Books for/about - mac

Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional
Authors: Amit Singh

ISBN: 0321278542
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Summary: Stunning
Wow. This book is amazing. If you are a Mac developer, Operating system fan, or Macintosh lover then buy this book. I'm reading it cover to cover and loving it! Great job!

Summary: Horrible braindead DRM - get the hardcopy edition!
Buyer beware - the electronic download is DRMed, and will not download to a Mac. Utterly useless - get the hardcopy instead.

Summary: A technical tour-de-force
"MacOS X Internals" is the first book introduced since the advent of OS X that focuses on the low-level details of the MacOS in a way that will give technical people, ranging from geeky end-users to hardware-level programmers, a thorough and fascinating tour of the MacOS. This book is not for "average" end users; it is not an introduction to how to use a Mac. Nor is this book for people looking to get started programming on the Mac; there are plenty of books designed for new Mac developers. What "MacOS X Internals" tries to be is something unique: a guide to the MacOS from the bottom up, and it hits this mark very well.

"MacOS X Internals" can be roughly divided into three parts: a technical history of the MacOS, a review of the MacOS firmware and booting process, and a technical tour of various parts of the OS itself (such as interprocess communication and the file system, to pick two at random). The first section will appeal to any technically-included user of the MacOS, the latter two are aimed more at programmers, although there is plenty there to increase the knowledge of anyone with a strong technical bend, whether they have coded before or not. The MacOS history is a detailed trip down memory lane from the very first post-Next developer builds of MacOS X right up to Tiger and beyond. The features introduced in each OS are described in detail with emphasis on technical and "under the hood" changes. The author is clearly an enthusiast as well, as he frequently sprinkles entertaining bits of trivia in with the meat of the main narrative.

Moving on from the historical sections to the present, author Amit Singh gives a blow-by-blow description of the process of the Mac booting. If you have ever wondered exactly what the Mac is doing as the power flows and the grey apple logo appears, this is for you. Everything from the sequence of initial power-on tests, to the bootloaders and Open Firmware onto the higher level unix boot process are covered in detail. Of special note is the extensive coverage of Open Firmware, which is much more then a merely the "BIOS" of a PowerPC Mac. Singh describes many activities that a system programmer can do in Open Firmware, including making a draggable windowing environment and even programming the famous "Towers of Hanoi." Unfortunately, this book was mostly finished before the Intel Macs arrived on the scene, and while there is a section on the EFI (extensible firmware interface) that is the "BIOS" of all Intel Macs, it is not nearly as deep as the Open Firmware section (updated information on EFI and other topics can be found on the author's web site at http://osxbook.com/).

Roughly following the guide to the MacOS booting, Singh delves into the meat of OS X's Unix underpinnings, describing how the MacOS really runs "under the hood." This section covers all the expected topics, including the kernel, interprocess communication, and memory is very thorough fashion, with tons of code snippets all clearly explained. This will be especially useful for readers who are familiar with how other Unixes work behind the scenes, as Singh frequently and helpfully points of the areas where MacOS differs from other flavors of Unix. There is a great section on the various file systems that OS X supports, which is notable because other then a simple list, I have never seen this information in a book with such detail. The section of the primary OS X filesystem, HFS Plus, is very useful for both developers and power users alike.

"Mac OS X Internals" clocks in at 1641 pages in the end, and is over two inches thick. I was thoroughly impressed by this book. The author's technical knowledge, as well as his enthusiasm and skill at presenting these topics is excellent. It's hard to find anything negative to say about this book other then the the above-mentioned need to have more information on EFI (which isn't the author's fault, it was a matter of timing). I do wish the book came with an electronic version, as this would have made searching and copying the code snippets much easier. There is a coupon included for a time-limited trial of online access to the text, but I would prefer that a PDF be included on a CD with the book, even if this required an increase in the price (you can buy an electronic version on Amazon, but this is separate from the print version). These minor complaints aside, I cannot recommend "MacOS X Internals" enough. It is the finest technical book on MacOS X yet published, and puts Apple's own technical documentation to shame in comparison. If you are a highly technical end user of developer, this book belongs on your shelf.

