Adamson Books

I have followed Ian Adamson for years, and he is the real deal. This book has proven to be an indispensable resource for my team mate and I as we prepare for our first adventure race. The information in this book was immediately useful, and it has kept me from making several crucial mistakes in gear purchases. I would highly recommend this book for anyone who is interested in adventure racing!

This book is a expert job by a man who knows his trade! Is a must to anyone interested in this subject.

Whether you're a veteran or a rookie just starting out in adventure racing, this is one book you should never miss in your collection. This is a classic reference written in clear and understandable language by adventure racing's Michael Jordan. Each page contains a veritable treasure of information, from training, to equipment selection, to navigation and sleep management, culled from years of racing across the world in diverse terrains and climates. If there was only one book you can buy to learn about the history and discipline of adventure racing ---this is it.

If you are a fan of adventure racing (AR), the author's reputation is quite familiar to you. Adamson is among the very best adventure racers in the world, with loads of big race experience.

He is also a good writer. The book is clear and readable. Most of the material will not be new to you if you have significant experience already, but there are tips and tricks and anecdotes that are both entertaining and illustrative.

The sport is so varied and demanding that no book, and certainly not one as brief as this one, can be complete in its coverage of it. However, there is a lot of good, accessible information here and you will not regret including this book in your AR library.

Note that as to gear recommendations, the equipment available is changing very quickly, and some preferences are just personal, so update your information before spending a lot on gear if your only reason for buying was because Ian likes it.

I have read two other books on Adventure Racing that were published before Ian's book came out in the market. Those two books were also good, in fact Ian wrote the foreword on both. But Ian's book came out a cut above the rest. His book offered his and his teamates "winning strategies and experiences". The book was intelligently written and commanded authority on all topics discussed such as proper training, purchasing and use of the right equipment, proper nutrition, good leadership and teamwork skills, sleep strategies etc. For sure the book will inspire and guide beginner racers to the sport, and will further provide veteran racers of new knowledge and valuable proven race strategies and techniques from Ian and his awesome NZ and OZ teamates. Ian is truly one of the best adventure racers in the world along with his mates John Howard and Steve Gurney. To sum it all up, this is an outstanding book, I can't wait to buy the second edition.

I am thirteen and have read a lot of books on Labs, but none compare to this! It is very easy to read and gives a whole lot of information. I would definitely recommend it to readers of all ages.

I recommend this book to all dog owners, regardless of breed. For those Labradorially inclined, the breed-specific information is invaluable, honest, and detailed. For Labradorians and all other dog owners, the behavior and training sections are some of the best I've read. This book is comprehensible and comprehensive.

The layout and writing style make the information extremely accessible. The information itself is extremely detailed and important to all dog owners. Joel and Eve have succeeded in explaining the secrets of making a good dog into a great dog, through management and training.

It's no surprise this book is so popular. Not only is it about one of the most wonderful and popular breeds of dog today, but it is chock full of information vital to dog owners of any breed.

In my capacity as a professional dog trainer, I have had occasion to work with puppy owners who have read this book, and I have to say "What a difference a book makes"--this book! Owners who have read this book understand how their dogs' minds work, and grasp what I have to teach them about training and problem solving that much easier. Thank you, Joel and Eve, for helping me do my job better!

There's LOTS of good advise whether you're a novice or long time lab owner. There's stuff here that you'd only get from a long-time breeder of Labs. It's unlike any other book on the market that I've found. They have crammed volumes of info into one book.

Joel has written a book which realy can apply to all breeds. It is concise and very readable for the lay person as well as to the professional trainer. I recommend Joel Walton's book to people in all stages of learning to live with and train their dogs.

Any Labradorian would find this an exceptional book written with humor and fun-loving training techniques. It is the perfect gift for anyone thinking of being owned and loved by a labrador retriever.

Wonderful animal communication anecdotes and insight. Very clear, step-by-step instructions on getting started in animal communication.

Debbie McGillivray is certainly gifted. Her book completely blew me away. She does a fantastic job of blending the reality of pet communications with stories of her experiences along with exercises we can do to learn how to communicate with animals.I always believed some people could communicate with animals on some level, but had no idea we all can do so if we develop those skills needed as Debbie describes in her book. Kudos to Debbie on such an eye opener.

This book is a page turner! The author Debbie McGillivray not only explains HOW to communicate and WHY you should but gives us clear examples of her teachings as reasons that we should interact with our pets and give them credit for their thoughts. Debbie includes personal interactions and tender stories about her own beloved family of pets and others she has personally helped. We have all seen pet psychics on television tell us what an animal is thinking but Deb includes backgroud information, contents of the communication and how she was able to help the pet or how the pet has actually communicated and helped its owner. She has blown me away with her spiritualality, trust and total belief in what she does and shares with anyone who really wants to learn.This book is a total package, a must read!

