IT programming books related reviews
Product: Book Paperback
Title: SQL for Dummies
Publisher: For Dummies
Authors: Allen G. Taylor
Rating: 5/5
Title: SQL for Dummies
Publisher: For Dummies
Authors: Allen G. Taylor
Rating: 5/5
This is a book that I really wish that I'd had when I first started doing a web application that was to use an Access database for the backend data. I looked at a lot of Access books, but none of them went into Access SQL. For that alone this book is worth five stars.
This book starts with a bit of discussion on the fundamentals of a relational database, but not too much. After all, this is covered in all the Access books. It quickly gets into the fundamentals of SQL itself.
I was a bit concerned when he started using the Microsoft graphical design tools to create the database, but he quickly went into using SQL CREATE TABLE and ALTER TABLE commands. From there on he went on to a reasonable complete but elementary discussion on using most the the rest of SQL.
You gotta have a few complaints, so:
There is discussion in the book, including a list of reserved words for SQL:2003. But Access doesn't talk SQL:2003. It doesn't even talk SQL:92, it's an extended SQL:89. A list of Access reserved words would have been nice.
He doesn't talk about the two database engines in Access, Jet and MSDE; and these two engines speak very different dialects of SQL.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Transact-SQL Programming
Publisher: O'Reilly
Authors: Lee Gould, Andrew Zanevsky, Kevin Kline
Rating: 4/5
Title: Transact-SQL Programming
Publisher: O'Reilly
Authors: Lee Gould, Andrew Zanevsky, Kevin Kline
Rating: 4/5
If I could only have one book by my side while working with SQL Server, this would be it.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Programming PHP
Publisher: O'Reilly
Authors: Rasmus Lerdorf, Kevin Tatroe
Rating: 5/5
Title: Programming PHP
Publisher: O'Reilly
Authors: Rasmus Lerdorf, Kevin Tatroe
Rating: 5/5
With one of the authors, Rasmus Lerdorf, being the creator of PHP you know you are in for a good book and "Programming PHP" certainly doesn't disappoint. This book will take you from the ground floor to developing your own web applications. As with most books, it begins simple and progresses to more advanced topics.When reading the book cover to cover, you are taught in a logical manner. The concepts of functions and arrays are taught before databases for example. Many books out there today jump ahead too quickly before the foundations are in place. This book does not. While teaching the foundations, Rasmus and Kevin show great programming style. As the preface mentions, their goal is not that you just become a PHP programmer, but a good PHP programmer.Beyond the basic foundations presented in this book, it also covers topics such as creating images with GD, using the PDF features of PHP, and XML. For those that really want to get knee deep into PHP, they also have a chapter devoted to extending PHP by creating your own extensions. They walk you through creating a simple rot13 extension, then show you what you need to know in order to create more complicated extensions. There is also a chapter devoted to programming in PHP securely. This addresses issues that every PHP programmer, new and seasoned alike, need to pay attention to.If you are looking for a book to break into the world of PHP, this one should be among the top of the list.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Using Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 (Using)
Publisher: Que
Authors: Rob Kraft, Matthew Shepker, Eric Wilson, Simon Gallagher, Tibor Karaszi
Rating: 2/5
Title: Using Microsoft SQL Server 7.0 (Using)
Publisher: Que
Authors: Rob Kraft, Matthew Shepker, Eric Wilson, Simon Gallagher, Tibor Karaszi
Rating: 2/5
I found this to be a very cursory reference manual. It did not go into the depth and detail that I would have liked. This book is more geared to beginner/intermediate analysis of SQL Server 7.0. There is no help on DTS ( a huge component of 7.0)
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Essential PHP for Web Professionals
Publisher: Pearson Education
Authors: Christopher Cosentino
Rating: 5/5
Title: Essential PHP for Web Professionals
Publisher: Pearson Education
Authors: Christopher Cosentino
Rating: 5/5
This book has been a big help since I'm a beginner at PHP. It's very informative although I do find most of the same stuff online.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Oracle PL/SQL Interactive Workbook (2nd Edition)
Publisher: Prentice Hall PTR
Authors: Benjamin Rosenzweig, Elena Silvestrova
Rating: 1/5
Title: Oracle PL/SQL Interactive Workbook (2nd Edition)
Publisher: Prentice Hall PTR
Authors: Benjamin Rosenzweig, Elena Silvestrova
Rating: 1/5
The idea of an interactive workbook is good, but this book is so riddled with errors, undefined terms, and grammatical/language errors as to be an embarrassment to the publisher. If you're going to publish a book by people whose first language isn't English, then make sure you get a very good copy editor and proofreader.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Professional SQL Server Reporting Services
Publisher: Wrox
Authors: Paul Turley, Todd Bryant, James Counihan, George McKee, Dave DuVarney
Rating: 3/5
Title: Professional SQL Server Reporting Services
Publisher: Wrox
Authors: Paul Turley, Todd Bryant, James Counihan, George McKee, Dave DuVarney
Rating: 3/5
With this book you will be able to set up and run Reporting Services, however, if you are looking for something that details advanced report design (e.g. anything more than simply bound table data) then this is not the book for you. In fact I don't know what would be the book for you. I'm still looking.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Code Centric: T-SQL Programming with Stored Procedures and Triggers
Publisher: Apress
Authors: Garth Wells
Rating: 2/5
Title: Code Centric: T-SQL Programming with Stored Procedures and Triggers
Publisher: Apress
Authors: Garth Wells
Rating: 2/5
I was excited when I got this book, but steadily more disappointed as I began to read it. After reading the first chapter or two, I started counting the coding errors and typing mistakes. I was up to 23 when I stopped. A lot of the code in this book simply won't run. What does is too simplistic to really be useful.
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
This book changed my life. I was really in a fog about TSQL when I got it, but the lights have definitely come on. I come from an Informix and Oracle background, so TSQL was a complete left turn for me. I just couldn't seem to get it. Then I got this book. It lifted the haze. It taught me to treat TSQL like any other programming language I've learned. I got past my mental block and finally grasped the language and all its power.What this book does that others don't is twofold: it forces you to think in TSQL because it builds on the TSQL you've learned by teaching you in TSQL. By the end of the book, you come by it naturally. Second, it doesn't settle for dumping cool tricks on you -- it explains everything. Henderson writes the way that people speak, as he says in the front of the book, and that's the best way to communicate. It felt like I was sitting in a classroom with him at the board teaching me from the ground up.Bottom line: get this book if you want to master TSQL.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Apache Tomcat Bible
Publisher: Wiley
Authors: Jon Eaves, Warner Godfrey, Rupert Jones
Rating: 4/5
Title: Apache Tomcat Bible
Publisher: Wiley
Authors: Jon Eaves, Warner Godfrey, Rupert Jones
Rating: 4/5
Chapters 2,5 and 7 were worth the price, as I managed to get Ant up and running, a timely digression as our Tomcat experiment evolves into a real production environment. I would suggest downloading the source, rather than trying to follow the authors' instructions on setting up your development environment (if you followed their directions, you would put your web directory under bible\tomcat\hello).
