Managing ontologies and annotated data throughout their life-cycles is at the core of semantic systems of all kinds.  Ontology Management, an edited volume by senior researchers in the field, provides an up-to-date, concise and easy-to-read reference on this topic.

This volume describes relevant tasks, practical and theoretical challenges, limitations and methodologies, plus available software tools. The editors discuss integrating the conceptual and technical dimensions with a business view on using ontologies, by stressing the cost dimension of ontology engineering and by providing guidance on how up-to-date tooling helps to build, maintain, and use ontologies.  Also included is a one-stop reference on all aspects of managing ontological data and best practices on ontology management for a number of application domains.

Ontology Management is designed as a reference or secondary text for researchers and advanced-level students studying semantic systems, Semantic Web Services (SWS) and Web Services, information systems, data and knowledge engineering, and the Semantic Web in general.  Practitioners in industry will find this work invaluable as well.

 

Recent advances in sensor and computing technologies provide the impetus for deploying distributed sensing systems. Distributed networks are envisioned to provide real-time information in such diverse applications as building safety, environmental monitoring, power systems, manufacturing as well as military and space applications.

While significant research and development effort over the last decade in sensor development, physical layer transmission and networking infrastructure has laid the initial groundwork for practical deployment, realization of such distributed sensing systems is still in its infancy. The principle challenges from a systems-level perspective arise due to the difficulty in realizing the objectives of inferencing and control tasks for a distributed dynamical environment through an underlying power/bandwidth constrained ad-hoc networked infrastructure. The main challenge can be summarized as follows: How to make decisions under uncertainty, which arises from spatially distributed dynamic information when sharing distributed data is limited by networking constraints.

The book presents research on informational and mathematical aspects of networked sensing systems. The importance and timeliness of the book is evidenced by the explosion of several independent special sessions devoted to specific aspects of sensor networks in reputed international conferences. Despite these efforts the focus has been on specific and isolated aspects of networked sensing and there is a need for cross-disciplinary efforts to integrate ideas from the various research communities. The book presents research work conducted by internationally reputed researchers from control, information theory and signal processing focused on the common theme of distributed sensing, inferencing, and control over networks. On account of the contemporaneous nature of the topic, we have no doubt that there will significant interest evinced by the both the research and industrial community at large.

Knowledge-Based Intelligent Techniques in Character Recognition presents research results on intelligent character recognition techniques, reflecting the tremendous worldwide interest in the applications of knowledge-based techniques in this challenging field. This resource will interest anyone involved in computer science, computer engineering, applied mathematics, or related fields. It will also be of use to researchers, application engineers and students who wish to develop successful character recognition systems such as those used in reading addresses in a postal routing system or processing bank checks. Features

Presents research results on intelligent character recognition techniques, reflecting the worldwide interest in the applications of knowledge-based techniques in this field. Integrates several artificial intelligence techniques, such as expert systems, neural networks, fuzzy systems, and evolutionary computing. DLC: Optical character recognition devices.

The GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) offers a variety of compilers for different programming languages including C, C++, Java, Fortran, and Ada. The Definitive Guide to GCC, Second Edition has been revised to reflect the changes made in the most recent major GCC release, version 4. Providing in-depth information on GCC's enormous array of features and options, and introducing crucial tools such as autoconf, gprof, and libtool, this book functions as both a guide and reference.

This book goes well beyond a general introduction to GCC and covers key programming techniques such as profiling and optimization that, when used in conjunction with GCC's advanced features, can greatly improve application performance. This second edition will prove to be an invaluable resource, whether you're a student seeking familiarity with this crucial tool or an expert who uses GCC on a daily basis.

Download Description

• Provides a complete command reference and explains how to use the info online help system
• Covers material not covered in other texts: profiling, test coverage, and how to build and install GCC on a variety of operating system and hardware platforms
• Explains how to build and install GCC on Linux, UNIX, and Windows systems, whether you have an existing GCC or not

The Definitive Guide to GCC is a comprehensive tutorial and guide to using the newest version of GCC, the “Gnue Compiler Collection.” GCC is quite simply the most used and most powerful tool for programmers on the planet. It goes beyond just command line invocations and teaches you how to use GCC to improve the quality of your code (with debugging, code profiling, and test code coverage) and how to integrate other GNU development tools, such as libtool, automake, and autoconf, into your GCC-based development projects.

