Security Books

This book is an excellent review of performance measurement. It covers all of the areas and hits each with logical progression. Somewhat suprisingly, it holds up well as a straight through read as well as a reference.

Though I gave it five stars, I would have liked to see more on GIPS presentations. It does offer two chapters on the subject, but there is more that could have been included. That said, it is a great overview on GIPS in general.

This is one of the few books I have ever read twice. One reason is that, as a financial decision evaluation modeling consultant, I have found Investment Performance Measurement to be one of the few books on the topic repeatedly mentioned at financial firms, software providers and performance conferences. It is definitely a great foundation upon which to build an understanding of the field and I appreciated a number of its insights. I was also very impressed by the rarity of critical errors regarding the introduction it provides to technical matters.

I'm taking the Investments course within the Certified Financial Planner program. This book really helped clarify many of the terms and formulas we had to learn. The Mayo text covers the material, but from a more academic slant. I just wish I had bought the Feibel book well before the class started. It may not be technical enough for graduate students in Finance or people who normally read scholarly papers on investment theory. But for everyone else, like individual investors or people going back to school learning investing fundmentals, it's a great reference.

This book provides the novice a moderate reference to world of investment performance reporting, ala performance reporting 101.

As an IT management consult I can comfortably say there is no one authoritative reference on anything. That said, this text while historically and technically accurate does not represent nor provide meaningful examples of contemporary best practices.

Also, absent from the text are key discussions I would have benefited: the opportunities availed to a modern organization for large-scale automated computations - rather than all manual processes; linkages to the consumers of the performance information in various communities from client wealth tiers, brokerage operations, and financial advisers, analysts and money managers; and best practices for some of the new product and security types more prevalent in the 2006 era.

This book is very well thought out and takes it step by step from basic to advanced.

The really good thing about it is that it shows you how it looks in Excel which means it helps with how it would be entered into a computer.

I have just read the first three chapters and it looks like I'll finish it soon. Key Financial Instruments is the only readable book on derivatives that I have come across.

This book is both enjoyable and informative. I will find time to read it again.

not only does the author illustrate the book with real world examples but he communicates his thoughts in a lively manner.

incredibly well written - like JK Rowling of Harry Potter and Michael Lewis of Liar's Poker combined

Key financial instruments goes beyond the normal "how to" textbook. It helped me to understand "why" and "when" certain financial instruments should be used and when they should not.

Isaiah Berlin is one of the most important philosophers of liberty and freedom in the 20th century.

He is a liberal in the old sense of the word (the 19th century sense). His views on liberty and freedom have shaped many thinkers especially those that came out of the Chicago school. His writings were against "totalitarian" systems in which he had some experience with. He surveys the theoretical meanings of what "liberty" is and provides his own constructs.

He discusses positive and negative senses of liberty.

His views have been cited by Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer in Breyer's most recent book, Active Liberty: Interpreting Our Democratic Constitution. It is not clear whether Berlin would support Justice Breyer's extension of his views, but I believe Justice Breyer was seeking to define his own "Active Liberty" concept by using the positive aspect of liberty discussed by Berlin.

Isaiah Berlin is a very important 20th century philosopher (a political philosopher or political scientist as well) and this is a very important book consisting of his essays. I highly recommend it.

Liberty is a very precious and rare quality of a living condition.
As I. Berlin states, `The periods and societies in which civil liberties were respected, and variety of opinion and faith tolerated, have been very few and far between, oases in the desert of human uniformity, intolerance and oppression.'

I. Berlin explains clearly that liberty has two faces: a positive and a negative one.
Positive liberty is the answer to the question: who controls? Am I my own master?
Negative liberty circumscribes the area wherein a third person can prevent anybody to make a free choice.
On these bases, a free society can be organized, with 1) absolute rights (not absolute powers) and 2) frontiers, defined in terms of rules, within which men should be inviolable.
For the author, freedom is not an end, but a means to create `room for personal ends', for happiness. He rightly criticizes E. Fromm: freedom is the opportunity to act, not action itself.

Philosophically, freedom has been ferociously contested by the determinists, the defenders of `historical inevitability' (Hegel, Marx, Bacon, Fourier, Comte). The author remarks judiciously that if the world is ruled by determinism, nobody is responsible: there is no free will, no morality, and no justice. Individual choice is an illusion. Determinism represents the world as a prison.
A more brutal kind of determinism is presented by those who believe that there is a final answer, a unique goal, a central principle that governs our life. This principle and its executioners provoked barbarous consequences.

Isaiah Berlin's reflections on liberty are profound and still very actual.
Not to be missed.

