Hardware Books

Have used the book over and over and have been delighted with the help it has given me. While checking the chapter on "Opening folders" I found pages 61-72 are missing. It looks like a printers error to me and I wonder if others have reported this to you.

I am more of a visual person, so the easy to understand pictures and details are great..It makes it so much easier to understand when you can actually see where to point and which keys to type.. then someone telling you without the pictures especially if you are a beginner...

     The Windows 98 operating system is now standard on most new computer systems being manufactured today. Many are clamoring for an easy reference guide to get the ball rolling. There are many fine books available but when it comes to a beautifully illustrated learning guide, look no further than Shelly O'Hara's Easy Windows 98. This book offers a quick, fun, enjoyable, and easy way to learn about this new operating system.

     Readers are walked through the basic Windows 98 functions and settings. Brief and concise instructions are provided on how to customize the desktop, setting the taskbar, adding programs to the start menu, managing files, running applications, viewing documents, installing Windows components, installing software and hardware, setting up printers, using the Internet Explorer Web browser, the Outlook Express mail program, and much more!

     Easy Windows 98 is large, fully-colored, and features above average size printing that makes it easy to thumb through in a casual manner, allowing readers to move easily from one topic to the next. Readers will like the open workbook style format of the book. It can be placed on one's lap or near a computer and opened for convenient hands-off viewing. Quality color screen and menu shots show how to make the right moves and clicks necessary to make Windows 98 easier to live with.

     As are other books in Que's Easy ... series, this book is well-suited for students, beginners, and even senior citizens who desire or may require an illustrated approach to learning. This book will provide many hours of exciting reading. Readers will have no trouble at all picking up the skills necessary to successfully use Windows 98. Great for classroom use and makes an excellent gift!

Very Useful Book.. It explains everything with graphics which make it very easy fast and practical to use...

step by step instructions for anyone starting out and having little knowledge of how to get to certain areas and make specific changes. graphics were excellent!!

Graphic Design Portfolio Builder is a good supplemental book for designers and beginning students. I wrote supplemental because this book does not comprehensively cover the features of Photoshop and Illustrator software (and it wasn't suppose to) but to help beginners you get familiar with the software and up and running.

The book is very colorful, well laid out and full of useful information. What is comphrehensive is that it covers all aspects of what designers or artists would face and be challenged at work or in classrooms. Each lesson is written by an professional designers and artists with years of experience and I highly enjoyed reading the chapters so far.

The projects in the book are fairly challenging and somewhat time consuming which is good since it makes you explore the software to its full potential if you're feeling ambious.

For inspirations, I recommend you checkout other students work in the book or on their website. It really challenges you to come up with your best work and experiment with different ideas and creative concepts.

PROS:
Easy reading... lots of hands on pratice, which is also worded in an easy to understand language... Comes with a FREE membership to basically a webgroup website, but if you choose to take advantage of the service, the very authors of the book will critique and help you develop your projects, VERY HELPFUL/VERY COOL

CONS:
You have to have photoshop and illustrator in order to take advantage of this product

This book was so very helpful in aiding my desire to build a portfolio! It helped me learn more about Photoshop and Illustrator - plus gave me assignments that were reviewed and critiqued by a very helpful and polite instructor. This is more than just a book it is a full class at a book rate! I would recommend it to anyone looking for this type of work or just to improve what they already know.

[...] The company is centered around on line training in the general area of graphics design. ==This book is designed to go with one of their courses. The goal of this course is to help you create a portfolio of your work. It has a series of projects where you download various components of a project, then you do the project and post your results back on-line. A Sessions instructor will then give you a short critique of your work so you will have specific person to person contact that lets you know how you are progressing. This is kind of like working as a designer and having the client look at what you've done.

As you might well guess from the sub-title, these projects are oriented to Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator. This is not exactly a beginners course in these software package. You should have at least some beginning understanding of how to use these packages. The concentration hers is on improving your design skills, not on the details of the software.

