Analyzing and Troubleshooting Network Traffic
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
  4.0
On Apr 2, 2014 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Very good short book. Missing SSL
I usually don't start with this, but lately I had some time constraints that made me wondering if is right to use so much time reading books. The Wireshark Field Guide Analyzing and Troubleshooting Network Traffic by Robert J. Shimonski is only 149 pages long (if we cut the introduction, indexes, etc. it boils down to 128 pages). Full Review >
|
Services for a Changing World
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Oct 15, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Good book, mainly for basic users
The API are now becoming more used every day. Today every major website provides it's own set of API and often the company websites and services are chosen (or not chosen) based on the availability of API and their design.
In this huge world that is getting bigger every day, RESTful API plays a huge role, in fact a lot of companies are moving their API to RESTful API since it's easier to use, therefore more attractive for potential clients. Full Review >
|
Learn (Just Enough) to Make (Just About) Anything
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Oct 2, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Very good book
When I opened this book I was impressed on the image/text ratio. Being a Maker Media product, I thought it was somehow similar to the Make magazine. I was very wrong: in the whole book there are less then 10 images/photos. Full Review >
|
Preparing, Sharing, and Analyzing Complex Information
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Sep 26, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Awesome book
As you probably know, I usually do not comment the books layout, being more focused on the contents of a book instead of it’s layout.
This time I will start this review speaking about the layout of this book since it’s REALLY peculiar. The Introduction is written in a two-columns layout, very similar to the Science magazine layout. The book itself is written in a single column layout, still with a “Science like†look. What shocked me a little bit about this is the sense of old scientific document that this book has.This is true until you read the first few pages. As soon as you do it, the sense of old scientific document disappears quickly.
Full Review >
|
Hiding in Plain Sight Online
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
3.0
On Sep 25, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Good book, too expensive
The anonymity on the web is probably one of the most debated topics on the web. Is possible to be completely anonymous? The short answer is no. This book tries to help the read to improve its anonymity, staying is the “real worldâ€Â, as the “Practical†world in the title suggests. In this book you will not find anything that is too complex for an average user.
Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Sep 24, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Good book, bad CD
After few months after the review of CompTIA Security+ Rapid Review, I’m now here to speak about it’s bigger brother: the Training kit.
With its 569 pages, this book is more than twice the length of the Rapid Review one. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Sep 23, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Awesome book, some statistics are old
Hadoop is today a industry-standard software for the Big Data and this book it’s the industry-standard book for Hadoop. This book is able to bring you from no knowledge about Hadoop and the Big Data to a full knowledge of Hadoop and it’s usage.
The book is split in 16 chapters and 3 appendix for a total of 628 pages of contents. This make ~33 pages for chapter so it’s easy to read and to find what you need. This is very important since – even if it’s possible – it’s rare that this kind of book is read cover-to-cover.
Full Review >
|
Detecting and Preventing Web Application Security Problems
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Sep 5, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: A must read for every developer
Have you ever thought that the website you are developing or using is secure? Well, this book will make you change your opinion. This book will change your idea of security and therefor you’ll start to see anything as “probably having some security glitchâ€Â. Full Review >
|
The Authoritative Guide to Understanding the Concepts Surrounding Logging and Log Management
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Sep 3, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Good book, sometimes seems a little out of date
Logs are one of the most powerful tools in the sysadmin hands, and probably of all kind of IT roles.
This book does deep into the logs and their management.
One of the aspects that I really liked about this book is the division of the text in chapters. Full Review >
|
A Hands-On Video Workshop
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Aug 29, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Really good video, full of contents
As the name suggests, this set of videos is for developers. HTML 4 and Javascript are often used without much explaination about the JS code it self but only about the HTML5 Canvas part.
I felt to point this out immediately since I’ve not found it on the O’Reilly page, but I believe that is really important to specify. Another thing that I’d like to point out is that (as it is easy to imagine, but not obvious) these videos only speak about 2D graphics in HTML (therefore there will no WebGL topics).After these two notes (that will not influence in any way my judgement about the videos), let’s start talking about the videos. Full Review >
|
Tracking Dynamic Host and Application Metrics at Scale
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Aug 27, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: An awesome book to an awesome tool
Ganglia is the most robust and scalable tool for performance monitor I’ve tried or heard of.
This book, written by some of the top contributor of the project, is an awesome guide to Ganglia.
Due to its organization and the authors writing style, the book is easy to understand and can be read as a “full-guide†reading it from the first page to the last one, or a reference book reading only the parts that are relevant to you in that specific moment. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Aug 23, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Awesome book
When someone says the word “wirelessâ€Â, 99.9% of the audience thinks at the Wireless Networking Technologies (802.11 family). Very few think to the Bluetooth. Even fewer people think to all the other technologies that use wireless technology to work, such as cordless phone, guard radios, headsets, wireless camera etc. This book embrace the last point of view.