I read this book for a graduate class in Philosophy. Berlin in the book is talking about different understandings on liberty. How do liberals think about liberty? Not only liberals think about liberty, many isms do, there are many different ways to think about liberty. Berlin makes a few distinctions on liberty. In "Two Concepts of Liberty," he distinguishes between political liberty and individual Liberty. Political Liberty, democratic liberty having a vote and participating, like in Greek city-state. No limit on power of the government over any aspect of citizen's life, but a citizen has some control over government through his vote. Not all are citizens, women, slaves, etc. Liberals are interested in individual liberty; choose the activities they want to do. A tension between Political Liberty and Individual Liberty. Political Liberty implies that there is majority rule through the vote. Maybe a majority won't impose on people, but that can change through the majority vote. If you have a system that you set up to insure certain individual rights like the U.S. does you protect certain liberties like the 1st amendment to free speech. These rights are taken away from voting on by the majority and to change them you need a super majority. This takes away Political Liberty, so there is that antagonism between both liberties. Unless you are an anarchist, there are certain functions and liberties that must be given up to the government. The more individual freedoms you keep from government the less value Political Liberty has to citizens the fewer things we get to decide.

The famous concepts Berlin distinguishes between are Positive Liberty and Negative Liberty. 1. Positive Liberty means self-control over your own life. 2. Negative liberty means you are free from interference from other people. Other people can't force you to do something. Positive liberty is self-mastery, self-control. Negative liberty means you are free from interference from other people. Others can't compel you to act in a way you don't want to act. At first these sound like two sides of the same coin. What Berlin points out historically is that people who believe in Positive Liberty have taken it in a very different direction than those that believe in Negative Liberty. What they (Positive Liberty adherents) have done is to infer that from each person you can distinguish between what he or she thinks he or she wants, and what his or her better self or true self would want. Therefore, there is this idea that we all might have certain desires that we want but that they are not expressive of our real essence. An obvious case is an addict who has some part of them that really don't want the drug. Even though they put all their time and energy in getting the drug it might be tempting to think that they really don't want the drug. Once they got the distinction between ordinary desires that you are aware of and the desires that you truly want, then the Positive Liberty people are tempted to say that for someone to really have charge of their life to really have liberty than we have to make sure that they are doing what their true self wants to do, not the self that they are consciously aware of, not the self not the desires that seem to them to be strongest. But what the angels of their better nature want, that's real freedom. Even when the person is protesting that that isn't what they want, if you are making them do what their true self wants really then you are making them do good. Kant would be a supporter of this view.

We have two aspects of human nature. The numeral self and nominal self. The numeral self is our true self and is the basis of morality this is why we are morally obligated to do things because our true self accepts a certain kind of law and imposes it on us. We are obligated to obey it because it is a law our true self chooses even though we may not be consciously aware of it, we may have all kinds of desires pulling us in different directions. We are obligated to do it because it is what our true self chooses. Rousseau is very much in this tradition. He says people can be forced to be free. Historically, this is the direction that many people who believe in Positive Liberty go in.

The Negative liberty people tend to say that other people don't tell them what to do. They could have gone the same route thinking about two kinds of selves, and they could say negative liberty is when your lower self doesn't tell your higher self what to do, but that historically hasn't happened. That is not the kind of liberty they have been thinking about. Liberals generally belong to this kind of negative liberty position. The kind of liberty liberals tend to care about is freedom from other individuals or the government. Free to the extent no one tells you what to do, none of this true self-stuff. You are free if other people can't stop you from doing what you want to do. All the different liberals are going to believe that people should have a significant amount of this kind of (negative), liberty. All the critics of liberalism are not all going to want to take all this kind of liberty away, but they are going to definitely say that liberty is not as important as the liberals think it is and that it ought to be restricted in some significant ways.

Berlin says, once you see how the Positive Liberty idea was developed, it turns out not to have the same kind of tension with Political Liberty that Negative Liberty does. Since, you could always have the view what peoples true selves want can be discovered by a kind of democratic process, so that what the majority votes for is what everyone wants, even the minority, they just didn't really know what they wanted. We all really want what is best for our community, as Rousseau would say.

Recommended reading for anyone interested in philosophy, political science, and history.

