Hardware Books

I saw this book last week at a tradeshow in Cannes, France (3GSM World Congress) and I was blown away. I never realized the extent of how similar to my Windows PC my non-Windows smartphone (Nokia 7610) is! The book outlines cool tricks like copy/paste and also gives tips on applications users can buy and install to their phone after they begin using it. Believe me, the price is minimal for the value included in this book!

I'm a corporate IT professional and smartphone user. I've been looking for a Series 60 smartphone book as a basis for training our staff and helping them become more efficient. For the longest time there was nothing...and then I discovered this. I can't express how happy I am with this book. It's much more than a "Missing Manual." In fact, it's incredibly rich and useful, and the add-on applications it covers illustrate how to get even more "smartness" from smartphones, a point that the manufacturers haven't yet adequately communicated to the general public. Superb book!

Great service!!The book is new and the deliver has been so fast!(3 days more or less) :)

I have several graphics books and I find two are indespensible: The OpenGL Programming Guide and Dr. Buss' book. Dr. Buss' book has clear, elucidating language and good coverage for both the classroom and the practicing graphics software developer. Though the OpenGL Programming Guide covers many of the same topics, its coverage of the mathematics is thin. Hence, this text perfectly dovetails with it. Particularly well-written is the chapter covering the Phong and the Cook-Torrance lighting models.

Volume II picks up where Volume I left off by concentrating on more current real time rendering and game engine topics. Where Volume I painted a broad sweeping overview of real time graphics topics, Vol. II extends this and ties in more closely with how many of those ideas affect the actual creation of games in a real 3d games engine called 'fly3d2' included on CD with the text (a more current and improved version of 'fly3dsdk' from Vol. I). All source code is included for the engine and can be kept current via the website through downloads as it is steadily updated. ... the complete source code for all engine modules and utilities requires purchase of the book.
Mr. Policarpo the coauthor maintains the site and regularly contributes to threads so support remains current (a real blessing in a rapidly advancing science such as this).

Some of the topic covered include: Gamespace (BSP, PVS...) management, LightMap creation and challenges, Camera control, Collision Detection and Response, Path Planning and AI, Shader and TexureMapping with various effects, Character Animation, Skeletal Mesh Animation and related issues as well as the fly3d2.0 environment and support and tutorials to play with and to make these ideas real...

The book covers most of the features include in the engine and anticipates extensions that may some day be added as well. The engine design is modular and lends itself to the creation of plugins that can leverage classes already included or that are completely new created by the user. Users can design levels, characters, objects, and control how they interact with the engine. Tutorials are included in the book as well as on the website with new ones being added by members of the community quite regularly. The modular design (in C++) and utilities that adapt Microsoft's Visual Studio and Discreet's 3dsmax (as well as Quake level conveter and a few others) allow seamless integration of these tools into the environment for a wealth of creative possibilities.

The text is clearly and concisely written and Mr. Watt demonstrates a commanding expertise in these topics without a lot of gimmicky embellishments or self-aggrandizement common in other more fly-by-night texts. This is a real hardcover edtion made to last by a quality computer technology publisher. Watt obviously maintains a close relationship with coauthor Policarpo the designer of the fly3d engine so writing ties in well with the fly3d platform but is not limited by or to it.

I cheerfully recommend this book to anyone who is interested in learning the sometimes difficult and challenging topics of game creation, expansion and maintenance. It is a demanding subject not for the weak of heart that can be difficult and time consuming to master. I've found there are a lot of other books out there that promise to deliver by tempting the potential buyer with the ease and completeness their books will include; however, I have not come across any others as yet that come close to the coverage and approach this (and the previous) volume supplies.

Before I bought this book I already had tried other approaches to learning this material but found the all the books I'd bought offered poor to none of the support and potential that 3d Games Vol. II together with the fly3d platform delivers. To learn this material one needs to be able to play with the ideas and be excited about the possibilities and have the ability to play with real tools in a real games environment. 3d Games Vol. II is concise, helpful, well-written, and enjoys a small but dedicated community available through the website.

....
Mark Carleton Maguire
Boston MA

This book is a huge help to game developers. I found it a great read while writing my first game engine. It covers so much stuff it makes you want to try and add it all to your game! I am really happy with this book.

This book is a fantastic intro into the world of 3D Programming. It explains the concepts in an easy to understand format and gradually eases you into the more complex aspects of 3D. Also, because it is for WPF it makes it a cinch to get up and running quickly. I've also found that this book is a great way to get acquainted with 3D and these concepts are easily transferrable into the more complex 3D languages (ie: Direct3D and OpenGL). I highly recommend this book for anyone looking to learn 3D or to expand their WPF repetoire!

