The Sensual (Quadratic) Form (Carus Mathematical Monographs) Review

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The Sensual (Quadratic) Form (Carus Mathematical Monographs) ReviewThe book doesn't need a review. It's written by John Horton Conway. Enough said. But if you insist on a review, the book (actually a series of three lectures) is a radical new "look" at quadratic forms through visual topographs. The lectures progress with even more ways of sensing quadratic forms (eg "hearing the shape of a drum"), and that's where the title comes from. "The Sensual Form" -- get it? It will change the way you look at QFs. If you need more information on Conway, he's the inventor of the mathematical game "life" and the author of the sublimest, rockingest math books on the planet, dude: Winning Ways, Numbers and Games, etc. He's one of the rarest of birds -- a contributor to the highest echelons of mathematical knowledge who's also great at putting it into readable, learnable text.The Sensual (Quadratic) Form (Carus Mathematical Monographs) Overview

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The Finite Element Method: Linear Static and Dynamic Finite Element Analysis (Dover Civil and Mechanical Engineering) Review

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The Finite Element Method: Linear Static and Dynamic Finite Element Analysis (Dover Civil and Mechanical Engineering) ReviewThe Finite Element Methodology though conceptually simple (eat the elephant by chopping it up into mouthfuls), becomes somewhat involved when applied, because the of tricks used to get solutions, after all you still may have to solve 100,000 PDEs to get your approximate solution to an otherwise intractable problem. So in its own way FEM can become a bit of a pachyderm itself.
This book is very good, but be aware that this book is aimed at graduate physical-science/engineering students. This means that you know how to solve basic second order differential equations and understand how to perform path integrals for example.
This book is aimed at people who would like to be able to write their own FEM solver. If you are looking to gain some backgrounding in how to construct finite element models using a program to solve problems, this book is probably much more than you need. You might want to try Schaum's Outline of Finite Element Analysis if this is your objective.
DLearn is available from the http://www.zace.com/afdlearn.html or by typing
"Dlearn program FEA"
into google and following the link.The Finite Element Method: Linear Static and Dynamic Finite Element Analysis (Dover Civil and Mechanical Engineering) Overview

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Foundations of Agile Python Development (Expert's Voice in Open Source) Review

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Foundations of Agile Python Development (Expert's Voice in Open Source) ReviewIf you are looking to purchase this book, and you are in the year 2010 or beyond, DO NOT BUY THIS BOOK. Please continue reading my review below, however, to understand why.
This book is outdated because:
1. It has extremely detailed instructions for using eclipse (the IDE) with pydev, mylyn, and pydev-extensions. Eclipse has changed a LOT since this book was written, and the instructions are no longer accurate. The pydev-extensions plugin doesn't actually exist anymore, it was merged with pydev. This can be confusing for new users trying to get things running.
2. The instructions for getting buildbot running are no longer correct. Buildbot has changed a bit as well, and the details for installation is different than it used to be.
3. It spends a while talking about pMock, one of 2 python mock libraries, which hasn't been developed since 2004 and is considered obsolete.
4. It spends a while talking about pyfit, which hasn't been worked on since 2006 and is also not commonly used.
Now, for my thoughts about the book itself:
I decided to give this book a 5 star review because it is an excellent book:
- The author writes extremely well, and has a bit of humor throughout the book.
- The author covers extensions why TDD is good, how it helps, and how it should be used.
- The author describes the different types of testing, and provides clear, intuitive, and thoughtful examples that clearly demonstrate *how to* do the testing.
- The author covers extremely detailed setup / installation / configuration of the tools and development environments discussed.
The reason why I have to not recommend any readers purchase this book though, is that it is sorely in need of an update. I just finished reading this book (August, 2010), and it is very clear that it is outdated. This book would have been extremely useful two years ago, and maybe also the first quarter of 2009, but agile practices and tools have changed so much since then that this book really needs to be rewritten.
My advice to readers who are considering purchasing this book is to do so only if you are aware of what you will be getting, but would like to make use of the author's code examples, writing, and TDD explanations while disregarding the tools used.
I really did enjoy reading this book, however, and I really hope that Apress forces Jeff to release a new copy.Foundations of Agile Python Development (Expert's Voice in Open Source) Overview

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The Essential Engineer: Why Science Alone Will Not Solve Our Global Problems (Vintage) Review

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The Essential Engineer: Why Science Alone Will Not Solve Our Global Problems (Vintage) ReviewIn this highly engrossing book, Petroski eloquently challenges a fundamental and profound bias in our society--the relegation of engineers and engineering to second-class status among professions. He traces to roots of the perceived primacy of science over engineering to the Western Platonic bias that "ideas are superior and prerequisite to things" and to the simplistic linear model of research-before-development promulgated by science administrator Vannevar Bush in the 1940s. Petroski uses examples such as the steam engine, powered flight and rocketry, to demonstrate that engineering often leads science, and also that science is a tool of engineering. He also compellingly describes the optimistic, challenging, rewarding nature of engineering, showing its satisfying creativity. And to demonstrate the richness of engineering, he takes the reader through a tour of technologies as seen through the eyes of an engineer, including speed bumps and humps, dams, climate change, "geoengineering" of the earth to combat climate change, renewable energy, nanotechnology, robotics, structural earthquake engineering, hurricane protection, airline accidents, the electric power grid, evolution of the automobile, and "financial engineering." This book is essential reading, not only for engineers and students, but for all of us who benefit from the vast wealth of technology that makes modern life possible.The Essential Engineer: Why Science Alone Will Not Solve Our Global Problems (Vintage) Overview

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