IT programming books related reviews
Product: Book Paperback
Title: PHP3: Programming Browser-Based Applications with PHP
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Companies
Authors: Dave Medinets
Rating: 5/5
Title: PHP3: Programming Browser-Based Applications with PHP
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Companies
Authors: Dave Medinets
Rating: 5/5
As many of us have experienced, buying computer books is not necessarily easy. Sometimes you get books that are too hard, or too easy, and you have no patience to read though lots of stuff before getting down to coding (after all, we know basic programming right? just need to learn syntax!). This got me going pretty quickly. You also need to get the online PHP reference, and MySQL by DuBois, and a good ISP account. Then you're ready! (I assume you already know HTML and know what SQL is, although both books teach you basic SQL).
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Professional PHP4 Programming
Publisher: Wrox Press
Authors: Deepak Thomas, Wankyu Choi, John Coggeshall, Ken Egervari, Martin Geisler, Zak Greant, Andrew Hill, Chris Hubbard, James Moore, Devon O'Dell, Jon Parise, Harish Rawat, Tarique Sani, Christopher Scollo, Chris Ullman, et al
Rating: 3/5
Title: Professional PHP4 Programming
Publisher: Wrox Press
Authors: Deepak Thomas, Wankyu Choi, John Coggeshall, Ken Egervari, Martin Geisler, Zak Greant, Andrew Hill, Chris Hubbard, James Moore, Devon O'Dell, Jon Parise, Harish Rawat, Tarique Sani, Christopher Scollo, Chris Ullman, et al
Rating: 3/5
Having previously read Wrox's Professional ASP Programming, I tried this book, hoping for something of equal merit.This volume is has some decent material, but is marred by a tendecy to sloppiness.Firstly, as other reviewers have noted, there are too many authors (count 'em - 16!), which is unnecessary, and leads to inconsistencies in presentation. The book could quite easily have been authored by a single writer. There are only a few chapters that required specialist knowledge. For example, the early chapters are quite good at advising the reader on PHP settings. Since there's no option explicit in PHP,the author correctly advises the reader to increase their error setting to report unused variables. Later, however, much of the code uses uninitialised variables. This is particularly the case in the chapter on form handling, the approach to which is too crude, and uses form variables directly in code, whereas a better approach would be to capture them and process them using isset(). The isset() function isn't even covered in this chapter,but is used correctly in other chapters.Secondly, while the converstational tone of Wrox books is often appealing, it can also be a problem at times. The presentation is not always comprehensive enough, and Wrox authors have a tendency to give overly clever examples. Strangely, there's no reference section. I found some of the explanations sloppy and confusing, especially the section of session variables. (I still can't get the WAP application to work properly.)Thirdly, the chapter on OO design leaves the reader stranded. After a decent theoretical discussion, the writer informs the reader that there will be no code examples, as the reader now knows enough theory to work an example out for themselves! If I've paid for the book, I don't really want to have it set homework for me.Fourthly, there are an annoying number of errors in the code. Many of these are corrected in the online errata, but there are quite a few that aren't at present. Furthermore, some of them are not typos, but seem to be the result of misconceptions on the part of the writer. This tends to reinforce the impression that some of the authors are relatively inexperienced.Lastly, there are a large number of errors in the downloadable code. I suppose supplied code should be seen as a bonus, but it's poor quality control, and greatly adds to the user's annoyance.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: MySQL/PHP Database Applications
Publisher: Wiley
Authors: Jay Greenspan, Brad Bulger
Rating: 4/5
Title: MySQL/PHP Database Applications
Publisher: Wiley
Authors: Jay Greenspan, Brad Bulger
Rating: 4/5
I have read many good books on this subject and this is the best one that I have found for examples of applications. This book includes a CD with examples of the projects described in the book. Scripts are easy to install and modify and good starting point for better projects.
