IT programming books related reviews
Product: Book Paperback
Title: The Guru's Guide to SQL Server Stored Procedures, XML, and HTML (With CD-ROM)
Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional
Authors: Ken Henderson
Rating: 5/5
Title: The Guru's Guide to SQL Server Stored Procedures, XML, and HTML (With CD-ROM)
Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional
Authors: Ken Henderson
Rating: 5/5
Henderson is a modern-day polymath -- a person who's mastered many subjects. When you run into someone who purports to know something about a lot of different topics, usually they don't have much depth, the classic "jack of all trades and master of none." That's obviously not the case with this author. This book covers one topic after another in astonishing detail. The version control chapter is a must-read even for non-SQL Server people. Programmers in general should read it. Ditto for the design patterns chapter -- it's great stuff. The xprocs chapter, the database design chapter -- each of these is a distinctly different area within SQL Server and database technology. Not just any author could have pulled this off with such depth.My favorite example of this is the coverage of .NET. No one but a programmer who'd been there and back could have explained all the reasons we need the .NET Framework. No one except a programmer who'd built complex applications the "hard" way would be able to set the stage for the .NET Framework being embedded in SQL Server the way Henderson has. You get the sense that you're talking to THE MAN insofar as what the Framework will do for software deveopment. It's unusual to find this kind of insight anywhere, let alone in a database book.Henderson is my new all-time favorite technical author. I have his other T-SQL book and one of his C++ books. He's the best of the best.
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
I keep getting good referals from these authors. My first SQL Server book was Ron Soukup's Inside SQL Server. It was and is a great book. I've learned tons from it. Soukup's book told me that Joe Celko's books were "for the Mensa crowd" and, sure enough, Celko's book turned out to be very valuable. Now I've discovered that Celko recommends Henderson's book on the newsgroups and that he also wrote the book's foreword. Once again, I've struck gold! What a great book. It has a little of Soukup and a lot of Celko in it. There's nary a tough T-SQL problem that you won't find addressed in some form or fashion between its covers. On top of that, it's written extremely well. In fact, I think I like Henderson's style better than just about every other computer book author I've read. He's to the point and thorough - not easy to do. Highly recommended.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 Unleashed
Publisher: Sams
Authors: Sharon Bjeletich, Greg Mable
Rating: 5/5
Title: Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 Unleashed
Publisher: Sams
Authors: Sharon Bjeletich, Greg Mable
Rating: 5/5
My position as a SQL Server DBA for a large company with different platforms, requires me to do lots for research. I found this book very helpful in getting the answers I need for my job. Especially in the area of converting to SQL server 7
Product: Book Paperback
Title: MCSE Test Success: SQL Server 7 Administration
Publisher: Sybex Inc
Authors: Michael Lee, Rick Sawtell
Rating: 1/5
Title: MCSE Test Success: SQL Server 7 Administration
Publisher: Sybex Inc
Authors: Michael Lee, Rick Sawtell
Rating: 1/5
Despite the previous review of five stars and that he passed (using books on line and most assuredly experience) this book fails to do its stated job.While the book does have a lot of information about SQL Server 7 it is extremely short in some areas. I took the Beta Exam for Administration and noted the following shortcomings in this book:Almost nothing on roles, permissions, etc. The Beta exam had 13 out of 113 questions on this and they were very detailed. This book is too general. Never addressed moving users around.Nothing on Windows 98 as a server or client and connectivity. Beta Exam beat this to death.Over abundance of fill in the blank questions in the book. None of the questions took the format of the real exam.BCP is so lightly covered as to be laughable.Nothing about determining space requirements on a Database.Nothing on how to accomplish tasks that are normally done by wizards without using the wizard.Nothing about options when you perform these tasks. Beta Exam asked a lot about this.I could go on but you get the picture. Just wish the authors had taken the Beta Exam so the book would have done a better job. If they did take the exam they failed to incorporate lessons learned.If you buy the book do so knowing it will tell you some good stuff about SQL Server 7.0 but it will not get you ready for the exam.Cheers
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Oracle SQL & PL/SQL Annotated Archives
Publisher: Osborne/McGraw-Hill
Authors: Kevin Loney, Rachel Carmichael
Rating: 5/5
Title: Oracle SQL & PL/SQL Annotated Archives
Publisher: Osborne/McGraw-Hill
Authors: Kevin Loney, Rachel Carmichael
Rating: 5/5
I saw this book at Oracle OpenWorld SF and knew I had to get it! This book has scripts that are immediately useful. Combining these scripts with my own personal library of code has increased my own efficiency and proficiency in Oracle! This is a must buy for anybody programming, operating, or administering Oracle environments. Kudos to Loney and Carmichael for this book!