Berlin's considerable reputation rests largely on his essays. In his chosen areas of political philosophy and intellectual history, he produced no major systematic works. His essays, particularly those in the history of ideas, are long, insightful, and informed by impressive breadth of knowledge and a humane temperament. He was a consistently excellent and sometimes elegant writer. Of all his essays, he felt his most substantial work was the writings on Liberty collected in this volume. The core of this book is the Four Essays on Liberty, which appeared originally as a book of that title about 40 years ago.
How good are these essays? They were written originally in the late 1940s through late 1950s and were directed, at least in part, at issues that preoccupied British intellectuals of that period. The backdrop was the Cold War, and debates about the justification of socialist ideals and the nature of socialism. Most of these essays have not worn well. I don't think there is much original or profound in either the first or last essays of the four; Political Ideas in the 20th Century, and John Stuart Mill and the Ends of Life. I suspect most critical readers will find the essay entitled Historical Inevitability to be fairly pedestrian. This leaves the most celebrated of these essays, Two Concepts of Liberty. It is on this essay and some of his best historical studies that Berlin's reputation rests.
In Two Concepts, Berlin developed his famous distinction between "negative" and "positive" concepts of liberty. He particularly focused on how a certain rationalist conception of "positive" liberty can become, though often via a tortuous route, a justification for attacks on "negative" liberty and assault basic human rights. Berlin argues that this conception of "positive" liberty leads to the great crimes of the 20th century. This leads to an eloquent plea for some form of pluralism in regard to ultimate human goals. Berlin develops this argument brilliantly and with a self-assured writing style that is a pleasure to read.
But how good is his argument? As he himself points out, there are circumstances underwhich the distinction between "negative" and "positive" liberty can be cloudy, casting doubt on the utility and reality of this distinction. He is incorrect in assigning blame for all the terrible crimes of the 20th century to the rationalist view of "positive" liberty. This is certainly a fair criticism with respect to Marxism and the great crimes of Marxist states. But does it apply to Fascism and violent nationalism? These movements were marked by wholesale rejection of rationalism and exaltation of emotion, quite different from what he describes as the rationalist wellspring of all the crimes of the 20th century.
Berlin is an interesting and thought provoking essayist but not a major figure in political thought or intellectual history.

Henry Hardy the devoted student and editor of the work of Isaiah Berlin has reedited and expanded Berlin's on Liberty. These essays are at the heart of Berlin's liberal political philsophy. And their most well- known conception is the distinction between 'negative and positive liberty'.
This is the way Wikipedia makes the distinction.

"He defined negative liberty as the absence of constraints on, or interference with, agents' possible action. I am more "negatively free" to the extent that fewer opportunities for possible action are foreclosed or interfered with. Positive liberty he associated with the idea of self-mastery, or the capacity to determine oneself, to be in control of one's destiny. While Berlin granted that both concepts of liberty represent valid human ideals, he believed that as a matter of history, the positive concept of liberty has proven more susceptible to political abuse. He argued that under the influence of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Immanuel Kant and G.W.F. Hegel (all committed to the positive concept of liberty), European political thinkers were frequently tempted to equate liberty with forms of political discipline or constraint. This became politically dangerous when the relevant ideals of positive liberty were, in the course of the 19th century, used to defend ideals of national self-determination, imperatives of democratic self-government, and the communist notion of humanity collectively asserting rational control over its own destiny. In this way of thinking, Berlin contended, demands for freedom paradoxically become demands for forms of collective control and discipline - those deemed necessary for the "self-mastery" or self-determination of nations, classes, democratic communities, and perhaps of humanity as a whole. There is thus an elective affinity, for Berlin, between positive liberty and political totalitarianism."

Another of Berlin's major essays in this work deals with the conception of 'Historical Inevitability'. Here he is most fierce in his critique of Marxism with its posited inevitable stages of history. Something of a great man himself, Berlin was a strong champion of the idea that great individuals shape human events, and introduce novel transformations of reality.

A third center of Berlin's thought has to do with his 'pluralism' his sense of the differing ideals and values different societies have. His pluralism however is what he called an 'objective pluralism' as he thought that there are certain values such as 'individual liberty' which should prevail in all societies.

Ultimately though he claimed that both for the individual and for society 'ideal ends' often conflict, and that perfect realization in action, is therefore impossible. Life for Berlin moral decision for Berlin thus has a tragic element of incompleteness and contradiction.
In this sense of our limitation deriving from our own ideal ends and actions, Berlin 's thought ultimately corresponds to arguments concerning the limitations of Mind which have been made in modern thought regard to a wide variety of other areas of human inquiry, from theology to mathematics.

Libraries catering to system administrators will find LINUX FIREWALLS an essential acquisition, discussing the technical aspects of the iptables firewall and Netfilter built into the Linux application. Examples of firewall log analysis, policies, network authorization processes and more compliment chapters that include Perl and C code pieces to help keep a network secure. The result is a fine pick for any programmer's library.

Do you have any familiarity with TCP/IP networking concepts and Linux system administration? If you do, then this book is for you. Author Michael Rash, has done an outstanding job of writing a book that concentrates on network attacks--detecting them and responding to them.

