Software Books

I purchased this book for my wife when I got her a digital camera for Christmas. It was well worth the money. The book explains photography as well as post processing which is a critical part of digital photography today.

I know Matt Bamberg's writing and love his blog (digitalartphotographyfordummies.com). If you're new to photography and confused by all the terms, Matt takes you through the basics (although he says the book assumes you know the principles of photography, he patiently explains the technical stuff). If you're a seasoned pro, skip the refresher course and just enjoy the fabulous photos--which, by the way, everyone will appreciate.

I'm the outgoing vice president of NLAPW Palm Springs--we were honored to be among Matt's first speaking engagements--and have seen our members create beautiful digital art photography. Thanks to Matt's book, I now know how it was done! Artists seeking to sell and exhibit their work will find great career guidance. For other shutterbugs, the book will eliminate some of those photos that you cringe at later (I know I have a few!)

The image manipulation tips in Photoshop are extremely valuable. This is a terrific book, even if you've only toyed with the idea of doing digital photography. Matt's vivid, lively prose makes this a pleasurable read.

This is a great book for anyone using digital photography -- whether
you are just starting out or have some experience. There is something
for everyone! I found it to be a great source of information when it comes
to Photoshop. Of all my Photoshop books, I find I reach for this one the
most. It is permanently planted by my computer for quick reference when
I need it. It has GREAT editing tips and is easy to read and comprehend.

Matt Bamberg's book Digital Art Photography for Dummies is an excellent resource for both the beginner and the advanced student of Digital Photography. I have read the book and of especial interest to me were the numerous overt and subtle suggestions about technique and execution. Suggestions which I have used to great effect to dramatically improve my own compositions and to better concentrate and focus my shots.

In addition I really benefited from the suggestions regarding how to process and enhance your work, post shooting. One of the more important foci of the book regards how to transform your work from more simple photographic imagery into more complex renditions which can be considered artistic. Matt explains these techniques for image modification easily and logically and it was not difficult with the right equipment and software for me to begin experimenting with altering my works to produce far more spectacular work. Work which others have expressed interest in. I have even become my church photographer and have recently had other people ask me to undertake photographic assignments on their behalf. In addition I have started the process of taking previous shots and altering them for inclusion into my written works, as graphic enhancements to my writings.

However the book also contains a myriad of techniques which are useful and helpful for the amateur and for the individual who uses photography as a part of their other work. I am often involved in investigations and through some experimentation and adaptation I have used techniques suggested and explained by Matt in order to clarify, focus, and render my investigative photographs far sharper, clearer, and more relevant for my clients. So the book has indirectly benefited me professionally as well.

I have enjoyed Matt's book, have visited his blog and site, and found him to be an accessible and helpful author. Additionally he obviously knows his subject matter and is therefore professionally well-qualified. He seems very experienced and yet eagerly experimental, two traits I like in any individual who is trying to teach me something new.

I have Matt's book and consider it a valuable addition to my personal library on the subjects of both art and photography.

I recommend the book.

Jack.

If you are a digital photographer that is starting out or trying to get into the "art" side, then this book is for you. This book is well written, easy to understand, and full of excellent images and great walk throughs. I can tell that Matt is very comfortable with this topic and is an expert in his field. It touches on many easy ways for new shutterbugs to expand their knowledge without taking the fun out of photography. His Adobe Photoshop knowledge is also very useful when post processing scans of film, slides, or negatives as well as existing digital images.
Matt, thanks for your time and energy in writing this book. I will recommend it to both family and friends.

The book is well layed-out, and descriptions are clear and concise. The first 95 pages or so are relatively basic. I have used a crusty version of Homesite to create a few basic Websites in-the-past, so those first 95 pages didn't teach me anything that I didn't already know. Except perhaps for the design and paper and pencil preparation.

After page 95 (or so), you jump right into Dreamweaver and are instructed as to its' functions. The Webpage you're building is a basic HTML page, and does not use any server-side technology like ASP, or PHP, or CGI/Perl.