The Definitive Guide to GCC Book teaches you how to build, install, customize, use, and troubleshoot GCC 3.2, the GNU Compiler Collection version 3.2. GCC has long been available for most major hardware and operating system platforms and is often the preferred compiler for those platforms. As a general purpose compiler, GCC produces higher quality, faster performing executable code with fewer bugs than equivalent offerings supplied by hardware and software vendors. GCC, along with GNU Emacs, the Linux operating system, the Apache Web server, the Sendmail mail server, and the BIND DNS server, is one of the showpieces of the free software world and proof that sometimes you can get a free lunch.

About the Author

William von Hagen holds degrees in computer science, English writing, and art history. William has worked with UNIX systems since 1982, during which time he has been a system administrator, systems programmer, software developer, development manager, computing facilities operations manager, writer, documentation manager, and (now) content manager. William has written a number of books, including Linux Filesystems, Installing Red Hat Linux 7, and SGML For Dummies, and he contributed to writing Red Hat 7 Unleashed. Most recently, Hagen coauthored Mac OS X Power User's Guide with Brian Proffitt. William has written articles and software reviews for publications including Linux Magazine, Linux Format (UK), Maximum Linux, Mac Tech Magazine, Mac Home Magazine, and Mac Directory, and he has written extensive online material for CMP Media, Linux Planet, and Corel.

This reference is a fascinating and complete guide to using fonts and typography on the Web and across a variety of operating systems and application software. Fonts & Encodings shows you how to take full advantage of the incredible number of typographic options available, with advanced material that covers everything from designing glyphs to developing software that creates and processes fonts.

The era of ASCII characters on green screens is long gone, and industry leaders such as Apple, HP, IBM, Microsoft, and Oracle have adopted the Unicode Worldwide Character Standard. Yet, many software applications and web sites still use a host of standards, including PostScript, TrueType, TeX/Omega, SVG, Fontlab, FontForge, Metafont, Panose, and OpenType. This book explores each option in depth, and provides background behind the processes that comprise today's "digital space for writing":

• Part I introduces Unicode, with a brief history of codes and encodings including ASCII. Learn about the morass of the data that accompanies each Unicode character, and how Unicode deals with normalization, the bidirectional algorithm, and the handling of East Asian characters.
• Part II discusses font management, including installation, tools for activation/deactivation, and font choices for three different systems: Windows, the Mac OS, and the X Window System (Unix).
• Part III deals with the technical use of fonts in two specific cases: the TeX typesetting system (and its successor, W, which the author co-developed) and web pages.
• Part IV describes methods for classifying fonts: Vox, Alessandrini, and Panose-1, which is used by Windows and the CSS standard. Learn about existing tools for creating (or modifying) fonts, including FontLab and FontForge, and become familiar with OpenType properties and AAT fonts.

Nowhere else will you find the valuable technical information on fonts and typography that software developers, web developers, and graphic artists need to know to get typography and fonts to work properly.

About the Author

In addition to being a translator, P. Scott Horne is also a typographer, and fluent in the LaTeX system used for the original layout of this book. He translates from multiple languages into English including Chinese, French, Japanese, and Latin. His web site address is http://hornetranslations.com.

This book is the result of teaching computer graphics for one and two semester, year two/three undergraduate and postgraduate lecture courses in Computer Graphics. Throughout the book, theory is followed by implementation using C/C++ and complete programs are provided with suggestions for change to enhance student understanding. During 30 years of university teaching the author has become aware of the frustration that many students suffer, of code fragments that ‘never quite work’ and programs that on a different system require system dependent additions! With this in mind all the programs given have been tested using MS C++ v6 and most have been tested using Solaris 4.2 and Borland C++ v5.

There are a number of texts which give a more in depth approach to the OpenGL pipeline and repetition has therefore been avoided by referencing such texts for the interested reader. The objective is to get students immersed in graphics applications as rapidly as possible, to develop confidence, which in turn leads to experimentation, which is so vital to the enthusiastic programmer. Theory and practice have been developed in parallel so that in many cases the reader begins to understand the strengths and weaknesses of a particular algorithm.

After a rapid ‘getting started’ introduction we look at the structure of bit map (.bmp) files as a precursor to understanding audiovisual files (.avi). This work forms a foundation for later sections on image processing and texturing. These are very simple file structures that can be converted from other image file formats using commercially available software packages. The chapter introducing image processing covers edge detection, enhancement and data capture from CAT scans. Theory and practice can be quite different and some processing appears more of an art than a science due to the variability in the image quality and the nature of the image itself.