Rash, begins with an introduction to packet filtering with iptables, including kernal build specifics and iptables administration. Then, the author shows the types of attacks that exist in the network layer and what you can do about them. Next, he illustrates classes of application layer attacks that iptables can be made to detect, and introduces you to the iptables string match extension. The author also discusses installation and configuration of psad, and shows you why it is important to listen to the stories that iptables logs have to tell. He continues by introducing you to advanced psad functionality, including integrated passive OS fingerprinting, Snort signature detection via packet headers, verbose status information, and Dshield reporting. Then, the author discusses the culmination of the attack detection and mitigation strategies that are possible with iptables. Next, he compares and contrasts two passive authorization mechanisms: port knocking and SPA. The author continues by showing you how to install and make use of fwknop together with iptables to maintain a default-drop stance against all unauthenicated and unauthorized attempts to connect to your SSH daemon. Finally, the author wraps up with some graphical representations of iptables log data.

This most excellent book takes on a highly applied approach. In other words, after reading this book, you will be armed with a strong working knowledge of how network attacks are detected and dealth with via iptables.

Make no mistake, this book is on what it says it's about "Attack Detection and Response with iptables, psad, and fwsnort" it contains very little information about setting up iptables to block unwanted external traffic.

HOWEVER setting up iptables (in the basic sense) doesn't require an entire book. Sure there are whole books on that topic but there is no need for a 300 page book on it, that just seems to be the size computer books have to be in order to get published. Which means other books on iptables are probably going to about 250 pages of fluff.

Incidentally this book actually only spends about the first 35 pages describing that, the remainder is fantastic, useful, well written information about doing the things that make iptables truly useful. "detection and response" ACTIVELY securing your system.

In addition to being comprehensive and useful this book happens to be well written, far better than most technical books.

If you're thinking about buying a book on Linux firewalls, make it this one, but if you're not already familiar with iptables expect to read the first 35 pages, then a couple online tutorials and then come back to this book.

When I bought "Linux Firewalls" I was expecting a good book because I already knew that the work of Michael Rash is excellent. However, I expected the traditional Iptables handbook that looks more like a "man page". Surprisingly I found that the book was much better than that. Instead of detailing every single feature of the Iptables infrastructure, Michael Rash explains how Iptables can be used as a powerful (and free) Intrusion Detection/Prevention System. To achieve that, Rash presents three open source tools developed by himself: psad, an iptables-based port scan detector, fwsnort, a tool that translates snort rules into iptables sentences, and fwknop, a Port Knocking and SPA authentication system.

The book is very practical. It's amazing how everything is presented so clearly and with such useful examples. The author first introduces the potential threats that are associated with the Network Layer, Transport Layer and Application Layer (I loved those chapters). Then he starts discussing the detection of malicious attackers that try to break into the system. Finally he presents active response mechanisms against attackers and ways to secure the whole system with additional layers of security.

The book is great if what you want is to secure your Linux system using IPtables and the open source tools developed by Rash. Rash is an expert on firewalls and intrusion detection systems. If you follow his suggestions you'll build a very secure system. Firewall enthusiasts and TCP/IP fans will also enjoy reading the book because its written by a geek and its written for geeks. However, if you are looking for an Iptables handbook, you are looking for a theoretical book about Firewalls or you want to use other tools than the ones presented in the book, then "Linux Firewalls" may not be the best option for you.

Disclaimer: I wrote the foreword for this book, so obviously I am biased. However, I am not financially compensated for this book's success.

In the foreword I note that Linux Firewalls is a "great book." As a FreeBSD user, Linux Firewalls is good enough to make me consider using Linux in certain circumstances! Mike's book is exceptionally clear, organized, concise, and actionable. You should be able to read it and implement everything you find by following his examples. You will not only learn tools and techniques, but you will be able to appreciate Mike's keen defensive insights.

The majority of the world's digital security professionals focus on defense, because offense is left to the bad guys, police, and military. I welcome books like Linux Firewalls that bring real defensive tools and techniques to the masses in a form that can be digested and deployed for minimum cost and effort.

One of the main reasons Linux Firewalls is a great book is that Mike Rash is an excellent writer. I've read (or tried to read) plenty of books that seemed to offer helpful content, but the author had no clue how to deliver that content in a readable manner. Linux Firewalls makes learning network security an enjoyable experience. Mike is exceptionally detail-oriented (see the RST vs RST ACK issue on p 63 and elsewhere) and he often cites sources and additional references. Linux Firewalls very nicely integrates sample network traffic to make numerous points; Ch 11 has several great examples. The sections on Fwsnort even improved my understanding of Snort itself.

The bottom line is that if you are a user of non-Microsoft operating systems (Linux, BSD, etc.) and you want to know how Linux can help defend your network, you will enjoy reading Linux Firewalls.