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Mac OS X Tiger: Missing Manual

Publisher: O'Reilly Media
Authors: David Pogue

ISBN: 0596009410
List Price: $29.95
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Summary: GREAT MANUAL!
This manual is awesome for all your mac needs. It really has so much detail and anyone can use it to fix most problems on their mac. It has really been useful since I purchased it about a month ago. Has really helped with startup issues (not that Macs have very many). And for general use, it contains great details about how to use OS X and the programs that come with it! Would definitely recommend for all Mac users, especially beginners!

Summary: The Best Tiger Manual -- Stand up and applaud this book
After reading this book, I felt like I had to stand up or at least applaud. It was really a masterpiece: extremely comprehensive, easy to understand, expertly organized. The missing manual series by O'Reilly claims to be "The book that should have been in the box." This book is to computer manuals what iPods are to digital music. Powerful, yet easy to use

The book is designed for someone who has never used Tiger before and is not all that familiar with the Mac either. Unlike a dummies book, he doesn't talk down to you and respects the fact that you can learn things if shown how to use them.

This book doesn't just cover Tiger, but also covers the iLife application suite: iMovie, iDVD and iTunes. In fact, I really don't consider this just a Tiger manual. It's really a iMac User's Guide, covering pretty much every aspect of your new Macintosh. Have a problem with your Mac not working right? There's a great troubleshooting section at the end of the book.

The index and table of contents is well organized so you can focus on the sections you want to learn more about. For example, if you don't use classic applications (most people don't) then skip over the section. Finding out how to burn a music CD or setting up your email was very easy to find and understand. No aspect of Tiger was left unexplained. The book even explains how to use the voice recognition software..something I've never played with but always wanted to learn how to use

Personally, I thought the coverage of Mac to PC and PC to Mac networking was great, since so many people live in mixed computing environments.

The major complaint I think some people might have about this book is it's big. Over 800 pages can be a bit intimidating. I showed it to a customer and their response was: " I thought Macs were so easy to use?" Even though it is easy to understand and find the information you want, I wouldn't suggest it as the first manual to a new Mac user. I still think Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger: Peachpit Learning Series by Robin Williams is the best beginners book for Mac users. She really walks people through every step with bright colorful pictures.

The ideal user of this book is someone who understands the basics of Tiger and their Mac but says "I don't think I'm using my Mac to it's full potential." After reading this book, they'll have a complete arsenal to understand any aspect of their Mac.

Pros: The ideal book for Tiger users: complete, detailed, and easy to understand
Cons: Not designed for brand new users with no previous Mac experience, the amount of information may seem overwhelming

Summary: Good but not Great
I recommend this book for most intermediate users but if you really want to everything, there isn't information here.

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	Government By The People, National, State, and Local (21st Edition) Publisher: Prentice Hall Authors: David B. Magleby David M. O'Brien Paul C. Light James Mac Gregor Burns Jack W. Peltason Thomas E. Cronin
ISBN: 0131921568 List Price: $111.60 Amazon Price: $111.60 Usually ships in 24 hours Buy this book from amazon.com or from amazon.co.uk	Avg Cusomer Rating: Reviews: Summary:

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	Government By the People - National Version (21st Edition) Publisher: Prentice Hall Authors: David B. Magleby David M. O'Brien Paul C. Light James Mac Gregor Burns Jack W. Peltason Thomas E. Cronin
ISBN: 0131921592 List Price: $108.20 Amazon Price: $108.20 Usually ships in 24 hours Buy this book from amazon.com or from amazon.co.uk	Avg Cusomer Rating: Reviews: Summary:

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	Government By the People, Basic Version (21st Edition) Publisher: Prentice Hall Authors: David B. Magleby David M. O'Brien Paul C. Light James Mac Gregor Burns Jack W. Peltason Thomas E. Cronin
ISBN: 0131921584 List Price: $93.00 Amazon Price: $93.00 Usually ships in 24 hours Buy this book from amazon.com or from amazon.co.uk	Avg Cusomer Rating: Reviews: Summary:

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	Office 2004 for Macintosh (Missing Manual) Publisher: Pogue Press Authors: Mark Holt Walker Franklin Tessler Paul Berkowitz
ISBN: 0596008201 List Price: $29.95 Amazon Price: $19.77 Usually ships in 24 hours Buy this book from amazon.com or from amazon.co.uk	Avg Cusomer Rating: 3 Reviews: Summary: Disappointing This book was a disappointment. I had expected a reference of the caliber of David Pogue's Mac OS X Tiger manual. Among problem areas: a hard-to-navigate and incomplete index, fuzzy photo insets, and incorrect cross-references. The manual has the feel of something put together in a hurry without proper proof-reading, and borrowing heavily from canned sources. I learned some things but had to work harder to glean the information than I should have. I would not recommend this manual, unless it's the only game in town. I don't think it is. Summary: Beware the mistakes I am a big fan of the Missing Manual series. Previous books have given me lots of insights into my installed software and have made my computing time much more efficient. I therefore approached this book with much enthusiasm. Office is such a gargantuan program, with tons of bells and whistles, that Microsoft itself estimates that most users take advantage of less than a third of its capabilities. However, the book is a major disappointment, because of its many mistakes and poor organization. Most of the mistakes are ones you can work around--for example, on page 8 the topics covered by appendixes A and B are reversed--but the sheer number of such mistakes makes reading the book a major distraction. Every few pages I find myself going to the Missing Manuals web site to report yet more errata, such as incomplete or wrong instructions, figures that do not agree with the text or figure captions, incomprehensible writing, seeming confusion between the Mac and PC versions of the program, etc. And I agree wholeheartedly with a previous reviewer who complained about the inadequate index. It looks as though O'Reilly Publishers did not do an adequate proofing of the book, but instead rushed it out as soon as possible. That is too bad, because I will now be much more hesitant to purchase another Missing Manuals title. Summary: Good book crippled by inadequate index I was impressed by the other 'Missing Manual' book which I have read, their guide to OSX, and had high hopes for this one. The book itself is quite decent, though not as well written as the OSX guide. However, it is crippled by a totally inadequate index. First, the way in which the index is organized makes little sense -- some Word topics are listed alphabetically on their own, while others are grouped together as sub-entries under 'Word', forcing you to look in several different places. Far worse, the index is simply incomplete, making it difficult if not impossible to look up the answers to specific questions. For instance, let's say you want to look up how to use all those little triangle widget things on the ruler. There's just one entry for 'ruler' as a sub entry under 'Word' (and none as a stand-alone entry): page 22. Page 22 contains just two lines about the ruler, with the injunction to "See page 116 for details on how to use and change these settings". As it happens, there's nothing at all on page 116 about the ruler, and the reference should probably be to page 130, which contains a discussion of margins. But typos aside, the main issue is, why isn't the page which contains the actual information about how to use the various features of the ruler listed in the index under 'ruler'? This is typical of the grossly incomplete indexing which makes this book nearly useless as a problem-solving guide. The index is simply too short, with only a total of about three pages devoted to all of the Word entries. The Pogue Press/O'Reilly people should really create a proper index (how difficult can this be to do on a book which was doubtless created in electronic form by people who are presumably intimately familiar with the use of Word 2004) and post it on their website. That would at least make it possible to use the book as a reference source. Note: the above comments are based on the third of the book devoted to Word. I assume that the same problems exist in the other sections, but I bought the book primarily to use with Word and haven't worked in detail with those other sections. Summary:

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Learning Python, Second Edition

Publisher: O'Reilly Media
Authors: Mark Lutz David Ascher

ISBN: 0596002815
List Price: $39.99
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Summary: Kill your curiosity with this one
very bad book... do not use this book if youre starting programming or python. the first chapter itself will put you off completely. try instead beginning python by Magnus Lie Hetland. its simple practical and downright fun.

Summary: This should be your first Python book!
This is simply a stellar introduction to the Python language, for both newcomers to programming and those who are already proficient in another language. I know there are several choices for 'beginning' type Python books, and you may be tempted to choose a different one because it is newer than this one, but please understand that you lose nothing by reading this book instead. It covers Python 2.3 (which is just short of the current 2.4), and there are only a couple of items not referred to (e.g. decorators and decimals). But you can easily read up on the latest features online. The benefits of this book far outweigh the fact that it was published a few years ago!

Here is the true advantage of Learning Python: the authors describe the language in complete detail from the ground up. They begin with how to use the interactive interpreter and IDLE, and then move on to built-in data types. Every single thing that could be considered a 'component' of the Python language gets its own chapter (numbers, strings, lists, etc.), and the larger components (functions, modules, classes, etc.) each get their own Part (which is further divided into chapters). In other words, they take plenty of time to describe everything you need to know about everything in the language. You won't finish learning the core language until well into the 400-range of pages.