The example of edge finding on CAT scans where different slices may have well defined edges and other more fuzzy edges due to gray hair is not always apparent to the eye. We address these problems with alternative solutions with varying degrees of success to enable readers to comprehend that algorithmic development is still an inexact science for such applications.

In Chapter 4 we move to the first chapter, which might be considered to be computer graphics with all the mathematics that is required. I do not encourage students to skip over these areas of understanding for the ‘black box’ approach will only get you so far and gaps in knowledge at an early stage will come to haunt one later on. The toil of getting to grips with material will be amply repaid as students grow in knowledge – although I am aware that many avoid the joys of mathematical rigor!

"The authors have written a short book for students doing final year projects in computer science and information systems. Because the authors are from Sweden, the details of the procedures and expectations will vary in other countries. However, in the hands of a discerning reader, this book could be useful at several levels, at many colleges and universities, and in many countries.

The first section of the book introduces general concepts related to final year projects. Chapter 2 describes research and research methods in computer science and information systems. Chapter 3 discusses the roles of the student, the supervisor, and the examiner. Chapter 4 provides a very brief overview of the process of conducting final year projects.

The second and most extensive section of the book describes chronologically the major steps in the project. Chapter 5 describes the process of choosing a subject and developing a formal proposal. Chapter 6 explains how to handle references in the literature search. Chapter 7 describes the process of narrowing the aim of the project. Chapter 8 covers developing project objectives and choosing methods. Chapter 9 briefly discusses following, or not following, the project objectives. Chapter 10 takes a careful look at presenting and analyzing the data. Chapter 11 discusses drawing your conclusions, evaluating your work, and identifying future work. Finally, chapter 12 discusses the oral defense.

The third section of the book consists of a set of supplementary chapters. Chapter 13 discusses the report itself, including both general writing style and specific citation styles. Chapter 14 turns the tables and examines the examiners role. The book also includes a bibliography, a list of things not to do, and a list of relevant bibliographies available on the Internet.

According to the authors, "The amount of time spent reading a particular source is not relevant to whether it should be discussed in your analysis. The authors provide many such useful suggestions, which, although obvious, might be forgotten in the rush to write. They suggest studying a journal article in the subject area to examine the typical structure of a research report. They also suggest writing the abstract last. In addition, they suggest identifying both good and poor decisions made during the research process. They also point out this useful piece of advice: "You can usually get away with being boring, if what you say is well-organized and clear; but you cannot get away with talking nonsense just by being entertaining.

About the conclusions of the project report, the authors say, "This is not the time or place to surprise the enthusiastic reader (this is a technical report, and not a novel where the least suspected person is found to be the murderer at the end). Similarly, this book has no surprises, just well organized, clear, and useful advice."

by Ann Fleury from Aurora University, Illinois USA.
ACM Computing Reviews, December 2002

"The authors have written a short book for students doing final year projects in computer science and information systems. According to the authors, the amount of time spent reading a particular source is not relevant to whether it should be discussed in your analysis. The authors provide many such useful suggestions . this book has just well organized, clear and useful advice." (Ann Fleury, ACM Computing Reviews, December, 2002)

Reverse engineering is the process of discovering the technological principles of an object or component through analysis of its structure and function. Such analysis can then be used to redesign the object very quickly using computer-aided design in concert with rapid-manufacturing processes to produce small numbers of components adapted to the needs of a particular customer. This way of working has huge benefits of speed and flexibility over traditional mass-production-based design and manufacturing processes.

This edited collection of essays from world-leading academic and industrial authors yields insight into all aspects of reverse engineering:

The methods of reverse engineering analysis are covered, with special emphasis on the investigation of surface and internal structures.

Frequently-used hardware and software are assessed and advice given on the most suitable choice of system.

Rapid prototyping is introduced and its relationship with successful reverse engineering is discussed.

Importantly, legal matters surrounding reverse engineering are addressed as are other barriers to the adoption of these techniques.

Applications of reverse engineering in three significant areas: automotive, aerospace, and medical engineering are reported in depth.

Reverse Engineering is a "must have" title for anyone working with advanced modern manufacturing technologies, either with a view to researching and improving them further or to making their company leaner and more agile in a competitive manufacturing marketplace.

