JavaScript and Ajax for the Web, Sixth Edition Review

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JavaScript and Ajax for the Web, Sixth Edition ReviewThe audience for this book is beginning/novice web developers with a knowledge of HTML but not of JavaScript. The book begins with an introduction to basic JavaScript language features and then proceeds to work through a number of examples according to category (images, frames, browser windows, forms, regular expressions and strings, user events, and cookies). After, there are two chapters on AJAX fundamentals.
The book does not claim to be an in-depth resource. The general purpose of the QuickStart series of books is to provide an overview of the main concepts and practices in use by web developers today. It is meant to be a STARTING POINT to introduce novices to technologies, not as an in-depth reference. The authors of this and other QuickStart books point this out continually, yet still get bad reviews from people who have not taken the time to read about the purposes of various series from technical publishers. This is unfortunate for the public as well as unfair to the authors.
A previous reviewer mentioned what he took to be atrocious coverage of Ajax. The book contains two chapters exclusively covering Ajax. The first covers the fundamental techniques used to take advantage of this combination of technologies. The second chapter explores some of the popular Ajax toolkits currently available. This is consistent with the purpose of the book. Some readers may be interested in heading down the development path, yet others may be more interested in design and in using pre-existing tools. This book caters to both and has no intention of deceiving either reader.
The following quote is a good example of this. It is an excerpt from the title page of Chapter 16, which follows the introductory chapter (basic XMLHttpRequest usage, etc.) and precedes the Ajax toolkit chapter:
"[Writing] Ajax applications can be difficult. They often require a great deal of knowledge of working with the DOM, CSS, JavaScript, and server resources. Since this is a book for beginning scripters, we've shown you how to do some easy things with Ajax, so you can see that learning Ajax techniques is well within your reach. But many books have been written that are completely devoted to showing intermediate-to-advanced scripters how to create Ajax applications, and our Ajax chapters are no substitute for that kind of in-depth exploration."
As for the dual-column formatting that some reviewers disliked, it is consistent with the formatting of the entire QuickStart series, as well as the QuickPro series of the same publisher. The format is nice for tackling specific techniques in a concise amount of space. It is not as abstractly engaging as conventional technical books, but it is not meant to be. The format is excellent for explaining techniques (especial design techniques) as well as for conveying a sense of quick forward momentum.
I've only recently started reading books from Peachpit Press. I like these books because they get me up to speed quickly, and act as a comprehensive starting point, allowing me to understand "where I need to go from here."
This book is excellent as a broad introduction with lots of real-world examples. If you're a novice web developer with a decent grasp of HTML wishing for a comprehensive introduction to JavaScript and practical JavaScript techniques, this is the book for you.
However, if you're well-grounded and are looking for more in-depth coverage of JavaScript and Ajax techniques, "Professional JavaScript for Web Developers" (Nicholas Zakas / Wrox Press) and "Professional Ajax" (Zakas, et. al. / Wrox Press) are excellent in-depth resources geared toward real-world professional development, and both are among the best peer-reviewed titles in existence on these subjects.JavaScript and Ajax for the Web, Sixth Edition OverviewNeed to learn JavaScript fast? This best-selling reference's visualformat and step-by-step, task-based instructions will have you up andrunning with JavaScript in no time. In this completely updated editionof our best-selling guide to JavaScript, leading Web and computingexperts Tom Negrino and Dori Smith use crystal-clear instructions andfriendly prose to introduce you to all of today's JavaScriptessentials. Along the way, you'll find extensive coverage of Ajax andXML techniques, current browsers (Opera, Safari, Firefox), and more. Visual QuickStart Guide--the quick and easy way to learn!
Easy visual approach uses pictures to guide you through JavaScript and show you what to do.
Concise steps and explanations get you up and running in no time.
Page for page, the best content and value around.
Companion Web site at www.javascriptworld.com offers sample scripts, updates, and more!


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Hacker Debugging Uncovered (Uncovered series) Review