It too is well layed-out, and step-by-step. I only wished that a deeper discussion of CSS integration was employed.

So, for the beginner, or for someone who likes to paper & pencil prep, I'd have to say that this is a worthwhile buy.

For the more advanced user, I'd have to say that you may be better off with more of a reference-style tome.

All said, I do not regret the purchase.

If you are looking for website building software, you might want to take a look at Dreamweaver 8: Design and Construction. This book educates the reader on the various aspects of Dreamweaver 8. It also shows the reader, step by step, how to build a website using this software. The author also includes all sort so tips, illustrations of what the reader will see as he or she builds their site, and helpful tech talk boxes that explain some of the more technical issues in an easy to understand way. Everything in this manual is suitable for those with little or no knowledge of website design or website design software.

I believe that the best way to choose website software is to understand what that particular program can do and how this may or may not suit your needs and your abilities. It doesn't help to buy software that can do seemingly magical things if you don't have a clue how to actually make it work. This book helps the reader understand the basics of the Dreamweaver 8 program with a taste of some of the more complex things that can be done.

This book takes you from web-site zero through building a basic client-side only web site using Dreamweaver 8.

My only critique is that it seemed like we didn't even get to actually using Dreamweaver 8 until about page 100. Before that was an intro to general web-site concepts and HTML.

Anyway, it's an attractive and informative book that is priced lower than most.

This book is well written and laid out well (for the most part), but the lack of color really, really hurts this Dreamweaver 8 guide. Perhaps I am being a bit of a stickler, but a book in 2006 not only needs to have good content, but it need to also have a great layout as well. Deciding to go with 5 major colors (white, black, grey, blue, dark blue) not only makes the book seem dull and drab, it detracts from the reader the good content within.

For anyone that uses Dreamweaver 8 on a daily basis this is a great reference guide but the layout editor could have done a much better job. If you care about content more than pizzaz, I think you will be happy with this book

**** RECOMMENDED

Are you new to Dreamweaver 8? If you are, then this book is for you! Author Marc Campbell, has done an outstanding job of writing a book for people who are new to creating their own web sites from the ground up and all that it entails.

Campbell, begins by showing you how to devise your plan. Then, the author shows you how to develop a blueprint for your site. Next, he shows you how to add just about anything to the pages of your site. Finally, the author shows you how to take the working prototype that exists on your computer and publish it to the Web for all of the world to see.

This most excellent book serves an introduction to creating web sites using Macromedia Dreamweaver 8. More importantly, the focus throughout this book is that sound design and usability are inextricably linked.

This is an excellent book. It helps the beginners of "Dynamical Systems" to understand this branch of Mathematical Physics using Maple. It is very useful for undergraduate students as well as for teachers.

A great book. Great web pages and short, easy to copy and edit
Maple programs. Lots of material not covered in other books on this topic. Maple is my favorite package. The others are not
as user friendly. I felt I must write again since amazon have been showing excerpts from book. What a geat idea. Chapters in this book that interested me were fractals, multifractals and
optics. Authors web-site is given on back cover of book. Enjoy!

Thought I'd give a more in depth review than the others here.

Most advanced math textbooks contain one or two chapters that turn me off. I must say that every chapter in this book had useful information or very good applications.

The opening chapter is a brief introduction to Maple V (some Maple 8 commands are posted on the books website). Note that Maple 9 is now out and no doubt Maple X will soon follow.

Chapters 1-7 cover planar systems in some detail, vectorfield in DEplot is a real winner here. Chapters 8 and 9 cover 3D and nonautonomous systems - the poincare command in Maple is a real time saver.

Chapters 10-12 cover a lot of research results on limit cycles - the most lucid I have seen in any textbook.

The remaining half of the book concentrates on both real and complex discrete systems. There are the usual cobweb diagrams, bifurcation diagrams and Mandelbrot set. Where this book comes into its own, however, is in Chapters 16-20.

Lasers and nonlinear optics are investigated using complex iterative maps. Fractals and even multifractals are discussed in some detail. The book ends with a chapter dedicated to chaos control.

