It's unbelievable that how they can put those dozens of invaluable gems written by graphics programmer from all over the world together into one book. It's a must for every graphics programmer.

I'm the archivist for the free Graphics Gems code base on the web. I do it for free, because this code is so valuable. Others think so, too: there is an average of 100 hits a day on the site. Go look at the online list of what's in this volume to see if it's for you.

Highlights (for me) include an IEEE fast square root, uniform random rotations, triangle-cube intersection, and BSP tree ray tracing. There's tons more.

If you wish to self-publish and you use Framemaker or Ventura software, this book is for you. I've read numerous books on the subject, but none so detailed (and accurate). Takes you from Style Designs and Page Layout to Graphics and Final Publication. This is written for the DTP user who is looking for help in using the software as well as tips to develop a professional publication, whether it is a manual or book. A ten star rating without question

To start a software company and develop the product in UK, I looked for books about writing user manuals. Other books focus on how to write good contents. But this book focuses on how to create a good format. In the process of the manual production, I had to make a decision whether I create the manual internally or ask any technical documentation companies. By interviewing the technical documentation companies, I found that I had to provide contents anyway. However, the structure of contents depends on how to format the manual. By adopting the exact manual structure suggested in this book, I first defined the format of the manual , wrote the contents by myself and asked a technical editor to correct them for mistakes in grammar. By using this process, I could write a manual with a short time and less confusion. This book made me realize that the user manual writing is like a database development, putting the right details of information into the right layer of the document (Chapter, Sub chapter, note, etc). And I had never realized that I had to use so many fonts to write a nice looking manual and that there are font designers who spend their life to create new fonts. In next edition, It will be helpful if the book provides a enclosed diskette which contains templates.

I have a small library on printing and printing technologies. This book is the best single book I own. It's the best single source on printing I've seen, as well. The subject is laid out logically; the theory is provided to allow understanding; the graphics are clear and informative, and frequently provided; the writing style is clear, although a bit "Germanic" in thought-processes, resulting from the translation I assume.
I recommend this book to any printing professional seeking to learn about their field, or to any student of the industry. Just don't drop it on your toes.

Just ordered my english version of this, already having the german language version. The book is top-notch, very clearly explaining and illustrating, both with drawings and photos, the various components and materials used for all types of printing. Its breadth and depth make it a vital reference for anyone involved in the graphic arts industries.

This is an excellent tutorial for AutoCAD 2000 and also a great reference. I find that it is very comprehensive and is a valuable reference for programming and customizing AutoCAD 2000. As a bonus this book had a 30 day trial full version of AutoCAD in back on CD-ROM. Great value!

I use ACAD 200 daily. My copy of this book is quite dog eared and probably needs to be replaced. I am almost constantly thinking of ways that I could get my ACAD 2000 program to work better with me. This book is extremely helpful for me to do that. I have found this book to be laid out well and has a VERY extensive index so that I can find out how to do what I want to do. I recommend very strongly that anyone that uses ACAD 2000 on a regular basis to have this book in their library and within reach.

This is a great book... It has been a valuable tool for me in the web design business. It covers from picking the right colors to CGI programming... And it gives you helpful tips along the way... EVERYTHING you need to know about designing your own website is in this one book

This is an excellent book....Although I know how to code in Html and have my own website. I strongly recommend to beginners to buy this book as it teaches you the basics and how to use all the fantastic tools and utilities to improve your Home Page. I have added a link from my Homepage to her website for anyone wishing to get a hands-on preview before buying this great book.

Even while flipping through it for the first time, I found at least a dozen things that I didn't know about AutoCAD, and I've been using AutoCAD for 10 years now! I can't decide what I like most about this book. Not only do you get commands listed alphabetically, but it includes tips, keyboard/mouse functions, a detailed section on system and dimension variables, and highlighting new options in R14 (including the new Bonus Tools) all of which is in a neat, well organized format. A book like this usually comes in the size of a phone book with a price tag close to $85, but this book is a convenient size for much-much less. If you only buy one AutoCAD [R14] book this year, get this one!

Clear, concise, and authoratative reference for AutoCAD R14. A must for all users of AutoCAD (including R12 and R13 users).

While a co-worker was spending hundreds of dollars to
learn AutoCad at the local collage, I learned as much at
the same pace at home with this fine book. It should be sub-titled as a tutorial. The book begins assuming you know nothing about AutoCad,
and carefully explains in a straight-forward method all you need to know. Everything is done in sequence so each excercise teaches
new commands to be used in following drawings. It is a great primer
for new users learning 2-D basics, and I have shared it with experienced users at work as a reference manual for 2-D
and 3-D drawings. The book comes with a disk with programs
to help you learn which was a real time-saver for me. I would recommend this book to all beginning and professional
AutoCad users. I have other titles from The New Riders Publishing Company, and they have all been a very good investment.

Inside AutoCad 12 For DOS ISBN 1562050559
While a co-worker was spending hundreds of dollars to
learn AutoCad at the local collage, I learned as much at
the same pace at home with this fine book. It should be sub-titled as a tutorial. The book begins assuming you know nothing about AutoCad,
and carefully explains in a straight-forward method all you need to know. Everything is done in sequence so each excercise teaches
new commands to be used in following drawings. It is a great primer
for new users learning 2-D basics, and I have shared it with experienced users at work as a reference manual for 2-D
and 3-D drawings. The book comes with a disk with programs
to help you learn which was a real time-saver for me. I would recommend this book to all beginning and professional
AutoCad users. I have other titles from The New Riders Publishing Company, and they have all been a very good investment.

I must say I was pleasantly surprised with this book. I actually learned a ton more than expected which is unusual for a book not meant to teach all 3 programs. It is certainly at an intermediate level as stated which is also a refreshing surprise.

