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Showing posts with label Computer Science. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Computer Science. Show all posts

Sunday, October 25, 2009

MCTS Self-Paced Training Kit (Exam 70-536): Microsoft® .NET Framework Application Development Foundation, Second edition


Product Description
Your 2-in-1 Self-Paced Training Kit. Fully updated and revised! Ace your preparation for the skills measured by MCTS Exam 70-536 and on the job. With this official Microsoft study guide, you ll work at your own pace through a series of lessons and reviews that fully cover each exam objective. Then reinforce and apply what you ve learned through real-world case scenarios and practice exercises. Maximize your performance on the exam by learning to: Develop applications that use system types and collections Validate input, reformat text, and extract data with regular expressions Create services and multi-threaded applications Implement code-access security and role-based security Implement serialization to read and write complex objects Leverage legacy code using interoperability Monitor and troubleshoot applications Create applications for a global audience PRACTICE TESTS Assess your skills with practice tests on CD. You can work through hundreds of questions using multiple testing modes to meet your specific learning needs. You get detailed explanations for right and wrong answers?including a customized learning path that describes how and where to focus your studies. Your kit includes: 15% exam discount from Microsoft. Offer expires 12/31/13. Official self-paced study guide. Practice tests with multiple, customizable testing options and a learning plan based on your results. 300+ practice and review questions. Code samples in Microsoft Visual Basic and Visual C# on CD. Case scenarios, exercises, and best practices. 90-day evaluation of Microsoft Visual Studio Professional 2008. Fully searchable eBook of this guide.

Cloud Application Architectures: Building Applications and Infrastructure in the Cloud

Product Description
If you're involved in planning IT infrastructure as a network or system architect, system administrator, or developer, this book will help you adapt your skills to work with these highly scalable, highly redundant infrastructure services.

While analysts hotly debate the advantages and risks of cloud computing, IT staff and programmers are left to determine whether and how to put their applications into these virtualized services. Cloud Application Architectures provides answers -- and critical guidance -- on issues of cost, availability, performance, scaling, privacy, and security.

About the Author
George Reese is the founder of two Minneapolis-based companies, enStratus Networks LLC (maker of high-end cloud infrastructure management tools) and Valtira LLC (maker of the Valtira Online Marketing Platform). Over the past 15 years, George has authored a number of technology books, including MySQL Pocket Reference, Database Programming with JDBC and Java, Java Database Best Practices, and the upcoming Web Architecture and Programming in the Cloud.

Throughout the Internet era, George has spent his career building enterprise tools for developers and delivering solutions to the marketing domain. He was an influential force in the evolution of online gaming through the creation of a number of Open Source MUD libraries and he created the first JDBC driver in 1996-the Open Source mSQL-JDBC. Most recently, George has been involved in the development of systems to support the deployment of transactional web applications in the cloud.

George holds a BA in Philosophy from Bates College in Lewiston, Maine and an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management in Evanston, Illinois. He currently lives in Minnesota with his wife Monique and his daughters Kyra and Lindsey.

Beginning iPhone 3 Development: Exploring the iPhone SDK

Product Description

Are you a programmer looking for a new challenge? Does the thought of building your very own iPhone app make your heart race and your pulse quicken? If so, Beginning iPhone 3 Development: Exploring the iPhone SDK is just the book for you. Updated and revised for iPhone SDK 3, many of the discussions in the original book have been clarified to make some of the more complex topics easier to understand. In addition, all of the projects have been rebuilt from scratch using the SDK 3 templates.

Assuming only a minimal working knowledge of Objective-C, and written in a friendly, easy-to-follow style, this book offers a complete soup-to-nuts course in iPhone and iPod touch programming. The book starts with the basics, walking you through the process of downloading and installing Apple's free iPhone SDK, and then stepping you though the creation of your first simple iPhone application. From there, you'll learn to integrate all the interface elements iPhone users have come to know and love, such as buttons, switches, pickers, toolbars, and sliders. You'll master a variety of design patterns, from the simplest single view to complex hierarchical drill-downs. The confusing art of table building will be demystified, and you'll see how to save your data using the iPhone file system. You'll also learn how to save and retrieve your data using SQLite, iPhone's built-in database management system. In addition, you'll also learn about Core Data, an important persistence mechanism that has just been added with SDK 3.