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Hacker Debugging Uncovered (Uncovered series) ReviewFirst, a word about the publisher, A-List. This book was delayed time and time again. So much so that I had this book preordered for over a year. This sort of thing is just unacceptable, and would make me inclined to not purchase any books from this publisher in the future, and some of the rating I gave it is because of the publisher.
This book has a much larger unix focus than the 'Hacker Disassembling Uncovered' which was largely windows based, however the author's relative unfamiliarity with unix tends to show.
For example, on page 39 the author states:
IDA Pro, the best disassembler of all times, is nw available under Linux! Users of FreeBSD and other operating systems will have to be content with the console Windows version started under the emulator or have to work on native MS-DOS, OS/2, and Windows.
Unfortunately, the author does not mention (or does not know?) that the OS2 and DOS4GW products were discontinued when the linux version was released. Additionally, FreeBSD (and OpenBSD and NetBSD) can easily run linux binaries by mapping the system calls. It's a very cheap way to run linux binaries, and it was acomplished for OpenBSD within a day or so of the 4.7 release. A much cleaner way is available now; others have managed to do the same for FreeBSD, and NetBSD is likely to be straihtforward as well.
There's also some problems with the book that confuse me. For example, on page 432 the author states the following:The C programming language doesn't allow you to declare functions
returning pointers to functions, because this declaration is recursively
looped.
I simply do not know where he pulled this from. The following small C example demonstrates how to do just this:
#include
int (*HelloWorld(void))(int,int);
int helloworld(int a, int b)
{
printf("hello world: %d %d\n", a, b);
return 0;
}
int main(void)
{
int (*foo)(int, int) = HelloWorld();
foo(1,2);
return 0;
}
int (*HelloWorld(void))(int, int)
{
return helloworld;
}
And here is it being compiled:
brian@lemon:~> gcc -ansi -std=c89 -Wall -o foo foo.c
brian@lemon:~>
and here is it being run:
brian@lemon:~> ./foo
hello world: 1 2
brian@lemon:~>
On to the actual content of the book, it's largely okay. However, if you are expecting new antidebugging ideas, or even ideas hackers are actually going to use, you are in for a rather unfortunate surprise.
When I purchased this book, I sort of expected it would keep the duplication from Hacker Disassembling Uncovered to a minimum, but I found that the amount of the book dedicated to static analysis (ie: disassembling and the line) is significant. Far more significant than it should be; nearly the first half of the book is filled with static analysis stuff, working on straightforward crackmes (similar to the previous book in the series), and so forth. This strikes me as fluff in order to boost the price the publisher can charge.
Once you get past these negative parts, you have an okay book about (mostly) antidebugging techniques, and some debugging techniques. There's also the requisite PE injection section (sorry, no elf version) along with some basic PE documentation (also no elf version of this).
There's quite a bit here if you want a broad ovrview of binary analysis using both static and dynamic analysis. There's nothing new here at all, but if you'd like a bunch of things all in one place, this book may be useful, dispite its many flaws.Hacker Debugging Uncovered (Uncovered series) OverviewTips for the practical use of debuggers, such as NuMega SoftIce, Microsoft Visual Studio Debugger, and Microsoft Kernel Debugger, with minimum binding to a specific environment are disclosed in this debugger guide. How debuggers operate and how to overcome obstacles and repair debuggers is demonstrated. Programmers will learn how to look at what is inside a computer system, how to reconstruct the operating algorithm of a program distributed without source code, how to modify the program, and how to debug drivers. The use of debugging applications and drivers in Windows and Unix operating systems on Intel Pentium/DEC Alpha-based processors is also detailed.

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CSS: The Definitive Guide Review

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CSS: The Definitive Guide Review§
When Eric wrote the first edition of this book way back at the turn of the millenium, he proposed to "explain CSS in all its warts and glory." For CSS enthusiasts at the time, that was an advance -- every other author and Web lecturer fixated on the warts!
Six years have changed a lot. CSS, as a tool of modern Web professionals, has moved way beyond its former role as window-dressing for HTML. HTML (and XML) work in partnership with CSS to produce the most logical and yet most flexible page structure that defines current Web document standards.
The book has just about all you need as both a reference and basic how-to. Eric concentrates on the CSS properties and techniques that have real support among browsers. This increases the practical value of the book. Discussion of CSS selectors has been expanded to reflect the growing support for more powerful (and complex!) selector syntax. Most pages have multiple illustrations to clarify text. The book has updated information related to Firefox and IE7.
One disappointment was the sparse coverage of print media styles. Admittedly, browser support of print styling is itself disappointing but a lot of printing is done from the browser and there are still lots of things we can do, as Eric shows in some of his other writings.
Eric's ongoing experience with key real-life Web issues and design knowledge binds the material together and makes this a superior book.
§CSS: The Definitive Guide OverviewCSS: The Definitive Guide, 3rd Edition, provides you with a comprehensive guide to CSS implementation, along with a thorough review of all aspects of CSS 2.1. Updated to cover Internet Explorer 7, Microsoft's vastly improved browser, this new edition includes content on positioning, lists and generated content, table layout, user interface, paged media, and more.
Simply put, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a way to separate a document's structure from its presentation. The benefits of this can be quite profound: CSS allows a much richer document appearance than HTML and also saves time--you can create or change the appearance of an entire document in just one place; and its compact file size makes web pages load quickly.

Author Eric Meyer tackles the subject with passion, exploring in detail each individual CSS property and how it interacts with other properties. You'll not only learn how to avoid common mistakes in interpretation, you also will benefit from the depth and breadth of his experience and his clear and honest style. This is the complete sourcebook on CSS.