I am an animal behavior specialist. I bought this book for my students to read examples of how amazingly easily people can be manipulated into believing totally crazy things because they want to believe them - especially about cute and fuzzy animals. As an example of how never to go about understanding the natural world, it is unsurpassed.

This book is great. It teaches you how to understand your pets in order to ultimately communicate with them. Each chapter brings you closer to understanding your pets. Once you understand how they communicate with each other you will eventually learn how to communicate with them.

Venus Gilroy is a broke divorced American woman who works in a Adult Video store. Several times over the years she had come acrossed Marcello Brunelli a rich, Italian, but she never knew he was a Prince.

They never thought that they would see eachother again, but on her honeymoon (long story featured in My Three Husbands)they meet again. Several weeks later Marcello flys from Japan to go on a date with Venus in Portland, Oregon. During the time Marcello offers Venus to be his slacker coach and fly to Rome. He wants her to teach him how to be a slacker and hell teach her how to fall in love with him.

Venus flys to Rome, but Marcello is busy with strikes so she spends time with Johnny who shows her the sites around Rome. After a while Venus gets attracted to Johnny, whom she thinks is just a driver but who is infact Marcello's son Giavanni. However after Marcello suffers a mysterious ailment Venus falls in love with him and they end up married. Soon Venus s pregnant by Marcello and they go visit his mother on Capris. Unfortunatly during the trip to the Blue Grotto he has a heart attack and dies. Venus had alread incurred the rath of Marcello's daughte Giavanna, but his death made it worse.

Everything works out at the end when Venus and Johnny realize that they had fallen in love with eachother over gelattos over a decade earlier when Venus went on a trip to Capris with her fathers.

I picked this book up before a vacation. I was unable to put the book down once I started. It was a great story about a strong woman, very funny, although I did cry a bit towards the end because it was so touching.

I read this book, thinking that it would be an addition to my List Mania list: Belly Bump Books: Chick Lit You'll Love. I was a bit surprised to find that pregnancy doesn't hit the pages until the book is almost over (I'm not giving anything away - just look at the title!). Despite that, I found this to be a fun, light book- perfect for the beach or on vacation. Even though I didn't want to, I really came to love Venus and I adore her Faux Pa, Whitman. Filled with intrigue suspense, and yes, true love, this is a great read.

Funny, sweet, tart, poignant and very insightful. The dads are too much - I especially liked Whitman - no one could ever hope for a better "faux pa." Actually, I should say I loved Whitman, because love is what this book is all about.

What's Italian for "Bravo!"?

This book is what is known as a romp, a perfect summertime read, a delight, a laugh and a tear, and it's also something more. Without any positioning or preaching, it's a simple declarative statement about tolerance, acceptance, engagement and love. The exasperating Venus Gilroy is an unlikely heroine, yet one falls in love with her. Her entourage, a mom and two dads, are indelible characters. The Italian characters are...Italian. Molto bene! I could hardly put this book down.

Whether you have an interest in mid-century modern design, Frank Lloyd Wright's Usonian architecture or just Eichler...this book is a terrifc buy. While content rich it is still visually appealing and can easily function as a "coffee table" book. This book also serves as a terrific "idea guide" for those in search of small spacce solutions and/or modern landscaping layouts that bring the "outdoors in."

This book gives you alot of information. If you are interested in Eichler this is the book to get.

My word! I remember touring Eichler homes in Orange California with my parents. The homes, to me, were spectacular. My parents thought they seemed cheap. They were from the midwest and were used to brick homes built for powerful winters. We moved into another home several blocks from the Eichler Subdivision. I walked past the homes on they way to elementary school and just admired them so much. I guess I will never know what it is like to live in one, but I do know what it was like to tour an Eichler as a model home. What a memory! These are very special homes.

Scott K Dolik

As a Eichler home owner I couldn't wait for this book to arrive and thankfully it was a joy to read and pour over all the original photos in the book. I always knew I owned a special home and now I own a wonderful book that validates that too. Even if you are not a Eichler homeowner, but rather just a fan of mid-century homes this is also a must have for your library as it goes into more then just Joe Eichler and his homes. Enjoy the read!

Note: This book has 250 duotone photographs. The website run by the author is fantastic.