And there's much more! You'll learn to draw using Quartz 2D and OpenGL ES, add multitouch gestural support (pinches and swipes) to your applications, and work with the camera, photo library, accelerometer, and built-in GPS. You'll discover the fine points of application preferences and learn how to localize your apps for multiple languages. You can discover more about this book, download source code, and find support forums at the book's companion site, at www.iphonedevbook.com.
About the Author

Dave Mark is a long-time Mac developer and author and has written a number of books on Macintosh development, including Learn C on the Macintosh, The Macintosh Programming Primer series, and Ultimate Mac Programming. His blog can be found at www.davemark.com.


Jeff LaMarche is a longtime Mac developer, and Apple iPhone Developer. With over 20 years of programming experience, he's written on Cocoa and Objective-C for MacTech Magazine, as well as articles for Apple's Developer Technical Services website. He has experience working in Enterprise software, both as a developer for PeopleSoft starting in the late 1990s, and then later as an independent consultant.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

The Graveyard Book


Review
"The Graveyard Book is endlessly inventive, masterfully told and, like Bod himself, too clever to fit into only one place. This is a book for everyone. You will love it to death." (Holly Black, co-creator of The Spiderwick Chronicles )

"After finishing The Graveyard Book, I had only one thought - I hope there's more. I want to see more of the adventures of Nobody Owens, and there is no higher praise for a book." (Laurell K. Hamilton, author of the Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter novels )

The Graveyard Book is everything everyone loves about Neil Gaiman, only multiplied many times over, a novel that showcases his effortless feel for narrative, his flawless instincts for suspense, and above all, his dark, almost silky sense of humor. (Joe Hill, author of Heart-Shaped Box )

"It takes a graveyard to raise a child. My favorite thing about this book was watching Bod grow up in his fine crumbly graveyard with his dead and living friends. The Graveyard Book is another surprising and terrific book from Neil Gaiman." (Audrey Niffenegger, author of The Time Traveler's Wife )

"Like a bite of dark Halloween chocolate, this novel proves rich, bittersweet and very satisfying." (Washington Post )

"THE GRAVEYARD BOOK, by turns exciting and witty, sinister and tender, shows Gaiman at the top of his form. In this novel of wonder, Neil Gaiman follows in the footsteps of long-ago storytellers, weaving a tale of unforgettable enchantment." (New York Times Book Review )

"The Graveyard Book manages the remarkable feat of playing delightful jazz riffs on Kipling's classic Jungle Books. One might call this book a small jewel, but in fact it's much bigger within than it looks from the outside." (Peter S. Beagle, author of The Last Unicorn )

"This is an utterly captivating tale that is cleverly told through an entertaining cast of ghostly characters. There is plenty of darkness, but the novel's ultimate message is strong and life affirming..this is a rich story with broad appeal. " (Booklist (starred review) )

"Wistful, witty, wise-and creepy. This needs to be read by anyone who is or has ever been a child." (Kirkus Reviews (starred review) )

"Lucid, evocative prose and dark fairy-tale motifs imbue the story with a dreamlike quality. .this ghost-story-cum-coming-of-age-novel as readable as it is accomplished." (Horn Book (starred review) )

"This is, quite frankly, the best book Neil Gaiman has ever written. How he has managed to combine fascinating, friendly, frightening and fearsome in one fantasy I shall never know, but he has pulled it off magnificently - perfect for Halloween and any other time of the year." (Diana Wynne Jones, author of The Chronicles of Chrestomanci )

"I wish my younger self could have had the opportunity to read and re-read this wonderful book, and my older self wishes that I had written it." (Garth Nix, author of The Abhorsen Trilogy )

Product Description

Nobody Owens, known to his friends as Bod, is a normal boy.

He would be completely normal if he didn't live in a sprawling graveyard, being raised and educated by ghosts, with a solitary guardian who belongs to neither the world of the living nor of the dead.

There are dangers and adventures in the graveyard for a boy-an ancient Indigo Man beneath the hill, a gateway to a desert leading to an abandoned city of ghouls, the strange and terrible menace of the Sleer.

But if Bod leaves the graveyard, then he will come under attack from the man Jack—who has already killed Bod's family. . . .