Having taught graphic design for the last 13years, I am always looking for material to use as a reference or even text in my classes. This book gives many ideas on projects that students can use to create a quality looking portfolio for that first job interview. Even though I am constantly encouraging my students to go beyond the simple text assignment, many do not. This book my just give them that spark to do just that.

I don't even have an iMac yet. I purchased this book to learn more about them and I did. It answered all of my questions completely and opened my eyes to a number of abilities the iMac has that I hadn't realized.

I have had my Indigo iMac for 1 1/2 years now. I bought
several beginner books, being a computer 'newbie'.
This book is so fantastic (it's big), but even if you don't
have time to read it cover-to-cover, you can jump into
any section you want to learn about, and you will never
feel frustrated learning to use the computer. It is fantastic,
everything concise, clear, and above all the MOST
comprehensive iMac manual I have found! A must have,
just amazing. It's got it all!

This book goes into great detail about both the iMac hardware and the software programs included with it. It is very well written, with easy-to-follow instructions and explanations as well as lots of illustrations and screen shots. The index is comprehensive and helpful. This book covers all iMac models up to the most current iMac DV, and has very useful explanations of and instructions for using System 9. It also functions as a very good manual for AppleWorks and other software. I bought this book for my 73-year-old father, who has never used a computer before, and I recommend it for everyone who is buying an iMac for the first time.

I bought this book 2 days after purchasing my IMac, and boy was it helpful! It takes you through all the steps you need to REALLY get your machine up and running! This is a must have for people who are new to the Mac and work on PCs mostly.

Just as the title says this book provides you with instructions on how to do virtually everything with your iMac (hey, somebody can probably think of a useful iMac job it does'nt address). "Todd" starts off with setup and goes from there, even presenting options in peripherals (external drives), and software (utilities). This book is basic enough to be understood by a new iMac user and goes far enough to probably help a "techie". I initially bought this book to help me get to know the machine before it was delivered--now I keep my copy next to my iMac for reference.

this is a good reference book if you don't need to go to deep into the program. I recently upgraded to Illustrator CS and a few of the things confused me i.e. how the text to path tool works....so I bought this book as a quick reference and it has done a great job of fulfilling that purpose.

I would highly recommend it to anyone else that needs a book for the same purpose...If you are learning Illustrator for the first time or need something to really go deep into the program you might be better off with another book

Ideal for the beginning novice and strongly recommended for those with intermediate level skills with Illustrator software, Illustrator CS For Windows & Macintosh is the collaborative work of experts Elaine Weinmann and Peter Lourekas. Part of the simply outstanding computer software oriented "Visual QuickStart Guide" series from Peachpit Press, Illustrator CS For Windows & Macintosh provides a visual and easy-to-assimilate approach to learning Illustrator as the pictured images guide the reader through the software showing just what to do at each step of the way. Illustrator CS For Windows & Macintosh will also continue to be of immense value as a working reference.

I learned how to use Adobe Illustrator very well with the aid of this book. The book is organized in logical steps and the authors speaks in plain english which makes the instructions very easy to understand. The method of teaching in this book allows you to understand why you're performing a certain action. The book shows you how to create results with detailed instructions and mini pictures of Illustrator's tools and menu system. I found that the lessons tied in nicely and it provided me with a natural progression of learning. This book is great for print and web professionals. I found the chapter named Web to be very helpful to myself because I intend to use the complete Creative Suite to create my web pages. There are examples for each technique that is explained. If you have basic or decent Illustrator skills I can't see how this book can't help you. I became so proficient at Illustrator in such a short period of time that my wife marveled at some of my designs. I couldn't believe it myself to be honest. I've never learned software from a book form; I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised with the results. Even if you don't absorb all of the information in the book, the index makes it easy refresh your memory or learn of a new technique. There is a pattern to this book that allows you to absorb the information very easily. Outstanding book.

I purchased this book upon the recommendation of my professor for a college class in Computer Design. It is my first experience with the Visual QuickStart Guides and I am very impressed. It has been a valuable tool in helping me understand and use this previously unfamiliar software application. The table of contents is clear and well organized and the index is very extensive--I refer to it constantly. The book uses many illustrations with clear instructions and explanations. Commands and shortcuts and given for both Mac and Windows. I would definitely purchase another Visual QuickStart Guide.