Product: Book Textbook Binding
Title: MCSE Training Guide: SQL Server 6.5 Administration (Covers Exam #70-026)
Publisher: New Riders Pub
Authors: Brad McGehee, Chris Miller, Wayne Smith, Deanna Townsend, Stephen Wynkoop
Rating: 4/5
Title: MCSE Training Guide: SQL Server 6.5 Administration (Covers Exam #70-026)
Publisher: New Riders Pub
Authors: Brad McGehee, Chris Miller, Wayne Smith, Deanna Townsend, Stephen Wynkoop
Rating: 4/5
The bad news is that the answers to the review questions at the end of each chapter are all too frequently wrong. The good news is that the material is presented well enough so you can catch these mistakes. A clever ploy, perhaps? Other good news: the content is explicitly tied to the exam objectives, the exercises are worthwhile, several chapters are actually fun to read (e.g., Chapter 8:Managing Data), the chapter template is good (intro, content, exercises, review questions), and the authors frequently explain why something is the way it is.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Oracle Database 10g SQL (Osborne ORACLE Press Series)
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Authors: Jason Price, Jason Price, McGraw-Hill
Rating: 1/5
Title: Oracle Database 10g SQL (Osborne ORACLE Press Series)
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Authors: Jason Price, Jason Price, McGraw-Hill
Rating: 1/5
I am disappointed with this book because the following reasons:- A good portion of the book is dedicated to teach basic SQL to beginners, yet the examples provided ... leave the reader confused.- The book spends volumes explaining the obvious (obvious even to beginners), yet leave out the important details that enable the reader to fully understand. Many times the book fail to explain the differences between various Oracle functions.- Too little on 10g. Only a few pages on regular expressions search. Very unsatisfactory examples on PL/SQL. ...Overall, I get the feeling that the author does not fully understand the topic he is trying to write on.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Beginning Php 4 (Programmer to Programmer)
Publisher: Peer Information
Authors: Chris Lea, Allan Kent, Ganesh Prasad, Chris Ullman
Rating: 3/5
Title: Beginning Php 4 (Programmer to Programmer)
Publisher: Peer Information
Authors: Chris Lea, Allan Kent, Ganesh Prasad, Chris Ullman
Rating: 3/5
I was having headache when i read the book, that because the examples were all related to MATH . it's no use for building a real website . I feel sick of their explaination with more than pages, and just one example for the whole chapter . If you hate MATH , dont buy this book .
Product: Book Paperback
Title: The Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Performance Optimization and Tuning Handbook
Publisher: Digital Press
Authors: Ken England
Rating: 5/5
Title: The Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Performance Optimization and Tuning Handbook
Publisher: Digital Press
Authors: Ken England
Rating: 5/5
...This covers what some of the other tuning books covers - but every book shows you something the others don't. This book showed me quite a few undocumented commands and tips I didn't get from other books.I think what I liked best about it was the writing style. It doesn't read like a technical manual or textbook... it reads more like Ken England is talking to you personally. He explains concepts and techniques in a way that even I could understand. I highly recommend this book.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Oracle PL/SQL 101
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Authors: Christopher Allen
Rating: 5/5
Title: Oracle PL/SQL 101
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Authors: Christopher Allen
Rating: 5/5
I just started to read Mr.Allen`s book Oracle PL/SQL 101, with no prior knowledge of either Oracle databases or SQL. I was able to understand the different concepts and commands due to Mr.Allen clear and precise writing.
Product: Book Unknown Binding
Title: Apache Server Unleashed
Publisher: Sams
Authors: Richard Bowen, Matthew Marlowe, Ken Coar, Patrik Grip-Jansson, Mohan Chinnappan
Rating: 1/5
Title: Apache Server Unleashed
Publisher: Sams
Authors: Richard Bowen, Matthew Marlowe, Ken Coar, Patrik Grip-Jansson, Mohan Chinnappan
Rating: 1/5
i don`t what or who motivated the previous readers to rate this book such hight (probably you guess :)) ).anyway every apache distribution includes what`s this book made of: just a simple apache documentation. if you wan`t to pay 49 USD for a printing of the documentation, well your choice.i can absolutely not follow the previews reviews which let me buy this really disappointing book which is really not made for newbies to get an introduction in apache server.and if anybody might wonder my english is too bad to understand the book, don`t worry i usually prefer the english versions of any book.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: PHP Functions Essential Reference
Publisher: Pearson Education
Authors: Zak Greant, Graeme Merrall, Torben Wilson, Brett Michlitsch
Rating: 5/5
Title: PHP Functions Essential Reference
Publisher: Pearson Education
Authors: Zak Greant, Graeme Merrall, Torben Wilson, Brett Michlitsch
Rating: 5/5
This is without a doubt, a brilliant PHP reference book.
The PHP functions are grouped in chapters based on their relevance. E.G. String functions are in one chapter, Session functions are in another etc. So even if you don't know the name of the function you're looking for, you'll most likely find what you need in the relevant section.
The book is very well laid out, there are nice descriptions (not too long and not too short) of the function and its use. There is example code showing how to use the function and the functions have a 'related functions' part as well which in my case encourages further reading and thus expanding your knowledge of all things PHP.
Unfortunately though I've found that not all functions are covered in this book. I agree you can't cover them all, but surely a string length function would be covered? Don't let that discourage you though because I've only found a couple of functions that I've needed that weren't covered in this book. Apart from that, I wholeheartly recommend getting a copy. One of the best reference books I've ever purchased.