Overall, the book is concise with pertinent examples and applications. It is not dogged down with math notation, theorems and proofs.

Strogatz, Perko and Allgood are good books to practice more Maple programing techniques.

This book is a very nice introduction to the theory of dynamical
systems. It covers all aspects and even more than usually thaught
in a class on dynamical systems. Especially, I like to see
many examples for various applications. These examples and the
Maple programs make it well suitable for students to learn
on dynamical systems by themself.

This is only book I find with program files that work right away. Graphics in Maple is excelent for chaotic system and algebra very powerful. I like to rotate figures in 3D and use animation. I learn more about optics, it nice to see complex numbers used in applications. Lots of other applications also.

Book is best for students who want to get programs working quickly. There is a website with working programs. You should also look at Maple Application website for many many examples.

I recomend book to everyone.

Kantar is exceptionally readable, with a sense of humor which makes a difficult subject enjoyable. He goes through much material, but quite thoroughly and clearly. It's a book that needs to be studied - not merely read - but a good student will gain enormously from Kantar's work.

I found this to be the best book to improve bridge for an intermediate player. I've read it four times and learned from each chapter each time. Since one plays defense on half the hands, it provides the best time investment to improve one's bridge play. It is also an entertianing read. I have recommended it to the bridge players I mentor.

The book focuses on leads, signals (Attitude, Count, Suit Preference), and how to card (what card to play in 2nd or 3rd spot), rather than general defensive principles.

The content is excellent, well presented (humorous!!), and best of all, has lots of quizzes. None of this skimming a section and figuring you know it, the quiz will let you find out for certain.

2 warnings:

1) make sure your partner is using the same techniques, otherwise you may get worse results. Its not that the ideas in the book are radical, they are mainstream. But if pard doesn't understand your signal, they may do something weird and you will be worse off.

2) The book is a bit technical (5 situations where this is a suit preference signal. If Dummy wins with a Q then signal count, otherwise ... If you can see the X in dummy then pard will know to do this, else that, etc.
You will need to reread it several times, and probably make notes.

VALUABLE STUFF, but ONLY as part of a partnership that understands each other.

Kantar today is more noted as a bridge instructor than a bridge player. But one must remember that he is both and his latest book demonstrated both the instructional and practical sides. It is (as usual) clear, concise and ro the point. I like Kantar's prose, his ease of explanation and the way he sets just the right tone. Of course, he discusses the bid, the opponent and, most important, keeping track of the play while counting the cards (the one thing that separates the professional from the amateur). Good book with tons of examples.

This is a great book on defense, because Kantar covers almost every intermediate situation comprehensively and give you black and white rules for every situation. He doesn't in this book consider varied leading/signalling conventions but just gives one way to play, but that's fine as he explains his method clearly and shows why he recommends everything he does. I'd recommend it to every player.

Excellent book on JMS,
topics in book like easy going ,
dont think just buy and read its worth

This is a very decent book for JMS. It works out well to learn the basics. It goes into good depth on the basics. After the basics your pretty much on your own for getting too advanced.

This book makes the process of learning JMS easy for all skill levels. Dr. Yusuf provides real-world examples in a language that is down to earth. He has assembled its content into sections for someone just learning JMS while providing code samples for the seasoned developer. I found the "how to" diagrams extremely helpful when configuring Enterprise JMS in WebSphere. This is a must have for anyone interested in JMS and how it's applied in an IBM WebSphere environment. This is an excellent book!

I found this book extremely useful. It is practical, well-written and provides the necessary ancillary information required to understand the topics. The author builds up nicely from messaging, to JMS basics, advanced JMS topics, IBM JMS offerings, hands-on scenarios(which bring it all together, especially for people who learn by doing), and deployment. In addition, throughout the book, the author provides implementation considerations, recommendations and best practices, which will be of great value to designers and developers alike.

I've been working with WebSphere for over 5 years (since the beginning) and this was still worth reading. Great book full of examples, step-by-step "labs". This is focused on WebSphere and MQ, but will be very helpful to those who wants to use MQ with any other J2EE server. If you are not MQ and not WebSphere user - this still will be helpful since it has great deal of JMS basics, but you will have to use your vendor's tutorials and examples instead of those in the book. Concepts are still the same.