The book has helped me learned or brush up on the application in matter of minutes. It's concise and it saves time when learning new things during crunch time. For more, in-depth, sunject matter, a more advanced book is required. This done does a job well for beginners!

I'm not new to the Mac, but am new to iMovie and was struggling with some basics. I recently purchased Missing Manual and am glad that I did. Well written, complete and easy to read. My iMovie editing productivity has skyrocketed and would strongly recommend this book

I bought this book because I wanted to use I-movie to help me put together a short film in short order. It is quite simply the best computer book I have ever purchased. It is a very straightforward, lucid, step by step explanation of how to get the most out of this program specifically, and digital video in general. It seemed like every time a question or would pop up he would have a special box on the next page explaining how to solve it. Mr. Pogue appears to have thought of everything and then some. He presents a number of excellent "work-arounds" for the limitations of I-Movie and lays them out in step by step fashion. Using this book is like having an I-Movie Guru sitting next to you, helping you along. If you use I-Movie, you need this book.

I have used the iMovie application since March 2000 to create over a hundred hours of edited footage for my video production company. Before reading "iMovie: The Missing Manual, I concluded that I had learned all their was to know about this program. I previously considered it a limited program that was most effective when production time was critical and expectations were relaxed. However, I was astonished to learn of techniques and shortcuts that greatly expanded my knowledge of iMovie and radically refined my approach in it's use. The concise layout and effective index of this manual has kept it within arm's length whenever I launch iMovie. Few computer manuals are "page turners", but if you use iMovie the information that is contained in "iMovie: The Missing Manual" will surely excite and inspire you. The software that is made available is alone worth the purchase price of this excellent manual.

This book answers every question I have had since I started using iMovie in January. It is not only very complete and extremely easy to follow, it also includes some unexpected surprises such as a very comprehensive explanation of film basics such as lighting, camera angles and sound. Before reading the book, I thought that iMovie was a great program but had some severe limitations - that was not the case after reading the book. Any limitations I had come across were covered in the book and Pogue provided excellent and simple workarounds for most difficulties I have had. I would highly recommend this book as a starting point to any person- skilled or novice - interested in creating video productions for personal or public use.

David Pogue's long-awaited iMovie manual is a terrific intro to digital movie making using the incredibly popular and now FREE iMovie for Mac.

Now there's no excuse for not making that little movie that's been rattling around in your head. Pogue's guide is logically laid out with numerous easy to understand graphics that take you step by baby step through painless editing of your video footage.

This is the finest of the iMovie guides and equal to Pogue's best past efforts. He's a master of technical explanations and has a deservedly large and devoutly grateful following.

If you are considering buying an iMac or have ever thought about making a simple movie, this stimulating book would be an smart, inexspensive first step -- even before forking over a dime on any software, hardware or a DV cam.

The digital revolution has begun and this is the manual that is entry level. The initiation rites happen when you first plug in that firewire, batch capture and string some selected scenes in a new creative order.

For someone with a strong visual sense and some basic story skills and with careful pre-planning and this manual, it is possible for a first time filmmaker to make a high quality mini masterpiece. Or better yet, a product to enter in one of the red hot film competitions like the Palm Springs Short Film Festival.

Pogue even promises a (free?) download or revision for the inevitable iMovie version 2.

This book covers all bases and FAQ's regarding iMovie and iMac configurations.

Now stop reading this review, buy Pogue's book and commit to making that life-altering little film that's still screening in your head. Isn't that why you're reading this? Now you can be empowered to create that film that comes out of nowhere and charms the world (to say nothing of making millions). Step aside BLAIR WITCH. I know what you're thinking!

Every man, woman and now child can be a studio unto him and her self. No middleman. Peasants, raise your no longer missing manuals. Share the vision.

In other words, I am saying David Pogue's iMOVIE THE MISSING MANUAL is highly recommended.