This book introduce not only good practice for setting router but also good product such as;
erbium
zinc
cesium and xenon
oxygen
californium
hafnium

Also good appendixes such as
B. building the linux kernel
C. Testing strategies and VMWare
D. Ethics and other considerations

I have studied CISCO router, but I cannot set Linux router.
After reading this book, I can test some Linux router commands and configurations.

Excellent introduction. Topics well covered. Explanations straightforward. Logical. If you need a generic router book this is it. Highly recommended.

Hands on, good book for network admins.
Linux is an excelent router and this book shows why.
I recommend this book for anyone interested in networking.
It exposes a lot of the myths and secrets of networking in a very readable fashion.
My #1 most useful book.

This is the most practical book I have seen (without the word "Practical" in the title). I am a student who wants to setup a network in my dorm room. Here is what I did:

My PCs are in the school network, only one of which is known to the school servers. By reading chap 1-3, I activated ip_forwarding feature of kernel( >= 2.2.x->the book came out around this time). Doesn't work. I think about the situation. My PCs(in my network) see the outside servers but school servers don't see me. Answer: ip_masquerading->open up the packets of PCs inside the network, replacing the address with my router address(which outsiders know) and send them out. Perfect! I love linux. Ip_masquerading is explained in chap4 or Erbium->extranet router. All of these accomplish by reading about 100 pages.
The following chapters deal with WAN routers(I can't tell you practical aspect since I don't have WAN but I will one day).
This line is for beginners: so you feel worry about not understanding about networks?->chap 1-2 explains about all necessary basics to set up the router such as ip subnets/address, how to load/compile driver into the kernel, etc.
For those who are looking for WAN, here is a quote from the book: "I have been a longtime user of Sangoma cards, and enjoyed working with them so much that I took over the Debian package of their driver utility software(called wanpipe)."->pg 130.

To see whether it suits your needs, here are the chapters:
1)Routing Building Blocks

2)Ip, Ethernet, and Telephony Basics
3)Silicon-Lan Router
4)Erbium-Extranet Router
5)Zinc-Frame Relay Router
6)Oxygen-Internet Router
7)Californium-Satellite Office Router
8)Hafnium-Internet Services Router

Note: this book doesn't describe the installation (you are not reading this if you don't know installation).

This book/Mr. Mancill took me/my confidence in linux to the next level.

This book guided me from an almost nil knowledge level on linux routers to very competent. The spectrum of covered topics is fantastic and I also found the appendix extremely useful. Tony has an easy writing style to follow and I look forward to an advanced book on linux routing?

Linux System Security: The Administrator's Guide to Open Source Security Tools, Second Edition
by Scott Mann has advice on starting from scratch when you are setting up a machine to make it secure from attack from the outside.

It looks at everything from the filesystem upwards, and will give you a good starting point for looking at this.

Linux is better than Windows.

Actually all tools described are not Linux specific and can be used for any Unix including FreeBSD and Solaris.

The authors seems to know the subject and really used tools that they are writing about. For several popular tools the book provides some useful info that is difficult to find elsewhere. Pretty decent typography, although it's a little bit too academic and does not use icons on margins that IMHO simplify reading. 

As for the classic open security tools, the book covers PAM(36 pages), Sudo(20 pages), TCP Wrappers(24 pages), SSH(55 pages), Tripwire(24 pages), CFS and TCFS (30 pages), and ipchains.

From the first reading it looks like the chapters are *not* a rehash of existing online documentation. In addition to the chapters about classic open source security tools I like chapters about logs: a chapter on syslog (Ch.8) and a chapter on log file management (Ch.17). 

Now about weaknesses. The chapter on Tiger is rather weak. Moreover regrettably Tiger is a legacy tool, but actually information is not completely useless -- it's not difficult to switch to another tool after one understands how Tiger works. Actually Perl is superior for writing Unix vulnerability scanners in comparison with shell. May be hardening scripts like Bastille would be a better choice for this chapter in the second edition of the book.

Book is incomplete in a sense that neither Snort (or any similar intrusion detection tool), nor open source network scanners (Saint, Sara, etc.) are covered.

Of course there are some typos, but generally not that many. But what is really bad is that the Prentice Hall book page currently is pretty basic with no errata or additional links. The authors do not provide a WEB site for the book.

This book can probably be used for studying Unix security at universities along with somewhat outdated Practical Unix and Internet Security and this combination can somewhat compensate deficiencies of the latter (non tool oriented descriptive approach).

This book is well-written, thorough, and practical rather than academic. I particularly found the chapter on securing network services to be helpful, and was able to identify some potential security problems on the systems I support as a result of information provided in that chapter.

This book is incredibly thorough, and up to date. For example, Red Hat Linux 7 has just come out, and does now has xinetd as a replacement for inetd. Well, you guessed it, this book has about 27 pages on xinetd!

Want info on ipchains? This book has at least 50 pages on the subject!