Full Review >
|
The Penetration Tester's Guide
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Jun 15, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Really good book
Metasploit is the most common and complete framework for testing security. Metasploit is an entire suite of tools and methodologies designed for testing the security of computers and networks. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On May 20, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Good book, layout improvements to do
After Microsoft’s CompTIA A+ Training Kit, here I am reviewing the Microsoft’s A+ Rapid Review. This book is really similar to the book CompTIA Security+ Rapid Review (this too by Microsoft Press). Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On May 19, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Digital Capture After Dark by Philipp Scholz Rittermann, Amanda Quintenz-Fiedler (Rocky Nook)
This book does cover one of the hardest topic that are present in digital photography. In fact, the photographies in the dark are the are the ones which are more frequently bad looking. The book provides with a big amount of techniques and tips covering equipment, the actual taking of the image, and post-production. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Feb 27, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Really cool Make issue
It's Make! I think Make is one of the greatest, if not the greatest magazine available worldwide.
I think that this is a really cool number of Make. As it usually happens to me, the part I like the most i the "Projects part", in which I always find awesome ideas. Full Review >
|
A Historian And A Futurist Journey Through Steampunk Into The Future of Technology
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Feb 14, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Great Journey in the Steampunk culture
This book initially shocked me. When I downloaded it, it was a 140 Mb so I thought it was full of drawings and comics. As soon as I opened the file I saw it was nothing I thought it would have been.
Full Review >
|
A Guide to Engineering Experiences
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Feb 12, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Must-have book
When I read the first lines of the description "Ready to give your design skills a real boost? This eye-opening book helps you explore the design structure behind most of today’s hit video games. You’ll learn principles and practices for crafting games that generate emotionally charged experiencesâ€â€a combination of elegant game mechanics, compelling fiction, and pace that fully immerses players." on the O'Reilly website I thought it was a very well thought eye-catcher phrase to sell more books. Reading the book I understand that the phrase is 100% truthful. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Feb 11, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Good book, with small changes can be great
I come to this book less than a month after reviewing the 70-410 Exam Ref. As the title may suggest, this book is tailored to the preparation of the Microsoft 70-413 exam. Speaking of the exam, I have to advice that the book does cover any exam objective, but does not cover every exam question. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
3.0
On Feb 2, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Good book if you need basic information
When I’ve seen this book I had no idea about what I was going to find inside it.
As the title suggests, the book is pretty short (the PDF version count 161 pages) and so it’s really a few reading hours.
The book is divided in 5 chapters:
1. Planning: this chapter covers the Business Plan and all the accessories planning. From my experience (and the author too) a good plan is mandatory if you don’t want see your great idea failing.
Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Jan 20, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Great book, bad CD
Reading this book has helped me a lot understanding better how the A+ exam works. This book is tailored for the CompTIA A+ certification (and this led me to this book instead of another one, since I’m looking forward to take this certification).
Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Jan 14, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Great book, bad layout
After the CompTIA Network+ Training Kit I find myself to review the CompTIA Security+ Rapid Exam Review.
This book is pretty short (258 pages long) but is very dense. It is divided into 6 chapters + one appendix.
For each atomic argument, the author does propose 1 to 3 True-or-False questions, their answer and the explanation. I did like the question-answer approach, since you understand immediately which is your level, therefore you can understand which parts you have to cover more and which less. What I did not liked at all about this structure is the layout. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Jan 2, 2013 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Great book, bad CD
Reading this book has helped me a lot understanding better how the networking works. This book is tailored for the CompTIA Network+ certification (and this led me to this book instead of another one, since I'm looking forward to take this certification. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Dec 28, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Awesome material :)
When I’ve been selected to review, I was shocked by the amount of material that is hidden in this product.
This is more than 100 hours of videos of the Strata and Hadoop World conference.
The material is divided in three sections: Keynotes (14 videos), Tutorials (64 videos) and Sessions (81 videos). Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Dec 21, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Exam Ref 70-410: Installing and Configuring Windows Server 2012 by Craig Zacker, Microsoft Press
This in not an O'Reilly book, even if you have found it on the O'Reilly website. In fact this book has been published by the Microsoft Press. Maybe this is a good thing, since we are talking about Windows Server, one of the main Microsoft products. Who can speak about Windows better than its creator?
As the title may suggest, this book is tailored to the preparation of the Microsoft 70-410 exam. On the exam topic, I have to advice that the book does cover any exam objective, but does not cover every exam question. Full Review >
|
Cross-Platform Mobile Development for Android and iPhone
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Nov 29, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: 20 Recipes for Programming PhoneGap
This book starts with a little introduction and with the instructions to setup the environment. After this, the book starts at full speed with "the Recipes". The structure based on Recipes is what I liked the of this book.
Every Recipe has the structure:
- Problem
- Solution
- Discussion
I think that this is a very powerful structure because in this way we can learn from the obstacles that each one of us can encounter in his way while coding. Also, this structure, gives to the reader the choice of what read when. In fact, is possible to read this book from the first page to the last or to pick the single arguments that are useful to him in that precise moment.