And, hey, don't be ashamed if all you want to do is edit some vacation video or the kid's recital or some hanky panky with the spouse. But the potential for something far more creative is definitely available to anyone now. My guess is THAT is the drawing power of iMAC, iMOVIE and the terrific MISSING MANUAL.

A suggestion for future editions: include a simple appendix of film language and story structure basics. Maybe a CD-ROM for an on screen guide that includes filmmaking and digital film internet links.

And then, Mr Pogue, a clear guide to Final Cut Pro.

Quiet on the set. Action!

A pleasure to read, both for the inspiration coming from reading about people being very successful being idealistic, and from learning about the history of the Desktop Publishing revolution.

We at the Designer's Bookshelf have just awarded this book "THE BOOK OF THE YEAR" award for 2002. These awards are given by the editors and staff at the Design Bookshelf, DT&G Magazine, and the Graphic Design network as top choices for all those involved in the design, publishing and visual arts fields.

The only real flaw in this book is I want more. Adobe's story is fascinating, and I could probably read a detailed history of each product without being bored. (And I would have loved to have found out why Adobe never made an Illustrator 5 or 6 for the PC).

I got the book in the morning and started reading right away, skipped lunch and finished. Short read you might say... not at all; the text and the images are excellent and the book reads like a novel (reason why I skipped lunch). What a story!

It answered many questions that came up in my 10+ years of experience as a graphic design professional. Why Adobe this and how Adobe that.

The great thing about the book that it made me re-live my experiences; the advent of the mac and the LaserWriter, early releases of the software (it is quite touching to see pictures of the first, say, Illustrator), the successes and the failure the company went through. Those of us (graphic designers) who have pasted photostated type on the blue outline grid by hand will relate.

The book is about what and how things happened to allow us (graphic designers) to work the way we do today; it is, however, also about how Adobe changed the publishing world and global communication altogether.

Thumbs up on this one. Thank you Pamela Pfiffner for a great piece of research and writing. Thank you Adobe for the perseverance in bringing it all together towards the age of Network Publishing.

Anyone who uses a computer to design graphics, create printed documents, edit Web graphics, make movies and animations, or just type a letter should read this book.

While most people recognize the contributions Apple and Microsoft made to computers, few realize how much Adobe was right in there with those other companies.

This book tells that story--and does so with humor, behind-the-scenes gossip, and inside information. What were the "Font wars" of 1989? What were Adobe's original plans for Photoshop? What was the original purpose for the Acrobat PDF format?

Even better the quotes from industry greats. What did Steve Jobs think the first time he saw PostScript added to a printer? How did designers such as Roger Black and Louis Fishauf feel about products such as Illustrator and Photoshop?

The book is filled with tons of candid photos of those early days. You'll gasp as you see the much-younger versions of today's famous speakers and industry giants. My favorite is the extremely young Steve Jobs (in a tie and jacket!) at the debut of the PostScript LaserWriter.

The author must have been given quite a bit of leeway with the writing because she also describes those times Adobe didn't get it exactly right. What were the mistakes Adobe made in their first Web page-creation program? What was the problem with the original distribution of Acrobat Reader? And who was the only person at Adobe who could easily use the original Illustrator Pen tool?

And in an age of trade paperbacks, this book is a physical joy--a beautifully bound embossed-hardcover book with a varnish-coated dust jacket. The inside pages are exquisitely designed, with full-color photos throughout the book.

This is the sort of book you pick up and read, then pick up again, then again, then again. There's always one more little tidbit to laugh or smile over.

One valuable feature is the historical emphasis, which is usually lacking from such books, but is crucial for those who inherit existing networks. With state-of-the-art changing so rapidly, it's hard for even a veteran IT profesional to recall what were considered optimal solutions ten, five, or even a couple of years ago. Many network engineers working today are too young to remember what networks were like as recently as 1993. Also, the case studies show how theory can be applied successfully in real-world situations. Often, it's hard to visualize how a technical solution will work in a particular environment; by including a variety of case studies, solutions can be made apparent to readers from diverse backgrounds.