Beloved master storyteller Neil Gaiman returns with a luminous new novel for the audience that embraced his New York Times bestselling modern classic Coraline. Magical, terrifying, and filled with breathtaking adventures, the graveyard book is sure to enthrall readers of all ages.


About the Author

Neil Gaiman is the author of many highly acclaimed and award-winning books for children and adults, including the New York Times bestseller Coraline. He is also the author of the picture books The Wolves in the Walls and The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish, both illustrated by Dave McKean, Blueberry Girl, illustrated by Charles Vess, and The Dangerous Alphabet, illustrated by Gris Grimly. Among his many awards are the World Fantasy Award, the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, and the Bram Stoker Award. Originally from England, Gaiman now lives in the United States.

Saturday, August 8, 2009

How to Do Everything with Microsoft Office Project 2007


Covering the latest version of this versatile project management tool, How to Do Everything with Microsoft Office Project 2007 helps you maximize the software to organize work and people and ensure projects are delivered on time and within budget. You will learn how to set up projects, manage tasks and resources, track status, report project information, and much more. The book covers the standard as well as the professional editions, includes details on Microsoft Office Project Server 2007.
Work with the project calendar
Create tasks and assign constraints, dependencies, and resources
Estimate project costs
Resolve scheduling problems and resource conflicts
Establish project baselines
Track schedule and cost information
Create and customize project reports
Consolidate projects and share resources
Create custom fields, change the interface, and use macros
About the Author

Elaine Marmel has authored or coauthored more than 30 computer books.

Friday, August 7, 2009

Adobe InDesign CS4 Classroom in a Book


The fastest, easiest, most comprehensive way to learn Adobe InDesign CS4

Adobe InDesign CS4 Classroom in a Book contains 14 lessons. The book covers the basics of learning page layout with Adobe InDesign and provides countless tips and techniques to help you become more productive with the program. Explore typography and color, and learn more about creating tables and using styles. You can follow the book from start to finish or choose only those lessons that interest you.

Create layouts for magazines, newsletters, and brochures. Learn how to make Adobe PDF files and rich interactive documents. Prepare files for high-resolution printing and the Web.

“Adobe InDesign Classroom in a Book is the best way to learn hands-on with real-world examples. You'll gain exposure to good print design as well as efficient workflow techniques.” —Michael Witherell, Adobe Certified Expert, Publishing, Training, and Consulting
Classroom in a Book®, the best-selling series of hands-on software training workbooks, helps you learn the features of Adobe software quickly and easily. Classroom in a Book offers what no other book or training program does—an official training Incorporated, developed with the support of Adobe product experts.

C Programming Language


Presents a complete guide to ANSI standard C language programming. Written by the developers of C, this new version helps readers keep up with the finalized ANSI standard for C while showing how to take advantage of C's rich set of operators, economy of expression, improved control flow, and data structures. This 2nd edition has been completely rewritten with additional examples and problem sets to clarify the implementation of difficult language constructs. 7 x 9 1/4. Just about every C programmer I respect learned C from this book. Unlike many of the 1,000 page doorstops stuffed with CD-ROMs that have become popular, this volume is concise and powerful (if somewhat dangerous) -- like C itself. And it was written by Kernighan himself. Need we say more?

Cocoa(R) Programming for Mac(R) OS X



More advanced user interface features get their due by the end of the book, including cutting and pasting data through the Cocoa pasteboard and also adding drag-and-drop support. Final sections look at creating new controls for use with the Interface Builder palette, and, briefly, how to use Java with Cocoa (an option that the author doesn't necessarily recommend). Throughout this text, the author provides more advanced, challenging problems at the end of each chapter for the "more curious" reader. This approach keeps beginners from getting lost in the details of Cocoa development, but gives the more advanced reader something more to do.

While there are comparably fewer books on Mac OS X compared to other platforms, readers are lucky to have this one available. Anyone who wants to get onboard with Cocoa development will be well served by this title. It's a fine tutorial that earns high marks for its approachable, clear examples and an excellent presentation by an author who knows his stuff and, better yet, knows how to teach it to others. --Richard Dragan

Dashboards have become popular in recent years as uniquely powerful tools for communicating important information at a glance. Although dashboards are potentially powerful, this potential is rarely realized. The greatest display technology in the world won't solve this if you fail to use effective visual design. And if a dashboard fails to tell you precisely what you need to know in an instant, you'll never use it, even if it's filled with cute gauges, meters, and traffic lights. Don't let your investment in dashboard technology go to waste.