About the Author

Professor Vinesh Raja is a Professorial Fellow in Informatics at the University of Warwick. He is in-charge of the Informatics Group, which encompasses the Virtual Reality Center (VRC) and the Collaborative Product Commerce Center (CPC) at the Warwick Manufacturing Group. He focuses on augmenting and extending everyday, learning and work activities with interactive technologies that move beyond the desktop. This involves designing enhanced user experiences through appropriating and assembling a diversity of technologies including haptics, handheld and pervasive computing. The main focus of his research is not the technology per se but the design and integration of the digital representations that are presented via them to support social and cognitive activities in ways that extend current capabilities.

Dr. Kiran Jude Fernandes is the 40th Anniversary Research Lecturer in Management at the University of York. He has been a pioneer in the systematic study of Information Modelling Techniques and Tools and has studied their evolution using techniques from the Biological Sciences Domain. His research and teaching interests include strategic uses of information systems, information management, and the impact of information technology on the risks and benefits of outsourcing and strategic alliances. Prior to joining the University of York, Kiran worked at the University of Warwick and the NASA John C. Stennis Space Center.

In this book, all the major and frontier topics in the field of document analysis are brought together into a single volume creating a unique reference source.

Highlights include:

- Document structure analysis followed by OCR of Japanese, Tibetan and Indian printed scripts.

- Online and offline handwritten text recognition approaches;

- Japanese postal and Arabic check processing;

- Document image quality modelling, mathematical expression recognition, graphics recognition, document information retrieval, super resolution text, metadata extraction in digital library;

- Biometric and forensic aspects: individuality of handwriting detection;

- Web document analysis, text and hypertext mining and bank check data mining.

Containing chapters written by some of the most eminent researchers active in this field, this book can serve as a handbook for the research scholar as well as a supporting book for advanced graduate students interested in document processing or image analysis.

Why did I write this book? Actually, it took an army to write this book (read all of the names on the front cover if you don’t believe me). While I’m credited as the “lead author,” the experience and expertise of everyone who authored content for SharePoint 2007: The Definitive Guide is what is at the center of this work. Without all the combined talent represented by all of these writers, this book would be a shadow of what it is.

The fact that so many people have been involved in this project is what makes it “definitive.” One or two authors can contain a fair amount of experience and background in a particular area or topic, but 11 subject-matter experts can cover a huge cross-section of understanding.

In this case, that “cross-section of understanding” is about Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) 2007, which in many ways is a completely different breed of cat from its predecessor. For example, MOSS is fully integrated with a number of other Microsoft products including the rest of the Office 2007 suite. If you’ve taken a look at the interface for Office 2007 (“the ribbon,” for instance), you know that it’s not just Office 2003 with a couple of extra widgets added.

The same is true of SharePoint 2007. A few of the features are relatively unchanged, such as SharePoint’s discussion boards (unfortunately), but there are a great many additions, improvements, and just plain differences. If your company has migrated to or is thinking of adopting SharePoint 2007, you need to be ready for this change. MOSS 2007 isn’t just SharePoint Portal Server 2003 with a few widgets added. It’s a very different thing.

SharePoint 2007: The Definitive Guide gives you the theory and practice you need to either leverage your current SharePoint skills for this product or to ramp up to using MOSS 2007 as your first SharePoint experience. If you want to tap into the background and knowledge of almost a dozen SharePoint subject-matter experts and Microsoft MVPs, this is the book you’ll need.

This monograph describes a programming methodology based upon programming paradigms and generic programs and demonstates how distributed application programs can be developed by simple substitution of data structures and sequential procedures. The author introduces generic programs for two paradigms and shows how to derive new distributed programs for several applications related to the RSA cryptosystem, including RSA enciphering and deciphering, prime number generation, and factoring.

The book is well-written and easily accessible to the non-expert. The work is an appealing combination of the theory and practice of parallel computing and provides a clear introduction to the theory and practice of RSA cryptography.

Backed by a tireless development community, PHP has been a model of language evolution over its 10+ year history. Borne from a contract developer’s pet project, these days you’ll find PHP powering many of the world’s largest web sites, including Yahoo!, Digg, EA Games, and Lycos.

PHP Objects, Patterns, and Practice, Second Edition shows you how to meld the power of PHP with the sound enterprise development techniques embraced by professional programmers. Going well beyond the basics of object-oriented development, you’ll learn about advanced topics such as working with static methods and properties, abstract classes, interfaces, design patterns, exception handling, and more. You’ll also be exposed to key tools such as PEAR, CVS, Phing, and phpDocumentor.