"Integrating TCP/IP i-nets with IBM Data Centers" is an absolute must-read for network administrators, data communications managers, and chief information officers in organizations with IBM mainframe or midrange SNA hosts. Guruge is an expert on IBM's System Network Architecture, which, although a quarter century old, holds most of the data of the world's largest organizations. Guruge explains both in technical detail and with real-life case studies how organizations can take advantage of TCP/IP, the lingua franca of the Internet, to facilitate communications with and among SNA devices. If you speak the language of SNA networking, like 3270/5250,DLSw, APPN/HPR and are trying to do so in the same sentence with terms like HTML, Telnet, and screen rejuvenation, this is the book you must read. Mr. Guruge will not only explain how these technologies relate to one another, but he will provide examples of how organizations have married these technologies to meet specific organizational and business requirements. And by the time you finish the book you'll have a firm understanding of how your own organization can integrate its IBM data center with TCP/IP i-nets.

The book is very comprehensive, giving full coverage of all the information necessary to understand the implications and considerations that must followed in order to integrate IBM data centers with Internet technology. It provides an excellent explanation of the various Network, Gateway and management options that are available and their pros and cons. It is also very informative and thorough analysis of old vs. the latest groundbreaking technology available as well as a prognosis for future market winners and losers based upon valid market analysis.

It deals in depth with many concerns IS mangers typically have, including bandwidth and other performance issues related to various network types/configurations when it comes to "integrating the data center with i*nets".

I was especially glad to see his view on various vendors' e-business products or tie-ins and how these apply to applet, SNA-to-HTML conversion and programmatic access. Of course, in mentioning e-business, security is the number one concern that is raised by any reader, and was addressed in full with logical commentary/opinion as to what security methods are available and when/where to use them.

Extensive use of case studies to offer real-life examples of the technologies and how and why they were implemented for a given company's needs, adds further value by underlining the fact that the product/technology chosen is dependant upon each company's specific network and user requirements.

This book is a "must read" for any company IS manager considering a move to Web-to-Host technologies. The book focuses on the emerging Web-based host access trend and choosing the right solution for a given project.

This book proves that there are no excuses for NOT integrating IBM data centers to the Internet or Intranets. Security concerns, time to develop, cost, bandwidth - all these issues are addressed in the book and proven to be non-issues. From my experience the most difficult part in such an integration project is to integrate two teams or camps - the PC programmers, that don't want to hear about JCL and LUs with mainframe programmers and VTAM gurus that don't care about using the mouse (the arrow keys work just fine, thank you). Typically, there is an alphabet soup of acronyms that each camp is referring to mostly to keep outsiders out - SSCP, LU, PU, CICS, IMS and such on one side with TCP/IP, SSL,HTTP, etc. on the other side.

The book does a great job in explaining all the concepts involved in the mainframe/midrange network architecture, as well as explaining the TCP/IP based internet technologies

A multitude of charts are used to illustrate the underlying architecture and the protocols involved in gluing all the pieces together.

The author gives an overview of the evolution in networking software and hardware that has taken place in the last 30 years.

Real-life test cases are provided to prove that integrating IBM data centers to TCP/IP networks is not only possible, but does not require huge investments in either time or money. The reader should conclude after reading this book, that "Hey, it has been done before and nobody got fired".

Acknowledging the impact of Y2K on the scarcity of the enterprise IT resources, Guruge is describing solutions that do not require ANY changes to the legacy applications. All the integration work is done around them, with results ranging from immediate out-of-the-box, to ones that may take a few weeks to accomplish.

It goes without saying that the book is well indexed, with a proper glossary and can serve as a reference resource.

All in all a great book worth its weight in gold.

"Integrating TCP/IP i-nets with IBM Data Centers" is an absolute must-read for network administrators, data communications managers, and chief information officers in organizations with IBM mainframe or midrange SNA hosts. Guruge is an expert on IBM's System Network Architecture, which, although a quarter century old, holds most of the data of the world's largest organizations. Guruge explains both in technical detail and with real-life case studies how organizations can take advantage of TCP/IP, the lingua franca of the Internet, to facilitate communications with and among SNA devices. If you speak the language of SNA networking, like 3270/5250,DLSw, APPN/HPR and are trying to do so in the same sentence with terms like HTML, Telnet, and screen rejuvenation, this is the book you must read. Mr. Guruge will not only explain how these technologies relate to one another, but he will provide examples of how organizations have married these technologies to meet specific organizational and business requirements. And by the time you finish the book you'll have a firm understanding of how your own organization can integrate its IBM data center with TCP/IP i-nets.