In his informative writing style of writing, the author of this book gives you both a good understanding of 3D graphics concepts and digs deep into the specifics WPF and XAML 3D APIs. If you're doing and 3D WPF, this title is a must have sitting next to his previous WPF title, Applications = Code + Markup.

This is the definitive guide to WPF 3D.

This book is an excellent overview of WPF 3D.

Petzold blends his development experience with his math background to explain everything quite thoroughly, from the details of the API to the hows and whys of the math underneath.

* He explains why WPF 3D shades triangles differently depending on whether they share their vertices or not.

* His explanation of quaternions is probably the best I have read.

* He talks about why Viewport3DVisual is better than Viewport3D for printing.

* He explains the math behind lighting calculations.

The book contains lots of pictures, lots of sample code and a library of useful classes for WPF 3D programming.

If you're doing anything with WPF 3D, you simply must have this book.

I purchased this book about a year ago, and I have now read it pretty-much cover-to-cover. It is an excellent book. What I have found is that there are very few books on the market that cater to the individual who wants to build a microcomputer, starting from square one. This book caters to that market. If you are trying to build a Motorola 68000 system "from scratch", this book is for you. Be aware that there are a few pieces of information in the book that seem to be out of date. For instance, in the "working system" Mr. Antonakos describes how to build, he recommends an easier-to-use version of a UART that was apparently meant for the old Motorola 6800. The serial communications chip he recommends is now obsolete. However, as I have plowed my way through the morass of parts sellers and other charlatans, I have found that MANY parts are obsolete, even ones listed in the current catalogs of some of the biggest, most reputable IC distributors. Antonakos cannot be blamed for that. If you are interested in "building from scratch" with a Motorola 68000, also be aware of another data point : the 68000 seems to have an obituary written on it. My nose tells me Motorola is going to pull the carpet out from under it, maybe soon, or maybe not for another couple of years. In any case, it doesn't seem like the 68000 is going to be around for long. If you want to do it (build your own 68000 system), get this book and do it now !

This is a very good introduction about the 68000 from a pratical point of view,both at the assembly language level and at the hardware level.Only bad point is the accluded diskette which i found very tricky to use.The style of exposition of mr Antonakos is outstanding and very easy to follow.A great introduction to the 68000.

I've never used PowerPoint before so I ordered this book. I'm so glad I did. I got started right away and in no time, I was creating my own presentations. The explanations are clear and to the point and the illustrations helped me from losing my place.

I should mention that even though this book is geared for beginners, it goes into enough detail to appeal to many different levels of users. Check out the table of contents and you'll see what I mean. Great job Mr. Gilgen!

I needed some help in creating a presentation. I checked out four books on Powerpoint from my library. I read them all, and this book was by far the best. I have returned all the books to the library, and I will now buy this book for my permanent, personal library.

This is one of those books that I use all the time. Because this is the first book I've given 5 stars, I'd better explain.

First, I like the way the book organized itself along the lines that the ActionScript editor or toolbox lists the different ActionScript terms. The parallel makes things easy to find. Second, I like the way the examples are used. For instance, the author explains the geometry behind the cosine of an angle explaining the Math.cos() method and then provides an example that draws a perfect circle. That's a lot better than I get in just about any other book. (Maybe that's more than some need, but I appreciated it.) Third, I like the level range. The beginning of the book is only 2 chapters, but it's a good 2 chapters that provide a quick explanation of ActionScript and scripting. However, further on in the book, it also covers more complex things like registerClass() with a detailed examples. The same is true for all of the new objects like LoadVars().

Finally, I have found myself using the last several chapters covering UI components. Before I got this book, I really didn't use UI Components very much, and now I use them constantly. In fact, those chapters (Pt IV, Chs 14-21)are what I find myself using the most. If this book had nothing but Part IV, the book would have been more than worth it to me.

I think the book is worth 6 stars -- 5 for the first 3 parts and an additional one for the last part covering UI Components.

After Flash 5 ActionScript, I didn't think that it would get much bigger. Flash MX ActionScript is huge, and this book makes it available. The author spends only the first two chapters with the basics of writing ActionScript in the context of Flash MX and makes a nice transition from Flash 5 to Flash MX.

Then, from Chapter 3 to the end of the book's 21 chapters, the author decided to follow the order of actions in the Actions toolbox in the Actions Panel. That makes it very easy to find stuff because it's organized along the same logical patterns as the toolbox. Even so I found myself going to both the detailed TOC and appendix to look up terms, and I never had problems finding what I needed.

