C++ Network Programming, Volume I: Mastering Complexity with ACE and Patterns Review

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C++ Network Programming, Volume I: Mastering Complexity with ACE and Patterns ReviewI have worked on the development of large scale distributed networked systems for many years now, and have yet to see another so well organized text on the subject. It is an invaluable compendium that every network, distributed system, and application developer/programmer should keep handy.
It conveys, clearly, concisely and precisely a wealth of experiences from the development/coding trenches that is hard to come by and is rarely found in one place or even so well organized. The text enumerates in detail how issues faced during development were resolved in a manner that met a multitude of complex development criteria. The book breaks down ACE into a set of key crucial areas/modules, and then goes to work on each piece. It then surgically disects and explains the details of each line of code of the ACE toolkit and how and why the API's were developed the way they were and today what benefits and critical issues they solve as a result of those choices. I am eager to read the completed second volume.
I'd recommend this text to any and all students and practioners alike who are involved in distributed system (sockets, CORBA, RPC... etc with C++) development, even if they dont plan on using ACE, simply because of the high quality development advice and the way it makes one aware of pitfalls and issues that might and invariably do arise in large scale distributed systems development.C++ Network Programming, Volume I: Mastering Complexity with ACE and Patterns Overview

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Computer Networks: A Systems Approach, Fourth Edition (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Networking) Review

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Computer Networks: A Systems Approach, Fourth Edition (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Networking) ReviewThis review compares the following four books:
Computer Networks by Peterson and Davie (P & D)
Computer Networks by Tanenbaum
Computer Networks by Comer / Internetworking with TCP/IP
Computer Networking by Kurose and Ross (K & R)
By far the best book in the list is "Computer Networking" by Kurose and Ross. This book covers all of the essential material that is in the other books but manages to do so in a relevant and entertaining way. This book is very up to date as seen by the release of the 5th Ed when the 4th Ed is barely two years old. There are lots of practical exercises using wireshark and the companion website is actually useful and relevant. The attitude of this book with regard to teaching networking concepts could be summed up as "try it out and see for yourself". One interesting thing to note is that the socket programming example are all in Java.
Next up is the Peterson and Davie book which covers everything that Kurose and Ross discuss but is slightly more mathematical in how it goes about things. There are a lot more numerical examples and defining of formulas in this book which is fine by me and in no way detracts from the book. Also the socket programming examples are in C which is a little more traditional. The points where this text loses ground to K & R is that it doesn't have the practical application exercises that K & R has and it also doesn't extend the basic networking theory that is covered to modern protocols like K & R.
The two Comer books come next. Comer's "Computer Networks" book is probably the most introductory book out of this whole list and is more of a survey of networking topics that doesn't cover anything in any real depth. Still, this is an excellent book in that it is a quick clear read that is very lucid in its explanations and you can't help feeling that you understand everything that is covered in the book. Comer's TCP/IP book is the equivalent of the other authors' computer network books and in that respect it is pretty average. It covers all of the relevant material and in a manner which is more than readable but that is all. There is nothing exceptional about the book which stands out from the rest.
Last comes Tanenbaum's book from the author who is probably most famous for his OS books. This is probably the most technical and detailed of the books with lots of sample C code belying is experience with operating systems and their network stack code. The weak point of this book is that all of the code and technical minutia might prevent the reader from seeing the forest for the trees. Unless you are trying to learn how to program your own network stack for a Unix/Linux system, then I would get either the K & R book or the P & D book to learn networking for the first time. This book would best be served as a reference in which case the technical nature of the book becomes a benefit rather than detracting from the text.Computer Networks: A Systems Approach, Fourth Edition (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Networking) Overview

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Losing Control? Sovereignty in an Age of Globalization Review