What you’ll learn

• Write solid, maintainable code by embracing object-oriented techniques and design patterns.
• Create detailed, versatile documentation using the powerful phpDocumentor automated documentation system.
• Gain new flexibility during the development process by managing your code within a CVS repository and using the Phing build system.
• Capitalize upon the quality code of others by using the PEAR package management solution.

Who is this book for?

PHP developers seeking to embrace sound development techniques such as object-orientation, design patterns, testing, and documentation

About the Author

Matt Zandstra has worked as a Web programmer, consultant and writer for a decade. He has been an object evangelist for most of that time. Matt is the author of SAMS Teach Yourself PHP in 24 Hours (three editions), and contributed to DHTML Unleashed. He has written articles for Linux Magazine and Zend.com. Matt works primarily with PHP, Perl and Java, building online applications.

He is an engineer at Yahoo! in London. Matt lives in Brighton with his wife Louise, and two children, Holly and Jake. Because it has been so long since he has had any spare time he only distantly recollects that he runs regularly to offset the effects of his liking for pubs and cafes, and for sitting around reading and writing fiction. Learn more on Matt's website, getInstance.

It’s sometimes said that the true job of an Oracle database administrator can be summed up in one, essential skill: to be able to recover your database.

There’s much wisdom in that statement. Of all the things you are responsible for as a database administrator, nothing is more important than the data itself. Like it or not, the fearsome responsibility of protecting your organization's most critical data falls squarely upon your shoulders:

• Lose that data and your company could fail.
• Lose that data and you could be out of a job.

Scared? You should be. But there's help. You are not alone. Oracle experts Darl Kuhn, Sam Alapati, and Arup Nanda have come together in this book to show you the power of Recovery Manager, or RMAN, which is Oracle's backup and recovery tool of choice. RMAN Recipes for Oracle Database 11g helps you take advantage of all that RMAN has to offer by providing easy-to-understand solutions to business-critical backup and recovery operations. This handy guide

• Demystifies the steps required to protect your business data
• Provides ready-made and step-by-step solutions to simple and complex backup, restore, and recovery operations
• Is task-oriented, making it easy for you to find the solution to pressing backup and recovery problems
• Respects your time by providing example-based solutions, not endless reading material

When the pressure’s on, you don't have time for long discussions of theory. This book gets right to the point with quick and easy-to-read, step-by-step solutions that can help you backup and recover your data with confidence.

This book covers the fundamental concepts of data mining, to demonstrate the potential of gathering large sets of data, and analyzing these data sets to gain useful business understanding. The book is organized in three parts. Part I introduces concepts. Part II describes and demonstrates basic data mining algorithms. It also contains chapters on a number of different techniques often used in data mining. Part III focusses on business applications of data mining. Methods are presented with simple examples, applications are reviewed, and relativ advantages are evaluated.

The intent of this book is to describe some recent data mining tools that have proven effective in dealing with data sets which often involve uncertain description or other complexities that cause difficulty for the conventional approaches of logistic regression, neural network models, and decision trees. Among these traditional algorithms, neural network models often have a relative advantage when data is complex. We will discuss methods with simple examples, review applications, and evaluate relative advantages of several contemporary methods.

Responding to ever-escalating requirements for performance, flexibility, and economy, the networking industry has opted to build products around network processors. To help meet the formidable challenges of this emerging field, the editors of this volume created the first Workshop on Network Processors, a forum for scientists and engineers to discuss latest research in the architecture, design, programming, and use of these devices. This series of volumes contains not only the results of the annual workshops but also specially commissioned material that highlights industry's latest network processors.

Like its predecessor volume, Network Processor Design: Principles and Practices, Volume 2 defines and advances the field of network processor design. Volume 2 contains 20 chapters written by the field's leading academic and industrial researchers, with topics ranging from architectures to programming models, from security to quality of service.

·Describes current research at UNC Chapel Hill, University of Massachusetts, George Mason University, UC Berkeley, UCLA, Washington University in St. Louis, Linköpings Universitet, IBM, Kayamba Inc., Network Associates, and University of Washington.

·Reports the latest applications of the technology at Intel, IBM, Agere, Motorola, AMCC, IDT, Teja, and Network Processing Forum.

Text surveys the latest research and practices in the design, programming, and application of network processors. For researchers and practitioners. Softcover.