This book will teach you the visual design skills you need to create dashboards that communicate clearly, rapidly, and compellingly. Information Dashboard Design will explain how to:

* Avoid the thirteen mistakes common to dashboard design
* Provide viewers with the information they need quickly and clearly
* Apply what we now know about visual perception to the visual presentation of information
* Minimize distractions, cliches, and unnecessary embellishments that create confusion
* Organize business information to support meaning and usability
* Create an aesthetically pleasing viewing experience
* Maintain consistency of design to provide accurate interpretation
* Optimize the power of dashboard technology by pairing it with visual effectiveness
Stephen Few has over 20 years of experience as an IT innovator, consultant, and educator. As Principal of the consultancy Perceptual Edge, Stephen focuses on data visualization for analyzing and communicating quantitative business information. He provides consulting and training services, speaks frequently at conferences, and teaches in the MBA program at the University of California in Berkeley. He is also the author of Show Me the Numbers: Designing Tables and Graphs to Enlighten.

Adobe Dreamweaver CS4 Classroom in a Book


The fastest, easiest, most comprehensive way to learn Adobe Dreamweaver CS4

Adobe Dreamweaver CS4 Classroom in a Book contains 11 lessons. The book covers the basics of learning Adobe Dreamweaver and provides countless tips and techniques to help you become more productive with the program. You can follow the book from start to finish or choose only those lessons that interest you.

Learn how to create and manage web sites, build rich interactive interfaces, incorporate graphics, text, and video, and use Photoshop Smart Objects.

“The Classroom in a Book series is by far the best training material on the market. Everything you need to master the software is included: clear explanations of each lesson, step-by-step instructions, and the project files for the students.” —Barbara Binder, Adobe Certified Instructor, Rocky Mountain Training

Classroom in a Book®, the best-selling series of hands-on software training workbooks, helps you learn the features of Adobe software quickly and easily. Classroom in a Book offers what no other book or training program does—an official training series from Adobe Systems incorporated, developed with the support of Adobe product experts.

Hello World! Computer Programming for Kids and Other Beginners


"Computer programming is a powerful tool for children to 'learn learning,' that is, to learn the skills of thinking and problem-solving...Children who engage in programming transfer that kind of learning to other things."--Nicholas Negroponte, the man behind the One Laptop Per Child project that hopes to put a computer in the hands of every child on earth, January 2008


Your computer won't respond when you yell at it. Why not learn to talk to your computer in its own language? Whether you want to write games, start a business, or you're just curious, learning to program is a great place to start. Plus, programming is fun!


Hello World! provides a gentle but thorough introduction to the world of computer programming. It's written in language a 12-year-old can follow, but anyone who wants to learn how to program a computer can use it. Even adults. Written by Warren Sande and his son, Carter, and reviewed by professional educators, this book is kid-tested and parent-approved.


You don't need to know anything about programming to use the book. But you should know the basics of using a computer--e-mail, surfing the web, listening to music, and so forth. If you can start a program and save a file, you should have no trouble using this book.

About the Author
Warren Sande is an Electronic Systems Engineer who uses Python (and other languages) in his work, and also uses it to help teach his son about computers and programming. He holds a degree in Electronic Systems Engineering from the University of Regina, Saskatchewan as well as a Diploma in Communication Arts, specializing in Broadcasting, from the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology. He has taught introductory software courses to computer novices.

Carter Sande is a bright, curious, energetic, and thoughtful boy who loves computers, playing the piano, bouncing on the trampoline, and Pokemon. He has been playing and experimenting with computers from a very young age.