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Losing Control Sovereignty in an Age of Globalization ReviewI was very much dissapointed by this book. She talks about "globalization", yet never shows exactly what she means by this, and most of her arguments rely on anecdotes.
Her argument goes like this; There's more overseas production, there are huge multi-nationals, and there's an international capital market, and then there are international issues that goes beyond the national boundaries. Therefore, the sovereign nation is losing power.
While these are all true, the most important question is; to what extent? She never adresses this, and so, the whole book amounts to not much than some trendy talk of "Oh the world is global now and everything's different". So, forget this book. There's nothing in this book that is not throughly and plainly explained by, say, Paul Krugman's "Pop Internationalism" or even his "Age of Diminished Expectations". These books provide much better value and information for our money.Losing Control Sovereignty in an Age of Globalization Overview

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Understanding Sonet/Sdh and Atm: Communications Networks for the Next Millennium Review

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Understanding Sonet/Sdh and Atm: Communications Networks for the Next Millennium ReviewThe content of this book makes it an excellent introduction to SONET/SDH and as such is self contained. The material covered is presented clearly and comprehensively. What lets this book down is the large number of errors throughout the book, many of which appear to be lack of proof-reading. Unfortunately many of these errors will servce to confuse the reader who is looking for a reliable introductory text.Understanding Sonet/Sdh and Atm: Communications Networks for the Next Millennium Overview

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Architect of Global Jihad: The Life of Al Qaeda Strategist Abu Mus'ab Al-Suri Review

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Architect of Global Jihad: The Life of Al Qaeda Strategist Abu Mus'ab Al-Suri ReviewIn a fascinating tale of a fascinating individual this book delves deep into the soul of the Jihadist, learning about him, showing us his seminal work, which was 1,600 pages, and shedding lihgt on the man who theorized the global Jihad that threatens so many people today. This was not the Marx of Islamism or the Lenin. This was the Trotsky, the man who understood 'War Islamism' and how individualized Islamic cells of only a few men could spread havoc and take the war to the enemy on ground of the Islamists own choosing. Although Abu Mus'ab al-Suri, whose middle name was Sethmarriam, was not a latter day Sun Tzu or Clauswitz, her might have been. Alleged to have been killed in the snowy hills of the Pashtun, his wareabouts are actually unknown.
A fascinating book about Islamist history, about the birth and making of the Islamist and the strategy of Islamism. He was truly an architect of the international terrorist revolution.
Seth J. FrantzmanArchitect of Global Jihad: The Life of Al Qaeda Strategist Abu Mus'ab Al-Suri Overview

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Toward a Grand Strategy Against Terrorism (Textbook) Review

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Toward a Grand Strategy Against Terrorism (Textbook) ReviewThis book is better than any training I have had in the military. It showed me what happens on a higher level and how conflicts have been resolved. I can apply some of these same methods at work and use the theory behind it all in real life.Toward a Grand Strategy Against Terrorism (Textbook) Overview

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Computer Networks, Fifth Edition: A Systems Approach (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Networking) Review

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Computer Networks, Fifth Edition: A Systems Approach (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Networking) ReviewBought Computer Networks for my networking class. We are about 1/3 of the way through the semester and this book has some very good stuff. Lots of details about the current networking practices. For the price, it was worth the buy.Computer Networks, Fifth Edition: A Systems Approach (The Morgan Kaufmann Series in Networking) Overview

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DNS and BIND (5th Edition) Review

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DNS and BIND (5th Edition) ReviewI'm the DNS administrator at a mid-size Internet Service Provider, and because we are an ISP, a lot of our day-to-day operations rely on the proper implementation of DNS. After all, as I found out today, we do primary DNS for approximately 1800 domains (yikes). The combination of everyday experience with DNS and the wealth of information - both theoretical and practical - that I got from this book has done so much for my understanding of DNS and of the Internet as a whole. The book begins with the basics of building a nameserver, but I know that if I have a specific question, I can use it as a reference book as well. It's also written in a straightforward, accessible manner. The only constructive criticism I can offer is that I wish it had more information about managing many domains (not just subdomains). That's still not enough to lower my overall rating to four starts from five. If you have to get one book on DNS, get this one - it will more than suffice. I look forward to the next edition covering BIND 8.x. Excellent job, O'Reilly, Paul Albitz, and Cricket Liu!DNS and BIND (5th Edition) 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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How to Make Hot Cold Calls: Your Guide to Making The Sale or Landing That Perfect Job Review