The Fireworks section is quite extensive since all the examples rightfully are designed in or a major part of them are designed in Fireworks where they are then cut up, interactivity added (except for the Flash examples) and then exported.

The FreeHand section deals with primarily the tools that differ from Fireworks and things like perspecive, contour blends and bleneding. The blending feature allows you to do a shape tween type of effect and then use it in Fireworks for animation. Then there is extensive tips and tricks for preparing FreeHand files for use in Flash.

The Flash section is great fun and extremely useful. The entire section deals with ActionScripting projects, the author doesn't try to teach you Flash but useful ways to use it in conjunction to the other two programs. The projects such as the puzzle teaches more than it may appear on the surface. Sure, you may not need a puzzle, but it was a great way to demonstrate how to load movies that replace prior ones versus loading movies to a new level. This is just one example. There is also a jukebox that has four pieces of music (included) that uses a trick to load very quickly. A product display that rotates a full 360 degrees, a banner ad that allows you to print a brochure from within Flash and a banner ad that uses the color feature of Flash. There are more projects in this section.

Even though Dreamweaver isn't in the title of this book, it wasn't left out of the mix. There is an Appendix which takes an entire Fireworks design and places the images in DW and adds the behaviors, CSS Style Sheets in DW. There is also a section on adding FW pop-up menus in DW.

There are some great contributors that added value to this book as well. What I liked is they added VALUE not just their names. For instance, Hillman Curtis did a nice introductory piece on, "Motion is the Message" imparting some of his wisdom to us. There is also an entire interface given to us from Eyeland Studio that we can use and modify (with instructions on how)and banner ads from Figleaf Software.

All in all, I don't think you'll be disapointed in this book. I walked away with much more than I expected. This review took much longer to do than anticipated because the book is almost 500 pages (480) and is packed. Not only did I learn the strong points of each program but how to work more efficiently as well.

I already had Fireworks, and then I bought the Flash and Freehand bundle. I am used to Illustrator, and this book really helped me tie all the programs together. The projects are easy to do, but challenging enough to keep up your interest. They also build up your skill level so you increase your capabilities as you work in the programs.

The book is divided into three sections - one for each of the programs - and projects from one program are used in the other programs. There's just enough difference between the program interfaces to confuse you, but Ms. Evans has done an excellent job in clarifying them.

I especially enjoyed the rotating fishing lure exersize in the Flash section. I've wanted to do that effect for a long time, and her explanation got me through quickly and easily.

All in all, the book really will help you if you are putting up a website and haven't done a lot of graphic work before. The integration of these three programs is important, and the author did an excellent job in teaching. I recommend it heartily!

I keep this book close to me at work and usually stick it in my laptop case when I leave for home. It is my bible for metadata. The first time I read it, I carefully underlined passages with a fine light pencil. Now I've tossed book decorum to the winds and use highligher pens! To mention just one general topic, Elaine Svenonius grapples with all of the key issues that trained librarians face when cataloguing digital materials. She also covers controlled vocabularies from several perspectives, and understands the challenges/difficulties of applying standard "book" classifications to rich media collections. That it took me a long time to get through this book has nothing to do with her style -- Elaine Svenonius writes clearly, often beautifully -- but rather with the amount of information and the mind-expanding concepts, which I still mull over as I wrestle at work with asset management.

I think that a lot of people who work in information technology tend to think that the problems that we have with things like web-based search and retrieval are unique to Internet search engines and catalogue databases. I know that I've been working in the field while lacking an adequate sense of the historical basis of information organization.

Svenonius breaks information organization down into ideology (purposes and principles), the formalization of the processes involved in information organization, knowledge based on research, and key problems that need to be solved. It's information that's very useful for anybody who is involved with organization of information-- even for people like me who work more on the technical than conceptual side of content management systems.

The Visual Quick Starte Guides are just about the fastest way to get started on using a software package around. As stated from the title, this is a highly illustrated book that uses tons of screen shots to get you started using a software package.

In this case the package is iPhoto and it's written by a master writer. Because of the large number of illustrations in the book, it is very fast to go through. (My only problem is when I click on something wrong, my screens don't look like his, and then have to backtrack and find my error.) The easy visual approach works well for me.

If you're a beginner to iPhoto, this book will help you get it up and doing what you want in a very short time. The next step is to do more, say up to the intermediate level, and all that takes is that you go further into the book.

The other surprising thing about this book is the way it's organized. Most tutorial books are just that. You follow the tutorial through and then go do things. These books are then useless as a reference book. This one is different. Each task, almost each page, is organized with a headline of what you're going to do on that page. Then the index has an entry that points to the right page. For instance if you're going through the book there's a chapter on Sharing Photos. There's a page on Printing Greeting Cards. Learning about sharing photos will send you through the page on Printing Greeting Cards. But if you forget that, going to the index will give you an entry on Printing Greeting Cards that will send you to that page which is complete enough to enable you to get the greeting cards without having to go through the whole chapter.

His approach works for me.

Before picking this book up, I'd all but given up on iPhoto. I found it a bit too simple and way to encumbering of my system. But this book really changed my perspective. Well, this book and the fact that I needed a better way to organize my pictures on my Mac than simply having massive folders of pictures.

The book is very accessible and although I thought I was familiar with the program, it opened a lot of new doors and taught me a lot I didn't know. It also provided resources for other programs that work well with iPhoto and how to connect iPhoto to Photoshop (or any digital image editor) so I can do more advanced editing outside of iPhoto.

I think most important for me was learning that I didn't need to have my photos all in one library - that I could use a separate program like the iPhoto Library Manager to make separate, context specific, libraries. This was amazing, as the more photos in a library, the more encumbering it can be on your system.

Without a doubt, I find this to be one of the best and simple books out there covering iPhoto. I highly recommend it!