Another thing that I really liked about this book is the fact that Jamie Munro uses in the same time PhoneGap and jQuery Mobile so you can learn two libraries in the same time and you can learn immediately to write an application that is nice to see and use.
I really liked this book and I would suggest this book to everyone is interested in using the PhoneGap framework to develop Mobile applications. Full Review >
|
The Fundamentals of Software
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
3.0
On Apr 24, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Code Simplicity by Max Kanat-Alexander (O’Reilly)
This is not the typical O’Reilly programming book and you can find it out very easily when you have the book in your hands, since it does not have any code inside. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Apr 19, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Linux Pocket Guide by Daniel J. Barrett (O'Reilly)
This is one of my favorite book about Linux. Probably is the most favorite one. In the last years I've been looking for a book that was like a printed man with some more explanation and a rigid order. This book does all this plus something more (that I'd rather not having). Full Review >
|
Learn How to use Dialogs, Autocomplete, and More
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Apr 17, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: jQuery UI by Eric Sarrion (O’Reilly Media)
jQuery has very interested me in the last period. I think that it is the best JavaScript library for me. jQuery UI is a set of functions that allow you to improve the graphics and the functionality of your websites with very few lines of code. Full Review >
|
A Guide to Developing Internet Agents with PHP/CURL
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Apr 13, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Webbots, Spiders, and Screen Scrapers by Michael Schrenk (O’Reilly Media)
I’ve been immediately caught from this book since I’m in a project that is based on a webbot, and I’m developing it using PHP and cURL. Since the first day I’ve started to use cURL (and a lot of other PHP classes) I wondered about the sense of all these complex and extravagant classes and functions. Full Review >
|
UI Patterns for Mobile Applications
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Apr 9, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Mobile Design Pattern Gallery by Theresa Neil (O’Reilly Media)
This book is weird, I’ve to tell you. I was expecting a book with some examples and some text. Well, I ended up with a book that, at the first sight, seems more a book for kids rather than a professional book since is 90% images. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Apr 4, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: The Art of SEO by Eric Enge, Stephan Spencer, Jessie Stricchiolla and Rank Fishkin (O’Reilly Media)
Since the four authors are very popular in the SEO field, I was expecting the best book on SEO ever. All my expectation have been met. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Apr 1, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: jQuery Mobile: Up and Running by Maximiliano Firtman (O'Reilly)
jQuery Mobile is a library that allows you to develop mobile apps using jQuery. Is even possible to use a jQuery Mobile program as a native app, thanks to programs like PhoneGap. Full Review >
|
Analyzing Data from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Other Social Media Sites
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
3.0
On Mar 16, 2012 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Mining the Social Web by Matthew Russell, O’Reilly Media
Mining the Social Web is a good start for anyone is going to create scripts to analyze patterns in Social Networks. I’ve to say that this book consider that the reader already masters Python. I think that should be written directly on the title (ie: “Mining the Social Web with Pythonâ€Â). Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Feb 4, 2011 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Very good for beginners
A Microsoft book. Probably, the first Microsoft book I've ever read. Leaving aside what I feel about Microsoft, I've been pretty impressed by this book. Even if it is a Microsoft production, sometimes you can see examples with Ecplise (a free software IDE) and I really enjoyed this. Full Review >
|
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
2.0
On Jan 31, 2011 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: I don't see a possible target
This video gives you the taste of power of this technology, but is far from being complete. I do think that this is an excellent video to be seen if you are evaluating WebGL for a project or evaluating whether you're going to study it or not. Full Review >
|
Powerful Object-Oriented Programming
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Jan 30, 2011 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Programming Python by Mark Lutz
Programming Python is one of the biggest programming book I’ve ever seen (1600 pages). The book is really complete, if you do not count the frameworks and the beginners. The reason for the laking of frameworks talk is explained by the author that affirms that there was not enough space to speak about them. Full Review >
|
Patterns for Effective Interaction Design
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
5.0
On Jan 28, 2011 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Designing Interfaces by Jenifer Tidwell
Everyone had faced unusable programs. The biggest part of the unusable programs are caused by unusable interfaces. In my experience, one of the most difficult things a developer faces is the designing of good interfaces. Usually, the people whom will have to use the program are not developers and, in any case, no one likes to be slowed down by the counter-intuitive interface. Full Review >
|
A Brain-Friendly Guide
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Jan 26, 2011 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: Head First Python by Paul Barry
This book is a very particular book, from my point of view. This book, in fact, is not the classic programming book. If I can, I would define this more a bunch of notes rather than a book. Full Review >
|
Quick Solutions to Common CSS Problems
Fabio Alessandro's rating:
4.0
On Jan 24, 2011 Fabio Alessandro Locati wrote: CSS Cookbook by Christopher Schmitt
This is a very good book, but is not thought for beginners. As a lot of the O'Reilly 'Cookbook' collection, this is a book for people that already have the bases of the argument rather than for beginner. The book is very exhaustive, in my opinion, and it speaks even of HTML5 and CSS3.
Full Review >
|