This is a best book I have ever seen. It has every details about how to use the iText. It's very clear in every technical aspects. iText is also a great API for Java programmer. It's also really easy to learn. I love iText.

I love this book. I strongly recommand this book.

This is a great book for people developing or maintaining applications using iText. It covers every corner-case I've run into, typically offering various options on how to solve a problem. The writing is concise, with easily approachable chapters and examples.

In January 2006 I was assigned to build a system that would create lots of PDF reports, typically with hundreds of pages of tables, and with tables nested in other tables. I started with an an open-source tool called BIRT that is well-designed and powerful, but it didn't quite give me sufficient low-level control over some aspects of PDF creation. When I realized that BIRT wasn't going to work for me, I was behind schedule and in trouble. Then I discovered iText. (BIRT actually is built using iText jar files.) I found that iText gave me exactly what I needed: an easy-to-use yet powerful Java API for creating PDF files. The remainder of the project, using iText, went smoothly, and my boss was very happy with the results. But I sure wish that I'd had Bruno Lowagie's "iText in Action" book at the time! That would have shaved a few weeks off of the project and would have saved me from learning some things painfully, by trial and error. As the original developer of iText, Bruno Lowagie is uniquely qualified to write this book. He obviously put a huge amount of effort into it, reflecting his longstanding commitment to iText. He made every effort to explain things as clearly as possible, and to document the pitfalls as well as the attractive features. It is evidently a labor of love for him. The book is written to the high editorial standards of other Manning books, with clear organization, good typography and layout, and so on. I highly recommended iText itself, and also this book, to anyone who is using Java to work with PDF files.

This is nice book, though most of the contents can be found online (I believe it is linked from the author's website). I have created some complex PDF files using iText following the examples on the book and online tutorials. This is the book from iText creator, surely it worth a 5 starts.

I've always figured that there should be some way to create PDF files without the manual effort of any 3rd party software client. Now I find out there is a way, and it's rather exciting... iText In Action by Bruno Lowagie covers the iText open source software project. It's a very well done reference manual that can also serve as a tutorial for a decent Java developer.

Contents:
Part 1 - Introduction: iText - when and why; PDF engine jump-start; PDF - why and when
Part 2 - Basic Building Blocks: Composing text elements; Inserting images; Constructing tables; Constructing columns
Part 3 - PDF Text and Graphics: Choosing the right font; Using fonts; Constructing and painting paths; Adding color and text; Drawing to Java Graphics2D
Part 4 - Interactive PDF: Browsing a PDF document; Automating PDF creation; Creating annotations and fields; Filling and signing AcroForms; iText in web applications; Under the hood
Appendixes: Class diagrams; Creating barcodes; Open parameters; Signing a PDF with a smart card; Dealing with exceptions; Pdf/X, Pdf/A, and tagged PDF; Resources; index

Lowagie starts off with a brief background of how iText came into being, along with a scenario of where the ability to programmatically create PDF files could dramatically change the way a college would run a department. Then after a short Hello World example that involves creating a simple document, he delves into all the different features and capabilities. The book at this point starts to change from tutorial to reference manual, but it's done in such a way that you could just keep working through the material in tutorial fashion with little effort (and good results). The example code in all the chapters are extensively annotated and explained, so you're not left to your own devices to try and figure out what the logic is trying to accomplish. In fact, I would say that the code annotation and commentary is some of the best I've seen in a book of this type. Great job...