If you are using the Rational Unified Process, or considering doing so, and worried about applying it to a whole IT department rather than separate projects then this book could well be useful. The book has four parts - From RUP to EUP, Beyond Development, Enterprise Management Disciplines and Putting it all Together. Each section has several chapters and the chapters all start with a nice reader ROI section (showing the payoff for reading that chapter). The writing is clear and there are plenty of diagrams, tables and helpful tips.

The book starts of with some background in the RUP. I particularly liked the description of RUP as serial in the large and iterative in the small. Within the RUP there are also nine disciplines (Business Modeling, Requirements, Analysis and Design, Implementation, Test, Deployment, Configuration and Change Management, Project Management, and Environment). The authors outline 10 best practices they see as core to the EUP (they extend the original 6 in RUP) - Develop iteratively, Manage requirements, Proven architecture, Modeling, Continuously verify quality, Manage change, Collaborative development, Look beyond deployment, Deliver working software regularly and Manage risk. Each is clearly described.

In addition to the change best practices, EUP adds a Production phase and a Retirement phase. They point out that the Production phase is not just maintenance or just operations and support but both and more. I think that any organization building systems should spend as much time and effort thinking about production and running their application in production (which includes maintaining it over time) as they do in building it and I was glad to see this so strongly proposed. They also added an operations and support discipline, mostly but not entirely in the production phase. This discipline includes running the system and making hot fixes. I think the Retirement phase is overkill for most organizations but some will find it useful.

They also added some "Enterprise Management" disciplines for use outside the context of a project and this too is a good idea. The disciplines are Enterprise business modeling, Enterprise Portfolio Management, Enterprise Architecture (I particularly liked the idea that "modifiability" should be considered as part of an enterprise architecture - far too few organizations do this well and fail to differentiate between stable services and much more changeable ones), Strategic Reuse (Again I liked the called-out focus on this - without a real plan no reuse is going to happen), People management , Enterprise Administration and Software Process Improvement (Another good one and a timely reminder to all that you should keep improving your software processes)

Overall I liked the book, though it was a somewhat dry subject (as methodologies often are). There was a lot of good advice, some nice tips and some clearly hard-won experience being shared!

Many IT organizations still pursue pet projects and develop duplicate applications in isolation, only to address later crises in corporate reporting, portfolio management, IT infrastructure, business objectives, and other areas.

EUP gives a coherent roadmap of how to architect smarter and for the long term. For organizations that don't have a strong enterprise aptitude, this book is a lifesaver. The EUP provides the business case for implementing EUP that will help cut through the politics by addressing the benefits to the bottom line for pursuing an Enterprise Unified Process.

I will be referencing the EUP regularly, and passing it around to others in my organization!

The Enterprise Unified Process (EUP) unites diverse disciplines, including development, enterprise architecture, operations, production and portfolio management, reuse and business process modeling, under an easy to follow framework. It was refreshing to find a book that recognizes the need to accommodate the installed base of existing software as part of the planning, development and deployment process. This is an excellent guide for any manager who wants to ensure that essential IT disciplines are addressed.

The focus of EUP is to enhance the commonly accepted Rational Unified Process (RUP). The authors have added new disciplines to RUP that include business modeling, portfolio management, enterprise administration, reuse, enterprise architecture and process improvement. The introduction of business modeling into the overall process is essential to weave IT processes and disciplines into the most essential driver of any systems initiative - the business. The enterprise architecture discussion was also refreshing given that many organizations have forgone this discipline and have created redundant, stovepipe applications and data structures that significantly stifle business agility.

The "Reuse" chapter raises the rarely deployed reuse strategy. It is critically important to not replicate business processes, models, systems, data structures, source code and interfaces. The costs and risks of trying to keep parallel assets synchronized have been written about extensively. This book promotes the idea that reuse is just another aspect of the enterprise unified process. It is also one of the few discussions about reuse that recognizes the value of harvesting existing assets.