I could go on and on about this book it is so good!

This book is written by experienced people, not just an author who was assigned another book to write.

You will not regret buying this book!

The author explains vendor independent concepts of load balancers and discusses their (dis)advantages.

He is dividing them into four major applications:

* Server Load Balancing (63p)
* Global Server Load Balancing (19p)
* Firewall Load Balancing and (15p)
* Transparent cache Switching (8p)

additions:

* application examples (4p)
* future outlook (2p)

What makes the book so enjoyable to read is the authors love to the details. The story just flows very smooth.

Especially the thorough explanation, screenshots and technical details deserve the mark "distinction" (Very good). While I read the book it was like puzzle peaces suddenly falling all together to show me the bigger picture.

I did like the follow up of technical issues like session persistency (server affinity), URL switching, system design vs. functionality considerations and the limitations that come with the chosen solutions. The described issues are exactly those that system designers will face in real life and it doesnt stop there of course. The book is laying a good groundwork for development of advanced concepts.

The part of the book that I enjoyed most was the chapter about firewall solution concepts. As the author points out correctly the traffic flow in both directions must be managed. This is also why the setup from a redundant firewall to a load balanced redundant firewall must justify multiple complex issues.

In this case the author went through the analysis of the traffic flow, a stateful vs. stateless discussion, a layer2 vs. layer3 discussion, proxy firewalls, synchronized firewalls, multizone firewalls, VPN load balancing, active-active vs. active-standby discussion and the interaction between routers, load balancers and firewalls. While some topics could only be scratched on the surface the concepts and ideas behind it are explained very clear.

There is no doubt for me that a 2nd edition can easily just pickup where this edition left off. The author clearly shows that there are more scenarios to be discovered and discussed.

On the one side I would love to see a updated 2nd edition from the same author, on the other side I guess it's been held back to keep the competitions products in a distance ;-)

Also the book was published 6+ years ago I felt that the concepts did not loose any of its value. Which leads me to the point that this must have been " THE Technical Book of the Year 2002"

This book still receives well deserved full marks.

Bravo !!

if you are new to load balancing, get this book. Clear concept explanation, with diagrams. Highly recommend.

With his background in server products and networking products, this author is uniquely qualified with the product experience to present these topics.

From the simple beginnings of DNS server load balancing Kopparapu explains the driving forces behind and solutions presented to load balancing. The majority of the book is an introduction to the concepts and solutions available for server load balancing suitable for everyone from business casual to advanced technical users.

In addition to detailed explanations, the author demonstrates load balancing techniques through a number of illustrations. The illustrations are detailed enough to explain the concepts, but occasionally lack enough practical detail to go out and bulid in a lab or on a network without further understanding.

In combination with a good manual from a load balancing product, any reader would have enough information to implement sophisticated load balancing configurations.

In addition to server load balancing, the text covers caching techniques available through the use of some layer 4-7 devices. Of all the topics this one is the least detailed in the text. The author understandably covers only that part of cache technology related to layer 4-7 devices. A great deal of the technology required to put together an entire cache system resides in other parts of the system outside of the scope of this book. The implications for the architecture of a network are far reaching and worthy of at one more dedicated book on the topic.

Finally, the author presents the topic of firewall load balancing. Like caching, this is a complex topic. A complete understanding of network security and firewalls would require at least a few other books.

For those that already understand caches or firewalls though, this book provides detailed information on how to scale those systems with layer 4-7 technology.

This is certainly the most comprehensive and easy to read text on the topic. Anyone who reads this will also look forward to future texts from the author on emergning challenges in layer 4-7 network security and streaming content and distribution.

Compared with Tony Bourke's book, this one depicts more on technical details such as how packets flow, how health check is done and etc.. On the other hand, Bourke's book mentions more about the basic concept and the introduction to current available products.

If you are interested in how load balancers are designed, this is the right book for you. However, if you are just shopping around and only want to know what load balancers are, get Brouke's one.

Btw, I was a bit disappointed at chapter 9. I expected to see more opinions on the future development of load balancers but it was not mentioned too much.

This book is a very well written and nicely organised introduction to server load balancing. The author describes the basics of load balancing, including NAT, session persistence, and network architectures. A discussion on application-layer parsing was quite good. There is also a chapter on global server load balancing (including incorporating load-balancing into the authoritative DNS server) which I found to be very detailed and interesting.

Much of the book is centered on how to load balance TCP (and to a lesser extent UDP), and the author uses HTTP and FTP as his primary driving examples. Throughout the book, the author provides some insight regarding what approaches real companies use (e.g. "this method is what Foundry and Cisco uses."), which I liked very much. Also, the illustrations were plentiful (although a bit primitive-looking).