Thursday, August 6, 2009

Envisioning Information


A remarkable range of examples for the idea of visual thinking, with beautifully printed pages. A real treat for all who reason and learn by means of images. -- Rudolf Arnheim
A beautiful, magnificent sequel to his classic,

The Visual Display of Quantitative Information -- American Mathematical Society

A beautifully illustrated, well-argued volume. -- Scientific American

Office 2007 All-in-One Desk Reference For Dummies


Product Description

* Revised and updated to cover changes to all of Office's applications and productivity tools
* Offers beyond-the-basics coverage of Office word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, e-mail, databases, and desktop publishing
* Covers Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint, Outlook, Publisher, productivity tools such as Microsoft OneNote, and SharePoint
* Thoroughly updated to cover the new Office interface as well as new features in each application



From the Back Cover
8 books in 1 — your key to Office 2007 success!

Your one-stop guide to solving Office problems and getting work accomplished.

Office 2207 gives you a set of tools for managing documents and data, analyzing numbers, organizing your e-mail and schedule, building presentations, and designing publications - and this book covers them all! Get the scoop on all the Office programs, find out how to supercharge your productivity by using them together, and much more.
Discover how to:

*
Proofread text in Word
*
Crunch numbers in Excel
*
Corral data with Access
*
Subdue junk mail with Outlook
*
Pack punch into your presentations
*
Publish brochures and newsletters

The Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 Book for Digital Photographers


Written in concert with Adobe's development of the Photoshop Lightroom 2 Beta, The Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 Book for Digital Photographers - by #1 bestselling computer and technology author, Scott Kelby - is the most complete and concise Lightroom "how-to" book for digital photographers of all skill levels.

In The Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 Book for Digital Photographers, Scott walks readers through the basics of Lightroom use, leading them to a brilliantly devised and super efficient digital photography workflow that dramatically improves productivity and allows photographers to spend less time processing photos and more time shooting them.

Throughout the book Scott shares his personal camera and Lightroom settings, as well as the studio-tested techniques he's developed for his own photography workflow. The book is written in his trademark step-by-step, plain English style, and because he knows what really works and what doesn't, he isn't shy to tell you flat out which tools to use, which to avoid, and why. This allows digital photographers of any skill level to jump right in using Lightroom like a pro from the very start, sidestepping a lot of the frustrations that typically haunt those unfamiliar with new applications…especially those as powerful as Lightroom.

What really sets The Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 Book for Digital Photographers apart from other Lightroom books on the market are the last two bonus chapters where Scott answers the questions, "In exactly what order am I supposed to do things in Lightoom," and "Where does Photoshop fit in to the mix?" Both chapters start with an on-location photo shoot, including full details on the equipment, camera settings, and lighting techniques. Readers then witness as he takes the photos from each shoot through the entire workflow process, to the final output of the 16"x20" prints. And, because he incorporates Photoshop seamlessly right into this workflow, you'll learn some of the latest Photoshop techniques for portrait and landscape photography as well.
If you're one of those people who learns best by actually doing the projects yourself; who learns best without all the complicated technical explanations and confusing jargon, and if you really want to start using Lightroom today to unlock the productivity secrets of "The new digital photography workflow,"---there is no faster, more "straight-to-the-point" or more fun way to learn than this groundbreaking new book, and you are absolutely going to love it!

Programming Entity Framework


Programming Entity Framework is a thorough introduction to Microsoft's new core framework for modeling and interacting with data in .NET applications. This highly-acclaimed book not only gives experienced developers a hands-on tour of the Entity Framework and explains its use in a variety of applications, it also provides a deep understanding of its architecture and APIs. Although this book is based on the first version of Entity Framework, it will continue to be extremely valuable as you shift to the Entity Framework version in .NET Framework 4.0 and Visual Studio 2010. From the Entity Data Model (EDM) and Object Services to EntityClient and the Metadata Workspace, this book covers it all.t

Excel 2007 Power Programming with VBA


* This book is a single reference that’s indispensable for Excel beginners, intermediate users, power users, and would-be power users everywhere
* Fully updated for the new release, this latest edition provides comprehensive, soup-to-nuts coverage, delivering over 900 pages of Excel tips, tricks, and techniques readers won’t find anywhere else
* John Walkenbach, aka "Mr. Spreadsheet," is one of the world’s leading authorities on Excel
* Thoroughly updated to cover the revamped Excel interface, new file formats, enhanced interactivity with other Office applications, and upgraded collaboration features
* Includes a valuable CD-ROM with templates and worksheets from the book

Learn Objective–C on the Mac


Take your coding skills to the next level with this extensive guide to Objective–C, the native programming language for developing sophisticated software applications for Mac OS X. Objective–C is a powerful, object–oriented extension of C, making this book the perfect follow–up to Dave Mark’s best–selling Learn C on the Mac, Mac OS X Edition. Whether you’re an experienced C programmer or you’re coming from a different language such as C++ or Java, leading Mac experts Mark Dalrymple and Scott Knaster show you how to harness the powers of Objective–C in your applications!