Emma wants a big, soft, cuddly pet. She has a cat, Fluffy, who isn't cuddly enough, she says. So she sets out to search. A bug? Not cuddly. A snake? TOO cuddly. At the end of the day, Emma goes home without having found her perfect pet... suddenly, though, there it is - the biggest, softest, cuddliest thing she ever saw... her father!

The illustrations are cute, sort of pastel watercolor-like. Not the bright drawings that generally catch kids' eyes, but nice - and interesting enough for even the shortest attention span. With each potential pet in a picture, it's a good time to help little ones identify a bird, and maybe even learn to recognize a word or two.

Dads might be offended by the "big, soft" part but how could any Dad NOT want to be his little daughter's cuddly "pet"? Ok, it works better for Emma and HER dad because they're bears, but it's still a cute idea and, let's face it, there aren't enough good bedtime stories for Dads to read. This one will do!

Emma wants a pet, but is having a hard time finding the right one: the mouse is too small, the frog is too wet. Eventually she finds the perfect pet in a surprise place in a warm story which celebrates family relationships as much as it understands a young child's search for love. This board book will appeal to the young beginner who has some reading skills.

My daughter received this book from my sister-in-law when she was born. It has been her favorite for awhile! It is a simple book to read, short and very sweet! A good book for parents who like to read to their children. My little Emma just loves it!! :o)

Emma's Pet is a very cute story about Emma's search for a big, soft, cuddly pet. In her search she tries all sorts of animals. First she finds a bug, but it isn't cuddly. Then in order she finds a mouse, bird, frog, snake, fish, dog, and turtle. Each one has some problem, some reason why it won't make the perfect pet. The mouse is too small; the bird is too busy, etc. So Emma gets sad. Then she suddenly sees `the biggest, softest, cuddliest thing she had ever seen. (turn page) It was her father.' She then asks him if he will be her pet, and he asks if she will be his. `And she hugged her new big soft cuddly pet. And it hugged her right back.'

This book is very sweet, and has beautiful illustrations. I really like it.

Loggie-log-log-log

My daughter loves Emma's Pet. When I read it to her, I substitute her name for Emma's name and her cat's name for the cat character's name. At the end of the book where Emma hugs her daddy, my daughter gets up from my lap and gives me a hug. My daughter is 19 months old. Next to "Guess How Much I Love You" it is my favorite book -- and it is one of her favorites too.

If you are responsible for delivering results from your company's data warehouse, you owe it to yourself to read this book. Chris Adamson has lived and breathed this stuff and he knows first hand the challenges facing those who enable the business intelligence systems that more and more organizations have come to rely on. The implementation of aggregates in your data warehouse is not trivial. Make a mistake and the consequences can be very serious indeed. Mr. Adamson is more than an author. He is a scholar, an educator, and an experienced practitioner in the data warehousing world and the information he shares in this book is worth many times the cover price.

I must confess that I was skeptic before reading the book, because I thought that it could not add very much to Kimball's books. However, I was wrong: this turned out to be a very useful book. Not only it contains the most detailed explanation of DW aggregates available, but it also contains a very good discussion of the loading process for various types of dimensions and facts, which forms the bulk of data warehouse "back room processing".
One more final plus: the author completely adopts the Kimball approach to Data Warehousing, so this book fits very nicely with other books from Wiley's describing Kimball methodology.

Mr. Adamson is certainly the foremost expert in this area. He has many years of hands-on experience, research, and knowledge in Data Warehousing. I have been able to consult his books and find answers and solutions to problems that I encounter every day in my work. You shouldn't waste your time by not buying this book. Definitely don't waste your money by buying a book written by some else.

Recently, a colleague recommended "Mastering Data Warehouse Aggregates" and I have already applied many of the powerful techniques so ably presented by Mr. Adamson. Although experienced in the implementation of the Dr. Kimball's star schema approach, I have never been able to exploit its full performance potential - until now.

Despite the complexity of the material, the book is concise and easy to understand. NOTE: Adamson's approach is not tied to any proprietary HW or SW product. The book guided me from design fundamentals to a performance-optimized upgrade of an existing data warehouse. And it didn't take a long time to do it, either.

If you're a performance-oriented data warehousing professional, you'll find this book deserves a place on your book shelf of essential references. Highly recommended.

Chris does a great job of laying out both the good and bad associated with using aggregates as a means to support Business Intelligence and Hierarchical-type queries within a Data Warehouse environment. As a disciple of Ralph Kimball's Chris kept true to the doctrine and helped the reader understand why he recommended the tacts he did throughout the manuscript. The material was easy to follow and his illustrations were clear representations of the material being presented. I especially liked that he added platform-specific hints and scenarios to tailor the material to the reader's environment. While I do not necessarily agree that building aggregate tables are the solution to many of the challenges in a Business Intelligence use of Data from a Data Warehouse, I do feel that Chris' book is a great place to start to learn the challenges and start down the path of solution to the problem. Add on material might include mention of other solutions that are not manual that also address the same challenge - such as the software package from HyperRoll.

