IT programming books related reviews
Product: Book Paperback
Title: The Guru's Guide to Transact-SQL
Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional
Authors: Ken Henderson
Rating: 5/5
Title: The Guru's Guide to Transact-SQL
Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional
Authors: Ken Henderson
Rating: 5/5
Anyone who uses Microsoft SQL Server or Sybase Adaptive Server Enterprise (or any of the related products) must have this book on the shelf. It is THE best-written and best-organized computer book I have come across. It picks up where the manual leaves off. Despite its name, this book is useful for someone who has just a little knowledge of T-SQL, as well as advanced users. Chapters 1 and 6 serve the beginner well. The information on performace tuning is great for the more experienced user. Even DBA's will find useful information. I don't know what I would do without this book. It showed me some of the techniques that I use regularly, such as the CASE statement.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Hitchhiker's Guide to Visual Basic and SQL Server
Publisher: Microsoft Press
Authors: William R. Vaughn
Rating: 2/5
Title: Hitchhiker's Guide to Visual Basic and SQL Server
Publisher: Microsoft Press
Authors: William R. Vaughn
Rating: 2/5
With project deadlines, a stack of 1000-page books, and other interests, I just do not have time to wade through irrelevant information to find what I want. I will try to be objective. If you want a thorough reference, the author does a comprehensive survey. The work is thorough, but the information is hard to get at (see below). The author was one of the brains behind RDO (one of the six technologies covered in the book), so he is somewhat of an expert, and somewhat biased (toward RDO). Many of the readers apparently like a lot of jokes and sarcasm and historical information that can go on for paragraphs. If you have the time or patience for a lot of humorous or tangential reading while you are trying to find something out, then you might give this book five stars, but I wish it was reduced to a quarter of the present size so I could get what I want four times as fast. Because of the author's humor and sarcasm, many of the technical aspects do not come through clearly in explanation.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Inside Microsoft SQL Server 6.5 (Microsoft Programming Series)
Publisher: Microsoft Pr
Authors: Ron Soukup
Rating: 1/5
Title: Inside Microsoft SQL Server 6.5 (Microsoft Programming Series)
Publisher: Microsoft Pr
Authors: Ron Soukup
Rating: 1/5
I bought this book based on the good reviews it received here,but I was severely disapointed. Soukup claims that installingSQLServer is easy. "I'm proud to say that even a novice can comfortably install SQLServer in less than 10 minutes", he writes in the book. But nothing could be further from the truth. I've installed databases on UNIX (Linux and SolarisX86) and personal Oracle for Win95, without any problems, but SQLServer stubbornly refused to install on my WinNT 4 Server. In spite of numerous problem reports Soukup doesn't even mention that you might not be able to install SQLServer on your machine, let alone give you any guidance about what to do if you do have problems. In addition to these problems I found that the rest of the book is bloated with advocacy and fluff. I've worked with one SQLServer installation that crashed several times a day. Yet there is no entry for "reliability" in the index. Soukup was general manager for SQLServer and this book appears to be an advocacy job instead of an attempt to address the problems that people have encountered with his "child". Interestingly, he notes the frustrations that some customers have had with SQLServer, but apparently feels no obligation to try and provide fixes or a work around for them. This will be the first book that I've been forced to return for a refund in a long time. And it definitely does not deserve the good reviews it has received.
Product: Book Hardcover
Title: MCDBA Administering SQL Server 2000 Study Guide (Exam 70-228)
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Authors: Joyjit Mukherjee
Rating: 3/5
Title: MCDBA Administering SQL Server 2000 Study Guide (Exam 70-228)
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Authors: Joyjit Mukherjee
Rating: 3/5
This book does cover most of the exam objectives. Unlike Sybex books, it puts a "Certifiation Objective" label before a section that is supposed to cover a paticular objective but does not tell you which exam objective that is. The book is wordy in many parts and does not go straight to the point. But it does explain each topic properly and with reasonable depth. Playing with SQL Server 2000 will help you understand the book better. If you are new to SQL Server, this book can help you become a qualified beginner. The accompanying CD contains software that helps you revise the book's topics, not just an electronic version of the book.
This book takes a different approach from Sybex's study guides. If you are used to Sybex, you may not like this book.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: OCP Developer PL/SQL Program Units Exam Guide
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Authors: Steve O'Hearn
Rating: 4/5
Title: OCP Developer PL/SQL Program Units Exam Guide
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Authors: Steve O'Hearn
Rating: 4/5
This is my message : (xxxx is always me!)