Another intro Python book that I just began reading has already covered numbers, arithmetic operators, functions, modules, and a few other things, all by page 20! I won't name the book yet, because I'm not fairly deep enough in it yet. But this is certainly not good for a newcomer.

Don't even wonder about other books! Learning Python covers every aspect of the language in great detail, yet at the same time remains intelligent (e.g. it does not explain to you what variables in general are (hopefully you have a basic understanding of programming already), but it explains in great detail what variables *in Python* are). After you read this book, you will have an amazing foundation in Python.

Summary: Not really useful
This book is not very good for actually learning Python. It also lacks a reference section and is excessively wordy.

Learning implies tutorials and a gentle progression from basic to advanced subjects; this book does neither. For example, in chapter 3, "How You Run Programs", it introduces modules and namespaces--fairly advanced concepts to read about before even the first "hello world" program! In chapter 4, as it describes the use of numbers and strings, it is already delving deep into the uses and implications of Python's objects.

With well over 500 pages, there should be plenty of room for a reference section, but there is none. There is no list of built-in classes and their methods.

The overall tone of the book is enthusiastic, touting Python's object-orientedness and other advantages. Unfortunately, it is excessively wordy and difficult to read. Cheerleading can be excused, but it is present on nearly every page and gets old quick.

In a book about programming or a programming language, one might want tutorials, reference, discussion of advanced topics, or code examples. This book provides none of these things. I do not recommend it.

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Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac OS X: Visual QuickStart Guide (Visual Quickstart Guides)

Publisher: Peachpit Press
Authors: Steve Schwartz

ISBN: 0321247477
List Price: $21.99
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Summary: Microsoft Office 2004 for Mac OS 10 Visual QuickStart Guide
This books makes learning the workings of Microsoft Office 2004 super easy. The photos and instructions take the reader step-by-step through the inner workings of the program. A must for the beginner and a resource for the experienced user. Learn Word, Excel and PowerPoint, as well as Entourage and more by using this guide any way you wish.

Summary: Gets You Started Quickly
Aimed at the beginning and intermediate user of Microsoft Office for Macintosh, this book is part of the Visual Quickstart Guide. The philosophy of the series is to use a lot of photographs so that you can see what the screen should look like as you do various tasks during the learning process.

The organization of the book, after an introduction that you really should read or at least glance over, is modular just like the software. There's a part on Word, on Excel, on PowerPoint, and on Entourage. Each part is self standing and can be used independently of the other parts. You can read the part on the software you need without having to go do everything at once. Although to be sure you will sooner or later want to use the various applications together, and for this there is Part VI: Combining the Applications.

As a visually oriented book, there are hundreds of pictures/drawings to illustrate just about every point. It's a very fast way to get started.

Summary: Excellent quick guide to Microsoft Office
This 453-page book is written for beginning and intermediate users of Microsoft Office 2004. It blends short, well-written sections on the various parts of Office 2004 with screen shots and other graphics that show you visually how to do things. This is a winning combination and makes learning about Office 2004 easy and fun. I also was pleased to find short "tips" following the various discussions that further enhanced your ability to use the feature being discussed.

Starting the book is a good summary of what's new with the four components of Office 2004, namely Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Entourage. This is followed by separate "Parts" for each of these four applications plus an introductory section and a special ending section. The latter contains instruction on combining some of the aspects of the four applications. Within each of the major "Parts" are Chapters of major features each broken down further into short sections focusing on the various useful ways to use various features of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Entourage.

For example, Part II is on Microsoft Word. It is broken down into 6 chapters focusing on working with word, document formatting, text formatting, adding graphics, creating tables, and other word features. Then within each of those are several subsections providing specific help on various aspects of each chapter topic. For instance, within "document formatting" you'll find specific focus on paper size and orientation, margins, headers and footers, page numbers, inserting page breaks, creating multiple sections, and multiple columns. And all are user-friendly and quite helpful!

This book is part of the "Visual Quickstart Guide" series of Peachpit Press, and the again lives up to the other fine visual guides from this company. I was also impressed by the knowledge shared in this book by the skilled author whose past works included more than 50 other books and hundreds of computer-related reviews and articles for various well-known computer magazines. He knows his subject and has the skills to guide the reader to a most satisfying understanding of Office 2004.

All and all, I would highly recommend this helpful book and I'm sure I will be referring to it many times whenever I have a question about Office 2004 - and I have confidence that I'll find the answer!

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