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
I have several of Henderson's other books and I just wanted to get on here and say that this is his best one yet. I have several of his C++ and Delphi books and I'm really glad he trained his eye on Transact-SQL. This language needed a good dose of Henderson. No one writes better tech books. He mixes the perfect blend of outstanding technical content with friendly, humorous, down-to-earth narrative. Thanks, Ken, and congratulations on another fine book.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: PHP Certification Study Guide
Publisher: Sams Rating: 2/5
Title: PHP Certification Study Guide
Publisher: Sams Rating: 2/5
I got the second not the first edition of this book, so at least some of the errors have been corrected. And I agree with what the other reviewers said, this is certainly NOT the book to learn PHP from. I've been using PHP extensively for four years and I thought I might go for the cert.
What this book will provide you is a list of topics to know. But it fails to fill in the details, which are precisely what I forget in areas of development that I haven't been hanging out in lately.
And I just can't believe that the certification exam questions are really that easy.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Transact-SQL Programming
Publisher: O'Reilly
Authors: Lee Gould, Andrew Zanevsky, Kevin Kline
Rating: 5/5
Title: Transact-SQL Programming
Publisher: O'Reilly
Authors: Lee Gould, Andrew Zanevsky, Kevin Kline
Rating: 5/5
You'd think this book covers SQL Server 6.5, 7.0 and Sybase SQL Server that this is going to be patchy here and there, trying to cover one product here and another product there. You'd think SQL Server 7.0 is so much more advanced than SQL Server 6.5 that this book has to make so many compromises that it's only half good for either. And you'd probably think that this book has so few pages, this must only be an intro.Not so on all three accounts. This book is to-the-point Transact-SQL. There's no filler material here. I've programmed in Transact-SQL for quite awhile, and the examples, along with the descriptions, help me produce clean code. SQL Server is sensitive to how code and indexes interact. The author stresses the synergistic design of indexes and code.Here is what you do have to watch out for if you're considering this book:*This book is clearly a T-SQL only book. For example, it does not dwell on the exact page size; 6.5 uses 2k pages, while 7.0 uses 8k pages. You must be aware of this when you code and design indexes. This book covers the concepts very well, but it is up to you to apply the concepts to your design.*Certain exciting additions such as Linked Servers are not discussed. The book is a bit backwards on the inter-operability of SQL Server, since Linked Server offers remote queries in addition to the functionality of Remote Servers (Linked Server is not available in 6.5).*Replication is also not discussed. SQL Server 7.0 has greatly improved on the replication capabilities over 6.5, both in ease and reliability. In all fairness, replication is an enterprise architecture issue more than a coding issue.Like all thick products, SQL Server (and Sybase SQL Server) deserves more than one book on any developer's/DBA's desk. I really like this book as a coding guide, but would definitely supplement this with:*Inside SQL Server 7.0: performance tuning and deep understanding of SQL Server under-the-hood. This book is hard core.*Books Online: excellent coverage on Replication, DTC, disaster recovery. Although not nice to read, I've had a hard time finding this information elsewhere.*Deploying SQL Server: high level deployment guide.
Product: Book Hardcover
Title: OCP Introduction to Oracle9i: SQL Exam Guide
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Authors: Jason Couchman
Rating: 5/5
Title: OCP Introduction to Oracle9i: SQL Exam Guide
Publisher: McGraw-Hill Osborne Media
Authors: Jason Couchman
Rating: 5/5
This book is a great read despite the mistakes and typos littered about its pages. Its not dry or overdone like many prep books - it's just right. In addition, it's a super value considering it's hardcover and official. My book included a CD with excellent practice test software which helped me drill in some of the tough topics.This book is also a great place to start if you know nothing about the workings of an Oracle database. Some other cram type books leave you to figure out many of the nuts and bolts on your own so you can't put together the whole picture. This book doesn't do that. It takes you through gently but briskly giving you a solid ground to work from.After reading it, I passed on my first try with the help of an 8i Cram book because there were about 4 or 5 questions on the test that the book did not cover. This leads to my only real dissappointment. The fact is that it the book is just not detailed enough in just a couple areas.In the end, I give it 5 stars. I have read 5 certification prep books (2 Oracle) in the past few months and this is the best and my absolute favorite because of its easy to read content and its hard to beat value. Happy studying.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: SQL/400 Developer's Guide