* A complete course on the basics of Objective–C using Apple’s free Xcode tools
* An introduction to object–oriented programming
* Comprehensive coverage of inheritance, composition, object initialization, categories, protocols, memory management, and organizing source files
* A brief tour of Cocoa’s Foundation framework and AppKit
* A helpful “learning curve” guide for non–C developers


What you’ll learn

* Learn Objective–C programming, the gateway to programming your Mac or iPhone.
* Write applications for the Mac OS X interface, the cleanest user–interface around.
* Understand variables and how to design your own data structures.
* Work with the file system.
* Connect to data sources and the Internet.


Who is this book for?

For anyone wanting to learn to program native applications in Mac OS X, including developers new to the Mac, developers new to Objective–C, or students entirely new to programming.
About the Author

Mark Dalrymple has been a Mac developer since 1985 and a Unix programmer since 1990. Over the years, he has worked on projects ranging from cross–platform development toolkits, to high–performance web server software servicing hundreds of millions of hits per day, medical applications, and video products for Hollywood. He is the coauthor of Core Mac OS X and Unix Programming and Advanced Mac OS X Programming.


Scott Knaster is a legendary Mac hacker and author of such best–selling books as Hacking Mac OS X Tiger and Macintosh Programming Secrets. His book How to Write Macintosh Software was required reading for Mac programmers for more than a decade.
Product Details

Neuromancer



From Library Journal
Neuromancer is a fitting commemoration of the tenth anniversary of publication of Gibson's Nebula, Hugo, and Philip K. Dick Award-winning novel. The text is abridged, read by the author, and enhanced with music, sound effects, and other audio engineering. The plot contains sex, drugs, black market body parts, virtual reality, electronic relationships, pleasure palaces, murder, mayhem, cloned assassins, and intrigue in cyberspace, with nary a virtual nice guy in the mix. Wow! There's just enough time to take a deep breath between cassettes, as the listener is bombarded with strong language, tumultuous violence, and compelling imagery. Terrific stuff. Gibson's horrifying vision of our terrible headlong rush to nowhere is a must for science fiction and adult fiction collections.
Cliff Glaviano, Bowling Green State Univ. Libs., Ohio
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, from Edison to Google


From Publishers Weekly
While it may seem that we're in the midst of an unprecedented technological transition, Carr (Does IT Matter?) posits that the direction of the digital revolution has a strong historical corollary: electrification. Carr argues that computing, no longer personal, is going the way of a power utility. Manufacturers used to provide their own power (i.e., windmills and waterwheels) until they plugged into the electric grid a hundred years ago. According to Carr, we're in the midst of a similar transition in computing, moving from our own private hard drives to the computer as access portal. Soon all companies and individuals will outsource their computing systems, from programming to data storage, to companies with big hard drives in out-of-the-way places. Carr's analysis of the recent past is clear and insightful as he examines common computing tools that are embedded in the Internet instead of stored on a hard drive, including Google and YouTube. The social and economic consequences of this transition into the utility age fall somewhere between uncertain and grim, Carr argues. Wealth will be further consolidated into the hands of a few, and specific industries, publishing in particular, will perish at the hands of crowdsourcing and the unbundling of content. However, Carr eschews an entirely dystopian vision for the future, hypothesizing without prognosticating. Perhaps lucky for us, he leaves a great number of questions unanswered. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Review
'Information is born free, but everywhere is found in chains.' So Nicholas Carr—in his latest and characteristically stimulating challenge to conventional thinking about technology—might have paraphrased Rousseau. (Democracy )