There are only a few negatives about this book. The english writing is a bit stilted at times, and the chapters on firewalls and caches were basically rehashes of earlier chapters. Finally, I was hoping the author would have provided more detail on the load-distribution heuristics (which server to choose) with more metrics and actual real-world results.

I found the book to be extremely well organised. You will not get lost while reading this book, but you will need a university-level understanding of TCP/IP (and probably the link layer as well to get the NAT material) and networks in general to fully appreciate the matieral. Overall, a great book.

This book presents you with a step by step marketing plan template and clearly defines and explains what is the concept and the importance of each step in the plan. This is a great book for anyone in the public sector who has no marketing experience or background and is a great review for someone who does.

"Marketing in the Public Sector" by Philip Kotler and Nancy Lee provides ideas and advice on proven techniques for those in the public sector that reach and benefit the common good of the public.

There are three parts and 13 chapters. There are very specific and detailed sub-chapters within the main chapters, and they are listed in the table of contents.

1. Improving Public Sector Performance by Seizing Opportunities....
2. Understanding the Marketing Mindset
3. Developing and Enhancing Popular Programs and Services
4. Setting Motivating Prices, Incentives, and Disincentives
5. Optimizing Distribution Channels
6. Creating and Maintaining Desired Brand Identity
7. Communicating Effectively with Key Public
8. Improving Customer Service and Satisfaction
9. Influencing Positive Public Behaviors: Social Marketing
10 Forming Strategic Partnerships
11 Gathering Citizen Data, Input, and Feedback
12 Monitoring and Evaluating Performance
13 Developing a Compelling Marketing Plan

There are numerous real-life examples presented as case studies, basically.

One example in implementing information messages to the public is the Ad Council. The Ad Council is a private, nonprofit organization that taps volunteers from the communication and advertising industries to deliver governmental agency messages to the American public (p. 232). Not only must these messages be crafted well, but they do need to reach the targeted audience. There also has to be response. Response that can be statistically verified. The message is distinguished and emphasized so the target market audience knows about the campaign, believes they will experience the benefits promised, and thus are inspired to act upon it, or stop deleterious acts (p. 161). Like the private corporate media with its experience and sophistication, the government media is organized, tested, and methodical.

For the most part the term "methodical" is used in a good way. If there is a public message to be conveyed, it needs to be disseminated in the most optimum way. Many public messages are positive and conducive for the collective good of our communities. One example from many are the mascots such as Smokey the Bear for fire awareness, Mr. Yuck for poison labels, McGruff the Crime Dog, and Eddy Eagle for Gun Safety. These ad campaigns of course, are specifically targeted for children, yet also influence and remind parents to educate their kids on such potentially dangerous matters.

One doesn't need to be in the public sector to benefit from the information, case studies, and strategies in this book. The ideas can be used by many. There are dozens of pictures of ad samples and tables, and the index is comprehensive. Very good. Excellent for public administrators and students of Public Policy and Administration (PPA programs).

Philip Kotler and Nancy Lee encourage governments to learn from private sector marketing principles and techniques. It's a great idea, and they make a persuasive case that "social marketing" can change society, or at least certain aspects of it. The book is full of practical tips. Using examples from social marketing campaigns around the world, Kotler and Lee demonstrate how to apply basic marketing ideas in the public sector. Creative approaches have injected new life into many social programs, ranging from environmental awareness to customer service. We recommend this book to public officials and leaders of nonprofit organizations who are looking for new ways to educate their constituents.

The target audience for this particular book is government agencies. Inside you will find tools to get citizens involved with and supporting your agency, using your products and services, and how to influence public behaviors. The authors also include specific roadmaps to creating brand identity, gathering citizen input, and evaluating the results of your efforts. One of the better sections includes a how-to model for building an organization that is both high-tech and high-touch.

The book focuses on all levels of government agencies from the public servant trying to allocate scarce resources to governmental units trying to create social consensus to get things done. Loaded with lots of examples, Marketing in the Public Sector is required reading for governmental agencies.

At first glance you might think that this is a book on selling to the government. It isn't. This book is basically a primer, or a series of anecdotes or case studies where a governmental agency is attempting to sell their products or services to the public.

While we don't think of the government doing marketing, visit any Post Office and look at the ads plastered all over the place for everything from mailing supplies, to passports, to stamp collecting (where you buy a stamp from them and then don't use it for mailing - a lot of profit in that).

In addition to these actual products, there are a lot of stories about how the government wanted to influence behavior on the part of the citizens from litter campaigns (Don't Mess With Texas) to reducing drunk driving.

The intended audiance for this book seems to be organizations within the government who now need to communicate what they do, how well they do it, and influence behavior among the population. And that's the world population, not just the US.