This book is the one that should have been written for Java Media Framework, if only that API had ever lived up to its expectations. If you want to add media to your application, and you are using Java, Quicktime is your best bet. However, note that if the Quicktime for Java API doesn't seem very Java-like or object-oriented at first glance, then that's probably because it's not. That is because with Quicktime for Java you are not working with pure Java. Instead, you're invoking a flat C API to create and manipulate C or Pascal data structures using a thin Java wrapper. If you can live with that and you still want to use Quicktime for Java, this book is the essential guide and tutorial you need to get up and running. The book does not waste your time with API printouts or a Java programming language tutorial. Instead, like all books in the Developer's Notebook series, it gets down to business quickly by demonstrating working Java code for a number of useful tasks when working with media.

First, it tutors you on how to set up Quicktime for Java on a Windows machine. This task is more complex than you would think, and this book hits the mark on the subject. Next, it shows you how to play movies and audio files from your Java program. Next, the book tackles the editing of movies from a Java application. This includes topics such as cutting, pasting, going to specific frames of a movie, and "flattening" a movie. In Chapter four, the programmer is introduced to working with Java components and importing and exporting graphics. In chapter five, the user is introduced to working with QuickDraw, the Apple-originated drawing API. This is essential, since QuickDraw is what is used to work with captured images. Thus in this chapter the reader is taught how to transfer data between images and a movie. Next, the art of capturing both video and audio is explored, including capturing audio and video to the same file. The chapter is rounded out with the code for a motion detector. Chapter seven is devoted entirely to audio media. There are particularly timely topics here, such as how to read information from MP3 and from iTunes AAC files, how to provide basic audio controls, and how to build an audio track from raw samples. Similar information is provided in a separate chapter for information specific to video media.The final chapter discusses the effects available in Quicktime for Java, as well as how to add text captions and timecodes to your media.

All in all, I think the Developer Notebook format works well for this subject. At the beginning of each chapter there is an outline of the topics to be covered. For each topic there is a "How Do I Do That?" section that includes a short piece of Java code that performs the specified task. There is also a sample of the output you would expect to see on the screen that should result from executing the code. Next there is a paragraph entitled "What Just Happened?" that explains the code just shown, and finally each topic usually ends with a "What about.." section that answers common questions you may have about extending the code just shown. All code in the book can be downloaded from the book's website at O'Reilly and Associates.

This book is essential reading for anybody who needs to understand how to code with Quicktime for Java, and it is far better than any other publication on the subject that I have encountered. Amazon does not show the table of contents for this book, so I do so for the purpose of completeness:
Chapter 1. GETTING UP AND RUNNING WITH QUICKTIME FOR JAVA
Setting Up QTJ on Windows
Embedding QuickTime in HTML
Preflighting a QTJ Installation
Compiling QTJ Code
Opening and Closing the QuickTime Session
Playing an Audio File from the Command Line
Chapter 2. PLAYING MOVIES
Building a Simple Movie Player
Adding a Controller
Getting a Movie-Playing JComponent
Controlling a Movie Programmatically
Showing a Movie's Current Time
Listening for Movie State-Changes
Moving Frame by Frame
Playing Movies from URLs
Preventing "Tasking" Problems
Chapter 3. EDITING MOVIES
Copying and Pasting
Performing "Low-Level" Edits
Undoing an Edit
Undoing and Redoing Multiple Edits
Saving a Movie to a File
Flattening a Movie
Saving a Movie with Dependencies
Editing Tracks
Chapter 4. WORKING WITH COMPONENTS
Specifying a Component's Type
Exporting Movies
Exporting Movies to Any Installed Format
Importing and Exporting Graphics
Discovering All Installed Components
Chapter 5. WORKING WITH QUICKDRAW
Getting and Saving Picts
Getting a Pict from a Movie
Converting a Movie Image to a Java Image
A Better Movie-to-Java Image Converter
Drawing with Graphics Primitives
Getting a Screen Capture
Matrix-Based Drawing
Compositing Graphics
Chapter 6. CAPTURE
Capturing and Previewing Audio
Selecting Audio Inputs
Capturing Audio to Disk
Capturing Video to Disk
Capturing Audio and Video to the Same File
Making a Motion Detector
Chapter 7. AUDIO MEDIA
Reading Information from MP3 Files
Reading Information from iTunes AAC Files
Providing Basic Audio Controls
Providing a Level Meter
Building an Audio Track from Raw Samples
Chapter 8. VIDEO MEDIA
Combining Video Tracks
Overlaying Video Tracks
Building a Video Track from Raw Samples
Chapter 9. MISCELLANEOUS MEDIA
Creating Captions with Text Media
Creating Links with HREF Tracks
Adding Timecodes
Creating Zero-Source Effects
Creating One-Source Effects (Filters)
Creating Two-Source Effects (Transitions)

This book is great!