Anyone can explain the easy stuff like the old gotoAndPlay() actions, and so I went to the new OOP materials and XML socket section. The OOP stuff was mixed with non-OOP throughout the book, and OOP-related methods like registerClass() were explained in detail and supported with a good example using something that made sense in the context of Flash MX. In fact, the whole book was filled with good examples. Some examples extended over several pages and others were little ones that gave you a quick insight. Sanders is an ace with examples. As for the XML socket material, not only did the explanation explain to me for the first time ever what the blazes a socket server was, it provided a URL where I could download a free socket server, which I did. Then I worked the example, and now I have my own mini-chat in XMLSocket. I'm happy.

The last several chapters were in-depth explanations of the different ActionScript terms used with the new UI Components. Each component got its own chapter, and I found it invaluable for designing with the components. It does not cover re-skinning, but I was able to get the look I wanted by changing every element in the components and I am a big user of UI components. (You can change all the little parts of components like highlight, higlight3D, face, darkshadow, etc. without re-skinning.)

There were a lot of little details I liked in the book. The examples were mixed, interesting, and clarifying. Undocumented terms, like onData with LoadVars(), were included, and I found what I needed. One suggestion for people getting this book: buy some of those little colored tab stickem things to bookmark all of the part of this book you'll need to reference again and again.

This book stands out due to the diversity of its chapters. All together, they show a great amount of current research work in different research areas as well as different application domains, all dealing with adaptation issues in hypermedia systems. This diversity helps the reader to see new aspects and generate new ideas.

Everyone interested in Adaptive Hypermedia Systems must read this book. It captures the state-of-the-art in this fascinating field and delivers an one-stop reference volume for researchers, designers and developers of Adaptive Hypermedia Systems

This Book is so fun and easy to use. It was written to be use with Photo Shop Elements 3, but it can be used with any photo editing program. The instructions are great and easy to follow. I did all the crafts in Paint Shop Pro X,and my friend did hers in Elements.
If you like to do fun crafts with your digital photos. this is a great book to have on your shelf.
Included in the instructions the author even gives you the names of the products you will need to complete each projects, and you can download the graphics from their web site.

Books applying graphic software to craft projects aren't very numerous. Perhaps this is because authors of books about graphic software aren't familiar with traditional crafts. But when I opened this book, it was immediately evident by the way the material was presented that Elizabeth Bulger is at least familiar with traditional crafting; if not a crafter herself. Throughout her book, crafters will recognize the same simple presentation as found in craft books of all kinds.

Of course, by necessity, Bulger first explains the Adobe Photoshop Elements techniques, especially layers and selections, that she uses in the rest of the book. Her explanations aren't dry and laborious as those you will find in some books about graphic software and to make it even easier to follow along, you can download the example images from her accompanying website.

After a brief introduction to the software, Bulger offers a variety of fourteen projects which can be created using Photoshop Elements 3 or 4. Written from the traditional crafter's point of view, each project is an opportunity to practice new techniques. I love candles, so my favorite was the votive project. However, I could see the great small business potential of Bulger's technique for making a needlepoint canvas from a photo of the family pet. All of the projects can be completed with basic crafting supplies and inkjet printing papers. Bulger accompanies her step-by-step instructions with several photos showing the progression of the project. Here are the projects from the book--postcard, gift box, votive, journal cover, apron, placemat, canning jar label, needlepoint pillow, gift bucket, CD cover, ceramic tiles, Christmas ornament, gift wrapping and coasters.

Elizabeth Bulger is a graphic arts training consultant and coauthor of The Adobe Photoshop 5 Certification Guide.

I was new to video editing so I decided to buy this book. I didn't have time to read through 500 pages of text. This book and CD was just what I hoped for - a visual way to jump start me into the world of video editing. The videos cover the basic techniques. There is a second video that you can purchase directly from the author at Brainsville.com that covers more advanced techniques.

The software is so complex I cannot imagine trying to learn this product just from a book alone, I recommend this method.

I've been fighting with Premiere for more than 5 years.
I've tried to learn to use it A LOT OF TIMES.
Finally, FINALLY, this book and CD got me working with it!
Thanks, Bonnie! Your approach is clever. The .mov lessons
run smootly on my laptop and you are really GOOD explainng
those details I never could grab before...!!!
I hope to send you soon a mini mpeg thank you movie
using the knowledge I've gain in just the first couple of hours!

Best regards from Caracas, Venezuela.