Publisher: 29th Street Press
Authors: Paul Conte, Mike Cravitz
Rating: 2/5
Title: SQL/400 Developer's Guide
Publisher: 29th Street Press
Authors: Paul Conte, Mike Cravitz
Rating: 2/5
It's actually not an awful book - it's just really poorly organised, generously sprinkled with omissions and errors, and it doesn't provide any information you couldn't otherwise easily get from IBM's own AS/400 manuals, which are available online (http://publib.boulder.ibm.com). I've been using DB/2 on MVS mainframes since about 1984, and there are a number of well-written, well-organised texts on the subject, including Ranade's DB/2 book. Having started working recently with SQL/400, I really didn't need much help with DDL and DML basics - what I needed was an assist on learning the AS/400 equivalents of SPUFI and QMF, MVS's SQL user interfaces. The SQL/400 book wasn't much help. There was only a cursory discussion of ISQL (a watered-down kind of SPUFI), and I haven't yet come across a word about Query Manager. The index is really lacking, too - Ranade's book could serve the authors as an object lesson.In summary: Save yourself a nice wad of cash - and don't bother with this book.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Professional SQL Server 2000 Programming
Publisher: Wrox
Authors: Robert Vieira
Rating: 5/5
Title: Professional SQL Server 2000 Programming
Publisher: Wrox
Authors: Robert Vieira
Rating: 5/5
This is an excellent reference manual for SQL server 2000. It's to the point, easy to read and full of solutions to real world problems. I highly recommend it.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: SQL-99 Complete, Really
Publisher: CMP Books
Authors: Peter Gulutzan, Trudy Pelzer
Rating: 5/5
Title: SQL-99 Complete, Really
Publisher: CMP Books
Authors: Peter Gulutzan, Trudy Pelzer
Rating: 5/5
the book is huge and has much useful information in it. However, I was somewhat disappointed in regard to the completeness claim the title (and the size) suggests. Especially the more advanced features (the book marks most of them them as "obscure") are not covered well at all. In particular, the new features for handling inheritance with UDTs are hardly ever mentioned, let alone illustrated with examples.It seems that in places where they lack experience of their own, the authors copy the reference manuals at best, sometimes not even that.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Access and SQL Server Developer's Handbook
Publisher: Sybex Inc
Authors: John Viescas, Mike Gunderloy, Mary Chipman, John L. Viescas
Rating: 4/5
Title: Access and SQL Server Developer's Handbook
Publisher: Sybex Inc
Authors: John Viescas, Mike Gunderloy, Mary Chipman, John L. Viescas
Rating: 4/5
Simple enough for the astute beginner and complete enough for the experienced user.
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
The thing that sticks out about this book is the quality of the writing -- it's par excellence. Computer books come and go, but this one has real staying power. It's a cut above the rest in terms of the prose. Unlike a lot of techie books out there, this is one you can't put down. I picked up the book only mildly interested in the subject material and couldn't put it down. It took me a week or so to read through it all (the book is _really_ dense), and, once I had, I was half tempted to go through it again. It's great to run into a technical author who knows how to write. In my view, this book is right up there with the best works in other genres. Kudos to Henderson for such a wonderful piece of work.
Product: Book Paperback
Title: Murach's SQL for SQL Server
Publisher: Mike Murach & Associates
Authors: Bryan Syverson
Rating: 5/5
Title: Murach's SQL for SQL Server
Publisher: Mike Murach & Associates
Authors: Bryan Syverson
Rating: 5/5
SQL for SQL Server is a book that should be on every developer's bookshelf. It would be a great tool to have in the Administrator's library as well, though it is more language-specific than adminstrative-task oriented. The book starts with language elements, then moves through database design and implementation issues and finally on to "advanced SQL skills" - much of which is oriented to working with a larger SQL Server implementation with pre-existing code, views, tables, etc. There is good information on backups, restores, things like that, but my opinion is that the book is so much more a reference on the language and implementation than the administration of SQL Server - that's where the completeness of the coverage is really what makes it unique. For example, if you want to understand the CASE and COALESCE functions - it's covered with narrative and direct examples of the usage. CONVERT, CAST, UNIONs, are more examples. This text is one that you can put on the shelf and refer to whenever you get stuck with a function/syntax issue. Combined with Books Online, you'll be set. One thing I would like to see more of is an explanation of the gotchas, with some workaround ideas. It would be great to have a mix of SQL for SQL Server, SQL for Smarties and the tidbits from Sharon Dooley's Essential SQL Server 7 book.