This notebook makes all the QuickTime supported formats available to a Java developer. Like all the books in the notebook series, plenty of code, plenty of information to get up and running.

I really liked the information on reading the tag info from MP3s and AAC files, very useful.

Multimedia and Java made simple.

While at first I thought O'Reilly's new "developer's notebook" series seemed a bit hokey, this book is extremely useful. It's concise and to the point, but full of good examples and information. A plus of the small size is that it's more to-the-point and cheaper than a typical O'Reilly book (which very often seem to ramble on and on about marginally useful information, seemingly in order to justify their $45+ price tags).

With this type of walkthrough book I usually expect to see just the basic features of the technology explored. This book goes surprisingly in-depth, covering topics like adding effects to playback, transforming movies during playback, overlays, and a wide variety of topics.

All that is crammed into a trim 200 page frame. This is achieved by concentrating mainly on the code, and effectively using a minimum of images. That's a trick given the graphics intensive nature of the topic.

This is not a book for beginners, it's a fast-paced walkthrough for experience developers who want something less referential than the JavaDocs.

With Apple changing QuickTime for Java so anything you made when
use QTJava under MacOSX Java1.3 no longer worked under Java1.4 these required changes to most of your older QTJava code- if you wanted to have your code now run under Java1.4. Apple also moved classes to a new packages so to make the developers nightmare complete. BUT DONT WORRY! This book will show you workarounds for them missing classes (sequence grabbing is back! what a gem). Also covers all your needs as a new developer to the powers of QTJava. Time to make your very own QuickTime player in a few hours! You won't believe the stuff QuickTime can do under the hood. This books covers just more and more stuff as you go though it.

For me this QuickTime for Java book will be sitting next to the older most excellent book from Bill Stewart. I hope all books become as clear and well written as this one from Chris Adamson- top work. Sample code all over the shop; step by step stuff. Cuts to the tasks you will have to tackle without lengthy messing around. Brilliant buy if you want to do cool hardcore design media in java. Or just play a nice sound track in the background of your killer application - maybe u want to make the next video editing studio app, or your own media player, or a streaming server, or a image editor, or or or; you want ta take a ride?

Then again don't buy it! I wont have a job to go to in the morning! :).

In my opinion,the most splendid part of the story is the description of the room. It is so detailed that as if it were at my sight. The ending is unexpectedly and satirically. When it comes to the audiotape, the voice of the housekeeper is furry, her British tone was very suitable for the character. I appreciate the classic very much!

I have one chance to listen to a part of this story,"The Furnished Room",in my class.Telling the truth,I feel that it is not easy to read because of some recondite words. However, on the other side, with the detailed description and the radio reading, it makes me go through the situation personally. Esepecially the surprised ending, it also touched me much and I shut myself in a world of fancy for a long time. I think that it's a good story, a good love story. As a whole, I like the story very much!

This way to practice English for the EFL students benefits them not only the language itself but also the literature merit. This audio drama is the good media for modern people, since they always don't pay much time reading.

Not to be outshined by the bbc, this audiodrama collection gives O Henry's short stories a first- rate treatment. And best of all, they are faithful to the original stories.

This book is great! It was one of the course textbooks for my Business Law and Ethics class last term and to my amazement, I actually enjoyed reading this book.

The flow of the book is sensible, I could easily comprehend the material, and the case studies and example scenarios really helped bring the applications into focus.

Im not stupid, but not a rocket scientist either, and I find that too often, textbooks are poorly written, with excessive reiteration that causes me to lose interest in the subject matter, OR verbose and technical explanations that I have no frame of reference for. I get lost and discouraged with the reading. Not so this book.

A very very sensible read.

The book was delivered when promised and was in better condition than I thought it would be!

Item arrived as described. It took a little longer to arrive than I expected, but not terribly slow.

I doubted the content of the book at first thinking it'll just tell of normal business laws. But after the first chapter, I found this book actually being helpful in providing examples of cases that actually happened and how the business laws were applied. Even for normal reading, the book is surely interesting.