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How to Make Hot Cold Calls: Your Guide to Making The Sale or Landing That Perfect Job ReviewHow to Make Hot Cold Calls changed my life. As a sales manager with a very large financial institution, I was enlightened by the concepts found within Steven Schwartz's book. Never before had I been given the "how to" of this critical component of the sales process. I was so inspired, that I coordinated a seven-week pilot with 10 front-line sales staff within my organization. Here are some of the startling results from our informal process: a 73% average increase in our ability to get through to prospects over the telephone, and an 87% average increase in our ability to get the appointment or sale.
Believe me, this is a very reliable indicator of how intuitive Hot to Make Hot Cold Calls can be to a typical sales person today. Some of the behavioural changes from the team were immediate and permanent. Even more exciting was how my salespeople could overlay Steven's techniques during their face-to-face sales appointments. I strongly recommend the use of this book, the website, and the audio program.How to Make Hot Cold Calls: Your Guide to Making The Sale or Landing That Perfect Job Overview

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The Global Brain: Your Roadmap for Innovating Faster and Smarter in a Networked World Review

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The Global Brain: Your Roadmap for Innovating Faster and Smarter in a Networked World Review
With regard to the term Global Brain, Satish Nambisan and Mohanbir Sawhney refer to "the diverse set of external players that constitute the innovation network for the companies" discussed in this book such as P&G, IBM, Boeing, and Apple]; and Network-centric innovation to describe "the underlying principles of collaborative innovation in such a context." They add that a common theme n their research was their interest in the concept of distributed innovation. That is, "innovation initiatives that are spread across a diverse network of partners." Their vehicle for exploration was the Kellogg Innovation Network (KIN) -- "a forum for senior innovation managers of large companies - affiliated with the Center for Research in Information and Technology that [Sawhney] directs at the Kellogg School of Management. The KIN is an excellent example of the power of the Global Brain in action."
Nambisan and Sawhney carefully organize and present their material within five Parts. During the course of their narrative, they respond to questions such as these:
Why should companies seek innovation externally during a transition from being firm-centric and network-centric?
What are the core principles of network-centric innovation?
What are the four basic models and key elements of network-centric innovation?
How to develop a contingent framework that maps the context for innovation?
Which guidelines can help managers to evaluate the different types of opportunities that are most appropriate to their organization's resources, capabilities, and strategies?
What are the implications of network-centric innovation for the emerging economies?
What are the common trends in various countries' emerging economies?
How to analyze the potential for companies in these countries to "plug into the global brain"?
I especially appreciate Nambisan and Sawhney's provision of dozens of real-world examples that illustrate their key points. For example, in Chapter 5 they examine what they characterize as "the orchestra model" that can take two quite different forms: The Orchestra-Integrator model and the Orchestra-Platform model. With regard to the former, they examine Boeing's 787 Dreamliner project and include Table 5.1 (Pages 96-97) that portrays the project's specific elements of network-centric innovation. With regard to the Orchestra-Platform Model, they examine Salesforce.com and the AppExchange Forum. Figure 5.3 (Pages 110-111) illustrates the elements of its network-centric innovation.
"In both the Integrator and Platform model, the innovation architecture defined by the dominant firm becomes the context for the network partners to innovate...In both cases, the tricky part is to bring together a diverse set of capable partners who are sufficiently committed to the innovation architecture and to orchestrate their activities in a manner that leads to outcomes that are beneficial to all the network members."
After completing their exploration of the Global Brain and "painting a picture of the landscape of network-centric innovation," Nambisan and Sawhney urge their reader to chart her or his own organization's "journey" to position it as a player in the same rich and diverse landscape. "We have a simple mantra for [achieving] this: Think BIG, Start SMALL, Scale FAST."
Bon voyage!The Global Brain: Your Roadmap for Innovating Faster and Smarter in a Networked World Overview