Maximum Security deepened my understanding of the corporate CEOs who step on others to maintain or increase their own standard of living and feel they don't have "enough" as described in the book. What a wonderful message to give the world that we will never find enough "out there" - what we're searching for is and always has been within us, just waiting for us to connect to our expert within. That is true freedom!

Making & losing millions upon millions of dollars, Alan Gompers has led an enthralling life - "Maximum Security: The True Meaning of Freedom" leads him to seek and somehow find freedom in the one place in modern society where the lot of us view it to be denied - a maximum security prison, where Gompers had been doing time for a drug dealing offense. Following his life, you see how he ended up where he is and how he finds what he truly wanted all along. "Maximum Security: The True Meaning of Freedom is enthusiastically recommended as both an autobiographical account of a mans turbulent life and for Christian studies community library collections.

Alan Gompers' Maximum Security: The true meaning of Freedom. As the title suggests, it is a sort of spiritual autobiography/memoir. But unlike other abstruse or contrived books of this genre, Maximum Security is a refreshingly simple and delightful read. Though Mr. Gompers' background isn't in writing literature, his open-hearted and generous approach result in a natural and inviting narrative. The descriptions are so colorful and the style so accessible, you feel as though you are with him through his entire journey. And this is no small feat when you consider all of the places he has been. At times I would be so engrossed I would forget I wasn't reading a novel and there would be a incredible scene where I would think: "wait a second! that would never happen" and then I would remember that it actually DID happen and that this is NOT a work of fiction, but rather the simple memoir of a simple man in his very indirect, yet remarkable journey towards the true realization of Contentment.

This book grabbed me from the very first page. I could instantly identify with Alan's overwhelming desire to achieve external success (money, power, fame). When he described that at the pinnacle of success, he never felt more depressed in his whole life, it made me realize why movie stars and celebrities turn to alcohol and drugs...even though by all appearances they have it all! When Alan described "no man's land" it made me recognize all of the extreme fears I have in my own life. If he can survive prison, certainly I can survive the struggles and fears I have created in my own life. This book is a masterpiece and I wholly recommend it to everyone who wants to be inspired. In the end, you too will realize that peace and freedom comes from within!

Rene Descartes came to his now famous conclusion, Cogito, ergo sum, "I think, therefore I am (or exist)" after secluding himself in a baker's oven. The light turned on when he realized that, if he was thinking, he existed.

Alan Gompers, in his enforced seclusion, took the next step to the cogito, ergo sum. He asked, "Who is the Me that thinks?" That led to still another question, "How may I change that Me to a better person?" Accepting grace to become the person God intended, he began a life of personal discipline, meditation and self control. His pilgrimage to a new awareness of self, of hope, and of meaning began as he moved through Biblical thought, Transcendentalism, the wisdom of Swami Mukanada, and his prison life. His efforts resulted in new insights, and in the very difficult task of changing the person that he found to the person he needed to become. Maximum Security is an easy read and people of all ages could benefit from what Alan says about himself, his problems, his denial, and his finally coming to terms with life.

You have to have at least two brains to shoot. A cognitive thinking mind and a trigger brain. the trigger brain is much like the lizard brain and just lays there until you're up to your butt in aligators. This is definately a book of 'Brain Food' for both brains that you'll likely turn into a handy referance if you find yourself like me...your trigger brain remembers more than your cognitive brain. Don't be afraid to get them little marker thingies and mark the pages of importance! You won't remember all the ones that helped you!
A well written easy to comprehend book for the most logger head of shooters. If Lou don't tighten your group, take up golf! If he helps, take up shooting golf balls!

This is a great book. There is enough information and technical data to keep me reading and learning for a long time.

This book has everything you need to know to hone your skills or become one of the best. Definate good purchase and I would recommend this item to all.

This is the type of book that you will never really finish; as you will be constantly referring back to it for training. I read through it cover-to-cover like a novel; now I'm dissecting certain chapters that pertain more to my line of work. A superb manual, packed with information, photos & illustrations. Mr Lau is a true professional. Use this manual in combination with other manuals such as Major Plaster's "The Ultimate Sniper" to gain the most.

This book has tons of information. I found typos on practically every page, so the editor needs to be fired, but overall there's so much here and it's written so well that I would highly recommend it. Mike Lau has a friendly writing style, and does not overload the text with technical jargon and $5 words, though there is plenty of technical info in there. Reading it is more like talking to a shooting buddy than reading an engineering manual. There are also tons of pictures, and although I would have gladly paid extra for some to be in color, they are all clear, helpful, and interesting. This is not the end-all, be-all of shooting manuals; rather, it is really one person's knowledge as well as his experienced opinions. For non-fiction, it is quite a page-turner. Mike Lau was a soldier and is still a competitive shooter and is an accomplished custom precision rifle builder. Great book!