The main target audience for this book is the Java developer, as the iText project is Java-based. There are .NET ports for J# and C#, and knowing how close those languages are to Java, this book should work pretty well for those development efforts with a little bit of thought and modification. Other languages should be able to use the iText toolkit if they have some way to call Java code modules from within their programs. As a Notes/Domino developer, I should be able to utilize all of this package in any Java agents I write, and the LS2J feature of LotusScript might also work well. After reading this book, I know I have some things I need to try...

If you have any sort of need involving the creation of PDF files from within your own system, iText is a great alternative to explore. And if that seems to be the way to go, I don't know of any better book to get than this one...

I loved this book. The software the author talks about is on the cd rom with documentation! There are
a lot of nice extras on the cd-rom. Great sense of humor and kind of hard to put down. Twice already
I've used it as a reference. I will look to buy other books from this author. I can't believe he covers both
command line and gui apps that either do or almost do the same thing! Now I can get work done no matter
what with my small home network.

~~~~~
I picked this book up out of pure curiosity - a chimpanze on the cover of a Linux book? As I looked inside, I thought, "Gee, I really DIDN'T know you could do that in Linux!" My curiosity soon turned to amazement "Hey, you can't even do that in Windoze!" Next, I realized, "Hey, I have to DO this!" and bought the book.

The author has a refreshing sense of humor that makes you grin as you learn. He provides dozens and dozens of hard-to-find applications and tells you exactly what to type to implement the program. The CD includes helpful utilities, entertaining games, and even a full office suite. (Try to get THAT in your Windows O.S.!) Most of the programs on the CD include complete source code as well as a binary executable file. Many of the tools can run right off the CD.

This book is hard to beat if you want to get that "extra edge" in Linux. Your friends will be amazed and exclaim, "Gee, I didn't know you could do THAT with Linux!!!"

Lloyd W. Cary
~~~~~

I just bought this book. It contains 50 tips and tricks on using Linux. It also includes a CD-Rom with RPM's (for Red Hat 6.x) and lots of .tgz files. It has usefull info like how to undelete files and info on what applications are available to make Linux a real desktop OS ("real" replacement for Windows 98). It's a book for everyone and most software mentioned in the book is on the CD-Rom included. This book is definitly worth the price. Buy it!

I loved this book. The software the author talks about is on the cd rom with documentation! There are
a lot of nice extras on the cd-rom. Great sense of humor and kind of hard to put down. Twice already
I've used it as a reference. I will look to buy other books from this author. I can't believe he covers both
command line and gui apps that either do or almost do the same thing! Now I can get work done no matter
what with my small home network.

I have been using Linux for the last 5 years, and I have read quite a few books. I read this book just to refresh what I have learned throughout the years, and I can honestly say, this book is the only one I have actualy been able to sit down and read. This is a must-read for anyone getting into linux, or just want a refresh. It covers many useful topics, and is very easy to follow.

Excellent book with plenty and colourful images. Easy to do mods that give your computer an amazing appearance

This book covers all the basics that a beginning modder would need to know. He also branches out into modding a computer out of found objects, using a swiss hard shell backpack as a working example. There are plenty of high quality, color photos that clearly illustrate all the processes he describes.

But my favorite aspect of this book is Paul's teachings of the proper mindset for a modder. Adventurous, inquisitive, creative, always looking for a new and/or better way to do things. He not only gives very practical advise about this mindset, but demonstrates it in the working projects he goes through in the book. It is refreshing to have the author show how he learns from his own work, instead of seeming to sit on a high throne from his 20+ years of experience.

For any computer nerd with a sense of self this book is a great guide on how to turn your favorite machine into a personalized spitting image of yourself. I found this book very easy to follow, and the instructions were easy to follow, with colour images and step by step instructions

I was in the process of building a new computer for myself and shopped Amazon.com for some books to help with my build, Maximum PC hit the mark with a book that walked me threw the whole process.Not only was I so impressed with this book, I came back and purchased two more of Maximum PC's books. Thier books are bright full colored and easy to read. You can't go wrong with any of thier books.

This is a great book! The entire book is printed on glossy paper with full color printing - really, a quality book. The book has good, clear photographs on almost every page, and the writing clear and easy to understand. I've read most of the boks on PC modding, and in my opinion, this is the best one.