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To Uphold the World: A Call for a New Global Ethic from Ancient India Review

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To Uphold the World: A Call for a New Global Ethic from Ancient India Review(This review is based on the Penguin India edition).
To read To Uphold the World is to read several books at once. Presented as "a call for a new global ethic", To Uphold the World is a timely critique of the instrumental rationality of our time that has produced a globally networked self-destructive culture of consumption. At the same time it is a narrative of travel, a contemplation of the phenomenon of travel, a biography of the great King Ashoka, who Rich discovered while traveling when he came upon his monumental inscriptions, and then of his councilor Kautilya, and a philosophical treatise on ethics. Ultimately, To Uphold the World is a meditation on leadership and its importance in a world of collective self-deception.
It is a tribute to the importance of this book that it is published by Beacon Press, the publisher of Herbert Marcuse's magisterial One Dimensional Man. Rich extends and updates Marcuse's critique of the authoritarian ritualization of meaning that closes the "universe of discourse." Rich observes that "the penetration of market, transactional relationships has become so pervasive in Western society, and particularly in the Anglo-American world, that family and personal relations are increasingly atomized and replaced by market-derived transactional interactions." Past and future fade in our networked world of instantaneous communication; we have become a culture of the "eternally ephemeral".
Arguing that the modern world has exchanged traditional forms of social authority and identity for a highly structured global consumer economy, and now finds itself teetering on the brink of catabolic collapse, Rich suggests that mankind is left bereft of guidance on how to transit to a more resilient, sustainable and free state.
He turns to the past for lessons, because "the past provides us with a store of human experience that can be truly subversive of the present." The core of the book is the story of Ashoka the Great, the warrior emperor who unified India in the third century BC through a series of bloody campaigns, converted to Buddhism, and ruled benignly for about forty years, leaving behind a legacy of benevolent rule and respect for life, including arguably the earliest known bans on slavery and capital punishment, and the earliest environmental regulations and the protection of natural areas.
Although the story of Ashoka is, if not well known, not particularly obscure, Rich identifies a significant and underappreciated aspect; behind the visionary Ashoka stood his administrator Kautilya, author of the Artha''stra, the first known treatise on statecraft and economic policy. Kautilya was a materialist, master of realpolitik, and the fisted glove behind Ashoka's vision. "The critical issue is not the desirability of Ashoka's principles, which at a certain level of generality is easy to acknowledge. How to put these principles into practice in a society, and Ashoka's success and failure in doing so, is the deeper issue.... The greatness of Ashoka likes not only in his conversion ... following [the bloody battle of] Kalinga, but in his heroic effort to reconcile the underlying, tragic tensions between the dharma of the king and warrior, which prioritizes force and violence, ... the revolutionary materialism of Kautilya and his espousal of [it] in statecraft; and a universal dharma of non-violence." Ashoka and Kautilya represent the unity of universal ethical values and pragmatism. Perhaps it is this loss of unity that explains why, in today's world, progressives can't progress and conservatives can't conserve.
Rich concludes that we live on the cusp of a second "Axial Age" where "the old Gods are dead and what will replace them is still being born". He looks to religious tradition and a growing ecological consciousness as sources for an "emerging sense of the transcendent". The emergent culture will require both Ashoka and Kautilya in order to put principles into practice. Indeed, in the future we are likely to get a full measure of Kautilya in view of the massive system disruptions from a runaway climate that humanity is likely to face due to our lack of resolve today; the challenge is to find the Ashoka of the twenty-first century who can articulate the vision we need of a more resilient, sustainable mode of being.To Uphold the World: A Call for a New Global Ethic from Ancient India Overview

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