The Big Switch ... will almost certainly influence a large audience. Carr persuasively argues that we're moving from the era of the personal computer to an age of utility computing - by which he means the expansion of grid computing, the distribution of computing and storage over the Internet, until it accounts for the bulk of what the human race does digitally. And he nicely marshals his historical analogies, detailing how electricity delivered over a grid supplanted the various power sources used during most of the 19th century ... I also suspect he's right to suggest that in a decade or so, many things we now believe permanent will have disappeared. (Technology Review )

The Big Switch explains the future of computing in terms so simple I can understand them. (Ed Cone - Greensboro News-Record )

The Big Switch is thought-provoking and an enjoyable read, and the history of American electricity that makes up the first half of the book is riveting stuff. Further, the book broadly reinforces the point that it's always wise to distrust utopias, technological or otherwise. (The New York Post )

A leading technological rabble-rouser prognosticates a world beyond Web 2.0. [Carr's] broader sociological observations are punctuated by a pair of ominously prescient chapters about privacy issues and cyberterrorism. (Kirkus Reviews )

An enjoyable and thought-provoking read. (GigaOm )

Carr is one of the more cogent writers on the economic and social implications of the changes sweeping through corporate data centres. (Financial Times )

Carr may take a somewhat apocalyptic view of the vast technological and social issues which a move to utility computing will raise, not least those of privacy, ownership and access, but he makes a compelling case for its desirability in a world where the network is pervasive. Whether we go gently into this world is, of course, up to us, but with the insight offered here we will at least be prepared to understand the consequences of our choices earlier in the process rather than later. (New Humanist )

Carr stimulates, provokes and entertains superbly. (Information Age )

Carr’s analysis of the recent past is clear and insightful as he examines common computing tools that are embedded in the Internet instead of stored on a hard drive, including Google and YouTube. (Publishers Weekly )

Considered and erudite. (The Telegraph )

Lucid and accessible ... [Carr's] account is one of high journalism, rather than of a social or computer scientist. His book should be read by anyone interested in the shift from the world wide web and its implications for industry, work and our information environment. (Times Higher Education Supplement )

Magisterial ... Draws an elegant and illuminating parallel between the late-19th-century electrification of America and today's computing world. (Salon )

Mr. Carr is always interesting. (Washington Times )

Mr. Carr's provocations are destined to influence CEOs and the boards and investors that support them as companies grapple with the constant change of the digital age. (The Wall Street Journal )

Nick Carr has written a meditation on the loss of the old when confronted by the new, the loss of the incumbents' advantage when history shifts under them, the loss of data control to third parties, and the loss of sovereignty to institutions and other actors we can't control. (Public CIO )

Persuasive, well-researched, authoritative and convincing....He's reasonable in his conclusions and moderate in his extrapolations. This is an exceedingly good book. (Techworld )

Quick, clear read on an important theme ... Scary? No doubt. But as we prepare for the World Wide Computer, it's not a bad idea to consider its dark side. (Business Week )

Starred Review. Carr created a huge rift in the business community with his first book, Does IT Matter?, challenging the conventional wisdom that information technology provides a competitive advantage. Here he examines the future of the Internet, which he says may one day completely replace the desktop PC as all computing services are delivered over the Net as a utility, the Internet morphing into one giant 'World Wide Computer.' ... Carr warns that the downside of the World Wide Computer may mean further concentration of wealth for the few, and the loss of jobs, privacy, and the depth of our culture. (Booklist )

Programming in Objective-C 2.0


Product Description

THE #1 BEST SELLING BOOK ON OBJECTIVE-C 2.0!


From the author of Programming in C,Programming in Objective-C 2.0 provides the new programmer a complete, step-by-step introduction to the Objective-C language. The book does not assume previous experience with either C or object-oriented programming languages, and it includes many detailed, practical examples of how to put Objective-C to use in your everyday programming needs.


Objective-C has become the standard programming language for application development on the Mac OS X and iPhone platforms. A powerful yet simple object-oriented programming language that’s based on the C programming language, Objective-C is widely available not only on OS X but across many operating systems that support the gcc compiler, including Linux, Unix, and Windows systems.



The second edition of this book has been updated and expanded to cover Objective-C 2.0. It shows not only how to take advantage of the Foundation framework’s rich built-in library of classes but also how to use the iPhone SDK to develop programs designed specifically for the iPhone and iPod Touch.