About the Author

Mark A. Franklin received his B.A., B.S.E.E. and M.S.E.E. from Columbia University, and his Ph.D. in EE from Carnegie-Mellon University. He is currently at Washington University in St. Louis where he has a joint appointment in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, and holds the Urbauer Chair in Engineering. He founded and is Director of the Computer and Communications Research Center and until recently was the Director of the Undergraduate Program in Computer Engineering.

Patrick Crowley is currently a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington. Before arriving in Seattle, he earned a B.A. degree, summa cum laude, from Illinois Wesleyan University where he studied Mathematics, Physics and Computer Science. Crowley's research interests are in the area of computer systems architecture, with a present focus on the design and analysis of programmable packet processing systems. 

Haldun Hadimioglu received his BS and MS degrees in Electrical Engineering at Middle East Technical University, Ankara Turkey and his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Polytechnic University in New York. He is currently an Industry Associate Professor in the Computer Science Department and a member of the Computer Engineering faculty at the Polytechnic University. He worked as a research engineer at PETAS, Ankara Turkey (1980-1982). 

Peter Z. Onufryk received his B.S.E.E. from Rutgers University, M.S.E.E. from Purdue University, and Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Rutgers University. He is currently a director in the Internetworking Products Division at Integrated Device Technology, Inc. where he is responsible for architecture definition and validation of communications products. Before joining IDT, Peter was a researcher for thirteen years at AT&T Labs - Research (formally AT&T Bell Labs) where he worked on communications systems and parallel computer architectures. 

A wireless sensor network (WSN) uses a number of autonomous devices to cooperatively monitor physical or environmental conditions via a wireless network. Since its military beginnings as a means of battlefield surveillance, practical use of this technology has extended to a range of civilian applications including environmental monitoring, natural disaster prediction and relief, health monitoring and fire detection. Technological advancements, coupled with lowering costs, suggest that wireless sensor networks will have a significant impact on 21st century life.

The design of wireless sensor networks requires consideration for several disciplines such as distributed signal processing, communications and cross-layer design. Wireless Sensor Networks: Signal Processing and Communications focuses on the theoretical aspects of wireless sensor networks and offers readers signal processing and communication perspectives on the design of large-scale networks. It explains state-of-the-art design theories and techniques to readers and places emphasis on the fundamental properties of large-scale sensor networks.

 Wireless Sensor Networks: Signal Processing and Communications :

Approaches WSNs from a new angle – distributed signal processing, communication algorithms and novel cross-layer design paradigms.

Applies ideas and illustrations from classical theory to an emerging field of WSN applications.

Presents important analytical tools for use in the design of application-specific WSNs.

Wireless Sensor Networks   will be of use to signal processing and communications researchers and practitioners in applying classical theory to network design. It identifies research directions for senior undergraduate and graduate students and offers a rich bibliography for further reading and investigation.

     

Machine Learning involves several scientific domains including mathematics, computer science, statistics and biology, and is an approach that enables computers to automatically learn from data. Focusing on complex media and how to convert raw data into useful information, this book offers both introductory and advanced material in the combined fields of machine learning and image/video processing.

The machine learning techniques presented enable readers to address many real world problems involving complex data. Examples covering areas such as automatic speech and handwriting transcription, automatic face recognition, and semantic video segmentation are included, along with detailed introductions to algorithms and examples of their applications.

The book is organized in four parts: The first focuses on technical aspects, basic mathematical notions and elementary machine learning techniques. The second provides an extensive survey of most relevant machine learning techniques for media processing, while the third part focuses on applications and shows how techniques are applied in actual problems. The fourth part contains detailed appendices that provide notions about the main mathematical instruments used throughout the text.

Students and researchers needing a solid foundation or reference, and practitioners interested in discovering more about the state-of-the-art will find this book invaluable. Examples and problems are based on data and software packages publicly available on the web.

CodeIgniter (CI) is a powerful open-source PHP framework with a very small footprint, built for PHP coders who need a simple and elegant toolkit to create full-featured web applications. CodeIgniter is an MVC framework, similar in some ways to the Rails framework for Ruby, and is designed to enable, not overwhelm.

This book explains how to work with CodeIgniter in a clear logical way. It is not a detailed guide to the syntax of CodeIgniter, but makes an ideal complement to the existing online CodeIgniter user guide, helping you grasp the bigger picture and bringing together many ideas to get your application development started as smoothly as possible.