The 3rd edition contains:

Updates to reflect changes in the latest draft version of CSS 2.1
Browser notes updated to reflect changes between IE6 and IE7
Advanced selectors supported in IE7 and other major browsers included
A new round of technical edits by a fresh set of editors
Clarifications and corrected errata, including updated URLs of referenced online resources


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Disassembling Code: IDA Pro and SoftICE Review

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Disassembling Code: IDA Pro and SoftICE ReviewIf you don't know anything about what is a disassembler or a debugger, then you may find this book interesting. Personally, i bought it because i thought it would go in deep in IDA and softice. Unfortunately, the author cover both of those tools within 100 pages giving nothing more than a summary of commands. All the remaining content is about assembly (that is if you don't understand anything in the intel reference books), the PE format (studying PEDump and reading Matt Pietrek article would be better), some little cracking sessions (the free articles on the net are far enough for this purpose), some other tools like W32dasm and disassembling some sample windows programs.
Well, i am disappointed and still waiting for a good reference book about reverse engineering.Disassembling Code: IDA Pro and SoftICE OverviewThis book describes how software code analysis tools such as IDA Pro are used to disassemble programs written in high-level languages and recognize different elements of disassembled code in order to debug applications in less time. Also described are the basics of Assembly language programming (MASM) and the system and format of commands for the Intel microprocessor. Aspects of disassembling, analyzing, and debugging software code are considered in detail, and an overview of contemporary disassemblers and debuggers used when analyzing executable code is provided. The basics of working with these tools and their operating principles are also included, and emphasis is placed on analyzing software code and identifying the main structure of those languages in which they were written.

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Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software Review

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Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software ReviewI think that this is the best book that I have read all year. In some sense this is the book that I have been looking for for twenty-five years--the book that will enable me to understand how a computer does what it does. And--given the centrality of computers in our age--it has been a long wait. But now it is over. Charles Petzold (1999), Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software does a much better job than anything else I have ever seen in explaining computers--what they really are, and how they really work.
Have you ever wondered just how your computers really work? I mean, really, really work. Not as in "an electrical signal from memory tells the processor the number to be added," but what the electrical signal is, and how it accomplishes the magic of switching on the circuits that add while switching off the other circuits that would do other things with the number. I have. I have wondered this a lot over the past decades.
Yet somehow over the past several decades my hunger for an explanation has never been properly met. I have listened to people explain how two switches wired in series are an "AND"--only if both switches are closed will the lightbulb light. I have listened to people explain how IP is a packet-based communications protocol and TCP is a connection-based protocol yet the connection-based protocal can ride on top of the packet-based protocol. Somehow these explanations did not satisfy. One seemed like answering "how does a car work?" by telling how in the presence of oxygen carbon-hydrogen bonds are broken and carbon dioxide and water are created. The other seemed like anwering "how does a car work" by telling how if you step on the accelerator the car moves forward.
Charles Petzold is different. He has hit the sweet spot exactly. Enough detail to satisfy anyone. Yet the detail is quickly built up as he ascends to higher and higher levels of explanation. It remains satisfying, but it also hangs together in a big picture.
In fact, my only complaint is that the book isn't long enough. It is mostly a hardware book (unless you want to count Morse Code and the interpretation of flashing light bulbs as "software." By my count there are twenty chapters on hardware, and five on software. In my view only five chapters on software--one on ASCII, one on operating systems, one on floating-point arithmetic, one on high-level languages, and one on GUIs--is about ten too few. (Moreover, at one key place in his explanation (but only one) he waves his hands. He argues that it is possible to use the operation codes stored in memory to control which circuits in the processor are active. But he doesn't show how it is done.)
Charles Petzold's explanatory strategy is to start with the telegraph: with how opening and closing a switch can send an electrical signal down a wire. And he wants to build up, step by step, from that point to end with our modern computers. At the end he hopes that the reader can look back--from the graphical user interface to the high-level language software constructions that generate it, from the high-level language software constructions to the machine-language code that underlies it, from the machine-language code to the electrical signals that load, store, and add bits into the computer's processor and into the computer's memory.
But it doesn't stop there. It goes further down into how to construct an accumulator or a memory bank from logic gates. And then it goes down to how to build logic gates--either out of transistors or telegraph relays. And then deeper down, into how the electrons actually move through a transistor or through a relay and a wire.
And at the end I could look back and say, yes, I understand how this machine works in a way that I didn't understand it before. Before I understood electricity and maybe an AND gate, and I understood high level languages. But the whole vast intermediate realm was fuzzy. Now it is much clearer. I can go from the loop back to the conditional jump back to the way that what is stored in memory is fed into the processor back to the circuits that set the program counter back to the logic gates, and finally back to the doped silicon that makes up the circuit.
So I recommend this book to everyone. It is a true joy to read. And I at least could feel my mind expanding as I read it.Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software Overview
What do flashlights, the British invasion, black cats, and seesaws have to do with computers? In CODE, they show us the ingenious ways we manipulate language and invent new means of communicating with each other. And through CODE, we see how this ingenuity and our very human compulsion to communicate have driven the technological innovations of the past two centuries.

Using everyday objects and familiar language systems such as Braille and Morse code, author Charles Petzold weaves an illuminating narrative for anyone who's ever wondered about the secret inner life of computers and other smart machines.

It's a cleverly illustrated and eminently comprehensible story—and along the way, you'll discover you've gained a real context for understanding today's world of PCs, digital media, and the Internet. No matter what your level of technical savvy, CODE will charm you—and perhaps even awaken the technophile within.


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