Also of note is the portfolio management discussion that focuses attention on the need to incorporate project management with application management. It should be noted, however, that portfolio management has much less focus on applications than the traditional industry definition as promoted by Gartner, Inc.

Finally, this book makes great use of tips, tool references and citations to books or papers that readers can use to expand on their understanding of a given topic. The last chapter of the book takes a realistic and honest look at deploying the enterprise unified process, including its possible retirement.

This book is must readying for any organization using -- or attempting to use -- the RUP. The EUP's additional disciplines completes the RUP in a necessary and sufficient manner.
The book is written in a straight-forward manner, is easy to read and is well-organized. Each chapter reminds you to be practical (the antipatterns), explains how the additional discipline relates to the others and provides software tools and suggested reading.
Don't RUPture your software development efforts without having the more comprehensive approach of the EUP!

The book provides a very readable coverage of IBM's Rational Unified Process, as well as useful extensions that address important aspects of enterprise systems planning, development, and management. The systematic and disciplined treatment is greatly enhanced by the inclusion of much useful, pragmatic advice that draws from the practical experience of the authors in building real systems.
I quite liked this book. Although it doesn't give enough emphasis to conceptual data analysis (something RUP has always been weak on), it has loads of useful, practical content that make it a worthwhile addition to the literature.

Very nice explanation, with lots of examples. This is a marked difference from other books that are written for mathematicians. The book also contains implementation details (lots of circuit diagrams), hence is suited for those with a background in CS/EE. Will be good if the book came with lab notes!

Eventhough, my field of research is not concentrate on coding. But in the future, I may start research in this field. This book is the basic of all necessary principle of coding in wire or wireless communication. This book can be used in parallel with textbook of Prof. Parhi in order for you to design VLSI signal processing block with code modulation or something like that which is very useful in improving the performance of wireless network!

I have the first version of this book. Now I am so glad to have the second version too. It has great improvement. It added quite lot of recent FEC tech in, including Turbo coding, LDPC coding. Besides, it is quite easy for a engineer to understand, not awkward as some math equation filled textbooks. Its block diagram can be easily understood by an engineer like me. Amazing book!

Not only does this book contain almost all the important information about coding you could hope for, but it's written in such a clear way with such a consistent notation that it's also wonderful for learning. This book is more than twice as long as the first edition and serves as a great graduate-level text or reference for someone designing ECC systems.

I had the previous version of this book as my text at USC. This version is a huge improvement over the last one. This one covers all the new advances and adds emphasis on the use of coding to communications channels. A complaint I had of the last version was that it under-emphasized coding gains and Eb/N0 vs. BER performance figures. This book has overcome many of those difficulties. It is still a bit ponderous in places but then it is the only book that covers the material in this much detail, truly a Bible of the field. It is a great graduate level text and a must-have book for any comm engineer. Charan Langton complextoreal.com

Love this series of books, having a lesson if you will, followed by an assignment. All of the books that I have seen give you a good level of detail to describe the underlying details without getting too technical and very well written.

I'm so happy that I bought this book. It has really helped me better understand how to get the right exposure. He uses good examples that just make it click. If you are interested in going further with photography you need this for the shelf.

I would highly recommend this series of photography books {Photo Workshop). I purchased the full set and they have all been excellent.
The book arrived quickly and in excellent condition.

I am an avid amateur digital photographer. I have read many books on exposure and techniques. This is one of the best ever. The explanations are clear, logical, and the presentation is easy to follow. A concept is explained and then one or more photographs are used to demonstrate the concept. I highly recommend this book.

I couldn't be happier that I have this book. It explains everything that I needed to know about exposure, in such detail that a monkey could take better photos than Ansel Adams. I am so serious, If you have a DSLR, and you want to learn everything you can about it, you must have this book.

This book is a great guide for all FileMaker Pro developers interested in working with XML. Beverly Voth clearly has a strong grasp of both FileMaker Pro and Markup Languages. I found this book well organized, easy to follow and filled with useful information.