• Clear, structured tutorial on working with CodeIgniter
• Careful explanation of the basic concepts of CodeIgniter and its MVC architecture
• Using CodeIgniter with databases, HTML forms, files, images, sessions, and email
• Building a dynamic website quickly and easily using CodeIgniter's prepared code

Improve your PHP coding productivity with this guide to the powerful and popular CodeIgniter framework.

• Setting up the CI package on your web server
• Understanding the Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern for organizing a dynamic website
• Understanding the structure of a CI site
• Designing better views and controllers
• Object-oriented aspects of CI
• Integrating databases such as MySQL and simplifying your database access
• Making your site more robust and professional by using CI's built-in classes
• Creating and validating HTML forms with CI form helpers
• Handling files, images, and sessions with CI
• Sending email from CI
• Using CI for testing your code with error handling, unit testing, benchmarking, and profiling
• Getting an XML-RPC server and client working
• Generating Create, Update, Delete, and Read (C.R.U.D) entries on each database table

This book steps you through the main features of CodeIgniter in a systematic way, explaining them clearly with illustrative code examples.

Compressing data is an option naturally selected when faced with problems of high costs or restricted space. Written by a renowned expert in the field, this book offers readers a succinct, reader-friendly foundation to the chief approaches, methods and techniques currently employed in the field of data compression.

Part I presents the basic approaches to data compression and describes a few popular techniques and methods commonly used to compress data. The reader discovers essential concepts, such as variable-length and prefix codes, statistical distributions and run-length encoding. Part II then concentrates on advanced techniques, such as arithmetic coding, orthogonal transforms, subband transforms and the Burrows-Wheeler transform.

Features:

Clear overview of the principles underlying this field

Outlines the essentials of the various approaches to compressing data

Contains many learning aids such as: chapter introductions and summaries, chapter-end exercises, comprehensive glossary, etc.

Provides several examples of important compression algorithms

Offers a supplementary author-maintained website, with errata and auxiliary material www.davidsalomon.name/DCugAdvertis/DCug.html

An ideal introductory volume to David Salomons fourth edition of Data Compression: The Complete Reference

Complete and clear, this book is the perfect resource for undergraduates in computer science and requires a minimum of mathematics. It is also ideal for readers with a basic knowledge of computer science wanting to learn about data compression.

David Salomon is a professor emeritus of Computer Science at California State University, Northridge. He has authored numerous articles and books, including Coding for Data and Computer Communications, Guide to Data Compression Methods, Data Privacy and Security, Computer Graphics and Geometric Modeling, Foundations of Computer Security, Transformations and Projections in Computer Graphics, and Variable-length Codes for Data Compression.

The proliferation of digital computing devices and their use in communication has resulted in an increased demand for systems and algorithms capable of mining textual data. Thus, the development of techniques for mining unstructured, semi-structured, and fully-structured textual data has become increasingly important in both academia and industry.

This second volume continues to survey the evolving field of text mining - the application of techniques of machine learning, in conjunction with natural language processing, information extraction and algebraic/mathematical approaches, to computational information retrieval. Numerous diverse issues are addressed, ranging from the development of new learning approaches to novel document clustering algorithms, collectively spanning several major topic areas in text mining.

Features:

Acts as an important benchmark in the development of current and future approaches to mining textual information

Serves as an excellent companion text for courses in text and data mining, information retrieval and computational statistics

Experts from academia and industry share their experiences in solving large-scale retrieval and classification problems

Presents an overview of current methods and software for text mining

Highlights open research questions in document categorization and clustering, and trend detection

Describes new application problems in areas such as email surveillance and anomaly detection

Survey of Text Mining II offers a broad selection in state-of-the art algorithms and software for text mining from both academic and industrial perspectives, to generate interest and insight into the state of the field. This book will be an indispensable resource for researchers, practitioners, and professionals involved in information retrieval, computational statistics, and data mining.

Michael W. Berry is a professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.

Malu Castellanos is a senior researcher at Hewlett-Packard Laboratories in Palo Alto, California.

This book draws together experts from the multimedia, the knowledge and the integrated multimedia-knowledge domains to explore how knowledge technologies can be exploited to create new multimedia applications, and how multimedia technologies can provide new contexts for the use of knowledge technologies.

The step-by-step approach guides the reader from fundamental enabling technologies of ontologies, analysis and reasoning, through to applications which have hitherto had less attention such as personalisation of multimedia content and personalised content adaptation.