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Dreamweaver MX: PHP Web Development
Publisher: Peer Information
Authors: Bruno Mairlot, Gareth Downes-Powell, Tim Green
Rating: 2/5
Title: Dreamweaver MX: PHP Web Development
Publisher: Peer Information
Authors: Bruno Mairlot, Gareth Downes-Powell, Tim Green
Rating: 2/5
I'm very disappointed with this book. For someone just starting their journey in PHP, it simply has too many mistakes in the code presented on the pages of the book. Learning to program is hard enough without the help of wrongly printed code in a book that is suppose to be teaching the subject. After 3 day of frustation I go to the site only to find out they no longer support the book. They do however have an Errata page where you will find many corrections to the code which after some more time got the basic booking system to work. Then After a day on chaper 9 with a list of the corrections from the website in hand, I could not get the admin section to work so I download the code pages for chapter 9 from the site, and find they doesn't work either. I like the explanations on the subject and the layout of the book but damn I think a programming book should spend whatever time it takes to get the code right. I make my share of typos not to mention spelling but I don't write or sell books. This book is about teaching code and it seem to me someone could have spent more time making sure at least the code was correct. It's obvious these guys know what they are doing I just wish it had been better edited.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: SQL Server 2000 Black Book: A Resource for Real World Database Solutions and Techniques
Publisher: Paraglyph
Authors: Paul Whitehead, Patrick Dalton
Rating: 2/5
Title: SQL Server 2000 Black Book: A Resource for Real World Database Solutions and Techniques
Publisher: Paraglyph
Authors: Paul Whitehead, Patrick Dalton
Rating: 2/5
A "Comprehensive Problem Solver" it is not. The SQL Server 2000 Black Book is full of good information on theories and principles, and at the end of each chapter is a good amount of examples and solutions for particular situations. The examples do help you ,sort of, understand how to build your own SQL commands, but if you want to know WHAT those commands you typed in really means, you may want to buy another book.This book is supposed to be for Immediate to Advanced users and as toted a "problem solver". It's not. It seems like a good beginners book.I have two examples to discuss:
1) If/Else logic. Granted as a programmer I know how this stuff works, but they use the flow control statements throughtout the book, but never explain IF/Else statements. Considering how important If/Else statements are in programming, this is a major weakpoint.2) Stored Procedures. Chapter 14 of the book is supposed to cover Stored Proceduures. Well, it talks about it, and there are examples at the end of the book. But that chapter has more discussions than hardcore examples that it really depressed me about the book. It seemed to me that some of this chapter was probably taken from the manuals. If you wanted to understand Stored Procedures, this book won't help.Overall, it has some good points if you are beginning, bad points if you want a good programming/breakdown type of book.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: SQL Server 2000 Web Application Developer's Guide
Publisher: Osborne/McGraw-Hill
Authors: Craig Utley
Rating: 3/5
Title: SQL Server 2000 Web Application Developer's Guide
Publisher: Osborne/McGraw-Hill
Authors: Craig Utley
Rating: 3/5
I have read many computer books, and would say that this one covers alot of ground in a relatively small book. I had the feeling that more than one person wrote this book, and they just slapped one author's name on it. Around chapter 11 in the book the tone of the author changes and the explanations for certain things seem to be less thorough, not to mention that there are major errors in the exercises in chapter 11. The last half of the book just seemed to get sloppy. The other thing that becomes appearant is that the book covers old technology, the author goes on and on about VB.net and how there is no Visual Interdev in Visual Studio .NET. My advice -If you MUST learn Visual Interdev 6.0 AND will be housing your data in MS SQL Server 2000 strongly consider this book. -If you have a choice of development envoronment look for another one as this one is outdated, which the author continued to make clear throughout the book.
Product: Book Hardcover
Title: MCAD/MCSE/MCDBA Self-Paced Training Kit: Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Database Design and Implementation, Exam 70-229, Second Edition
Publisher: Microsoft Press
Authors: Microsoft Corporation, Microsoft Corporation
Rating: 3/5
Title: MCAD/MCSE/MCDBA Self-Paced Training Kit: Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Database Design and Implementation, Exam 70-229, Second Edition
Publisher: Microsoft Press
Authors: Microsoft Corporation, Microsoft Corporation
Rating: 3/5
I was not pleased with the contents of this book in terms of sloppy editing and in the paltry treatment of important topics. Those of us in pursuit of the MCP or MCDBA will have to augment this book and what we take from this book with other more complex books dealing with design and implementation. Do be prepared to purchase additional books on T-SQL programming and do be prepared to purchase real exam prep software.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Building Intelligent Databases With Oracle Pl/Sql, Triggers, and Stored Procedures (Oracle Series)
Publisher: Prentice Hall
Authors: Kevin T. Owens, Kevin T. Owens
Rating: 4/5
Title: Building Intelligent Databases With Oracle Pl/Sql, Triggers, and Stored Procedures (Oracle Series)
Publisher: Prentice Hall
Authors: Kevin T. Owens, Kevin T. Owens
Rating: 4/5
A book like this is essential for real world projects. The author knows exactly what he is talking about and it is easy to tell he has been a developer because he addresses the issues that usually come up during the development phase of a project. Also, the examples illustrate the concepts very clearly and it hardly matters whether you are using UNIX or NT.This book is way ahead of the other Oracle books I have seen. The reason I didn't give 5 stars is because this book doesn't cover the new Oracle8 features.