I've read many books regarding FileMaker Pro. In the few that mention XML, it is an afterthought. Beverly Voth's book is in depth, detailed and formatted in a manner that makes it readable, understandable and usable to both novice and professional developers.

The page layouts and presentation of the code and formatting is first rate. I was able to put what I learned into practice on day one of reading the book. This is a must have for all FileMaker Pro Programmers. I've recommended it to all my programmers. I recommend it to all who plan to ride the wave of the future with FileMaker Pro's XML features.

Ray Clements

Beverly Voth has written the "bible" on FileMaker Pro/XML integration. She takes what can be a daunting subject, and leads you logically from topic to topic, with demo files and plenty of code examples to illustrate her points. From the eight-page table of contents (in outline form) to the detailed index, this book is exceptionally well laid out, and has plenty to offer both the novice and the veteran FileMaker developer. This book does not suffer from the "we didn't have time, budget or inclination to proofread adequately" syndrome that plagues so many computer books these days... it flows beautifully, and I have yet to find a single typo.

The release of Beverly Voth's Guide is well worth our wait. While exhaustive, the writing is clear and not exhausting. She has given us the definitive textbook on this thorny, difficult subject, starting at the outside and working in. While breaking apart the various layers into edible morsels, Ms. Voth does not sugar-coat the complexities of her subject; she simply makes them disappear.

Finally a handy book that clearly explains XML and XSLT from a FileMaker perspective.

It is obvious when reading through this material, that Beverly Voth writes from experience. Her book is well researched, has a firm grasp of the FileMaker XML grammars and provides lots and lots of examples that make it easy for a developer to adopt this technology.

This book is full of useful tips, hints and clear explanations. There are many simple step by step exercises, XML and XSLT examples along with many do's and dont's that take the pain out of the development cycle.

The guide is complete with a useful list of resources, links and references and a glossary of acronyms and terms.

I use FileMaker applications everyday, I write stylesheets and now I always keep this book next to my computer as a quick reference and useful guide.

This book has helped me a lot for the TV commercial to be created in Flash..I thank the author of the book for this wonderfull help..

In order to use the examples in this book you will need a MacIntosh. You will also have buy quite a number of third-party plugins. If you own a Mac and have money for plugins than this is a very helpful book.

But look elsewhere if you only have a Windows computer and want to use only Flash for video work.

An excellent Flash book. It goes through every aspect of the production process, from writing the script to exporting to videotape. It tells you how to prepare your Flash animations the right way, and provides information on the correct project size, frame rate, title & action safe guides, etc. for broadcast. This information is invaluable if you ever intend to submit your Flash animation to a festival or studio, and you have to export your movie out to videotape. I also found the interviews with seasoned Flash animators to be very insightful. You will not regret buying this book.

If you're a traditional animator or a web-based flash animator (all levels), "Flash MX Design for TV and Video" IS the definitive guide to taking your flash animation to video, television and DVD. Not only is this book chock full of animation techniques, it also explores working with sound, flash video capabilities and limitations, visual storytelling and cross-purposing, the process of designing your project with a variety of delivery options in mind. This book is a must-have for every serious Flash Animator seeking to take their flash stories to the next level. We are proud to recommend it to our FlashTV members.

Nicholas Da Silva, ...

Its just a mater time before more quality content shifts from the workstations to the living rooms of the world. This is the definitive guide on bridging Flash content for the Web to Television. A truly indespensible reference for any Flash professional wanting to make the transition.
Janet Galore and Todd Kelsey lay it all out clearly and write in an easy to read style that doesn't skimp on details. The entire book is laden with terrific artwork and helpful screen grabs that support the text. Very undaunting for the visually inclined.
The sections on video exporting, and postproduction effects was particularly eye opening. this section alone cleared a lot uncertainty for me.
While this book won't make the reader a better Flash animator/designer, it most definately will make any level Animator or designer a more informed artist. It will open a lot of doors personaly and in the hands of a talented, creative person, change the ever evolving face of the Flash community indelibly.