I have bought the book "Oracle - OCP Developer PL/SQL Program Units Exam Guide (Exam 1ZO-101). It's a great book. Only one defect! Using the CD of BeachFromQuizzer I account for an error : in all the subcategories except for 01 Overview of PL/SQL and 3 Practise Test the button EXPLAIN is not enable.
In phase of Study session this button is useful and important...
Sometimes the cd shows wrong answer too.
I found a lot of tricks as regard as the data dictionary! This is a book also to learn a methods to programming following a good designed! That's all!
Giulia - Italia - Roma
22.02.2004 I passed the exam a few weeks ago!!! ;0)
Product: Book Paperback
Title: The Rational Guide to: SQL Server Reporting Services (Rational Guides)
Publisher: Rational Press
Authors: Anthony T. Mann
Rating: 2/5
Title: The Rational Guide to: SQL Server Reporting Services (Rational Guides)
Publisher: Rational Press
Authors: Anthony T. Mann
Rating: 2/5
Although the book is clear, it doesn't even come close to going deep enough. Rational rushed this one out the door to coincide with the Reporting Services launch. I see little value above saving one the difficulty of printing out the BOL.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Advanced Transact-SQL for SQL Server 2000
Publisher: Apress
Authors: Itzik Ben-Gan, Tom Moreau
Rating: 1/5
Title: Advanced Transact-SQL for SQL Server 2000
Publisher: Apress
Authors: Itzik Ben-Gan, Tom Moreau
Rating: 1/5
There is just one problem with "Advanced Transact-SQL for SQL Server 2000": it is not "advanced" in the slightest. Not atleast compared to Kenneth W. Henderson's "The Guru's Guide to Transact-SQL". I've been coding in the language for about 3 years now and didn't find a thing in it that I didn't already know. Henderson's book, OTOH, opened whole new worlds to me. Don't buy this book. Buy Henderson's book instead -- really, you'll thank me.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Core PHP Programming: Using PHP to Build Dynamic Web Sites (2nd Edition)
Publisher: Pearson Education
Authors: Leon Atkinson
Rating: 1/5
Title: Core PHP Programming: Using PHP to Build Dynamic Web Sites (2nd Edition)
Publisher: Pearson Education
Authors: Leon Atkinson
Rating: 1/5
Cuz this one is on it's way back to Seattle. After reading the initial reviews, I was quite eager for my copy to arrive. But now that it has I see I have fallen victim to an obvious pad job. More recent reviews paint a more accurate picture: this book is mediocre at best, and mostly lousy. The review from Cologne, Germany is spot on, as this text offers little more than minimally supplemented online docs and some basic programming concepts. And yes, there is an inordinate amount of whitespace. So it would seem the book shares some commonality with the early reviews. Both exhibit a lot padding!
Product: Book Paperback
Title: PHP Cookbook
Publisher: O'Reilly
Authors: David Sklar, Adam Trachtenberg
Rating: 3/5
Title: PHP Cookbook
Publisher: O'Reilly
Authors: David Sklar, Adam Trachtenberg
Rating: 3/5
This book is a collection of smallish code snippets that don't go into depth, but may be useful for your programming needs if you have very basic PHP knowledge.
If you want a truly indepth cookbook with
full blown practical solutions that you
can reuse in your own applications, then
you must own a copy of the "PHP web development
solutions" book from Wrox.
I won both these books, and i have benefitted from reading the two...
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Sams Teach Yourself SQL in 24 Hours (3rd Edition)
Publisher: Sams
Authors: Ryan Stephens, Ron Plew
Rating: 3/5
Title: Sams Teach Yourself SQL in 24 Hours (3rd Edition)
Publisher: Sams
Authors: Ryan Stephens, Ron Plew
Rating: 3/5
Enjoyed this book, and the lessons are very straight-forward, but the majority of the code supplied is pretty Oracle-specific. I had a devil of a time getting the code to work in a Microsoft environment (SQL Server or Access 97).As a beginner, I actually found Teach Yourself SQL in 10 Minutes by Ben Forta to be a better book. Forta provides notes on what will and won't work in what programs. Overall, this book was helpful, and it will probably remain a useful reference edition. But if I were going to choose again, I'd get the 10 minute version first.