Thorough coverage of all relevant topics is given, including ontologies for low level multimedia feature representation, higher level multimedia systems representations, application of multimedia ontologies for visual analysis and finally usage of multimedia and knowledge technologies for applications.

Presenting a fundamental work which can serve as a reference book for researchers and graduate students going forward, this book is an invaluable tool.

The EDI capabilities of BizTalk Server 2006 R2 are a new implementation of an old technology. EDI originated in the 1970s to facilitate the delivery of data between businesses. Rather than diminishing in scope, however, EDI continues to play a major role in commerce today. Because of this, an extensive engine has been added to BizTalk Server to provide for robust handling of EDI transmissions. This book will immerse the reader in working with the new EDI components and demonstrate how to successfully build and deploy a fully functional solution.

Who This Book Is For

The EDI implementation for R2 is unlike any previous incarnation of EDI in BizTalk. Because of this, there is material covered in this book that is equally useful to seasoned BizTalk architects and new developers alike. The intention of the material is to provide all of the detail necessary for any level of developer to envision, build, test, deploy, and support an EDI solution. There are several topics, such as exception handling, that are common to all BizTalk implementations and will prove useful in architecting any solution. The majority of the book, however, from the EDI schemas and party configurations to the new EDI reporting tools, is completely new material not covered in other mediums and will prove to be useful to anyone engaged in a BizTalk 2006 R2 EDI project.

The objective of Document Analysis and Recognition (DAR) is to recognize the text and graphical components of a document and to extract information. With first papers dating back to the 1960’s, DAR is a mature but still growing research field with consolidated and known techniques. Optical Character Recognition (OCR) engines are some of the most widely recognized products of the research in this field, while broader DAR techniques are nowadays studied and applied to other industrial and office automation systems.

In the machine learning community, one of the most widely known research problems addressed in DAR is recognition of unconstrained handwritten characters which has been frequently used in the past as a benchmark for evaluating machine learning algorithms, especially supervised classifiers.

However, developing a DAR system is a complex engineering task that involves the integration of multiple techniques into an organic framework. A reader may feel that the use of machine learning algorithms is not appropriate for other DAR tasks than character recognition. On the contrary, such algorithms have been massively used for nearly all the tasks in DAR. With large emphasis being devoted to character recognition and word recognition, other tasks such as pre-processing, layout analysis, character segmentation, and signature verification have also benefited much from machine learning algorithms.

This book is a collection of research papers and state-of-the-art reviews by leading researchers all over the world including pointers to challenges and opportunities for future research directions. The main goals of the book are identification of good practices for the use of learning strategies in DAR, identification of DAR tasks more appropriate for these techniques, and highlighting new learning algorithms that may be successfully applied to DAR.

Data mining and knowledge discovery (DMKD) is a rapidly expanding field in computer science. It has become very important because of an increased demand for methodologies and tools that can help the analysis and understanding of huge amounts of data generated on a daily basis by institutions like hospitals, research laboratories, banks, insurance companies, and retail stores and by Internet users. This explosion is a result of the growing use of electronic media. But what is data mining (DM)? A Web search using the Google search engine retrieves many (really many) definitions of data mining. We include here a few interesting ones.

One of the simpler definitions is: “As the term suggests, data mining is the analysis of data to establish relationships and identify patterns”. It focuses on identifying relations in data. Our next example is more elaborate: An information extraction activity whose goal is to discover hidden facts contained in databases. Using a combination of machine learning, statistical analysis, modeling techniques and database technology, data mining finds patterns and subtle relationships in data and infers rules that allow the prediction of future results. Typical applications include market segmentation, customer profiling, fraud detection, evaluation of retail promotions, and credit risk analysis.

This one suggests that data mining tries to find useful “information” from data that can help predict the future. These definitions do not explicitly emphasize a large volume of data, an issue in the next definition: “The process of analyzing large amounts of data in order to extract new kinds of useful information (such as implicit relationships between different pieces of information)”.

Laszlo in Action is the first comprehensive guide to the Laszlo system and its language LZX. OpenLaszlo is an increasingly popular open-source platform for the development and delivery of rich internet applications across multiple platforms: Flash, DHTML, and J2ME. The dramatic emergence of Ajax over the past year was a first step in the transition from page-oriented HTML web applications towards more full-featured rich internet applications. OpenLaszlo provides another important step in this continuing evolutionary process through the increased productivity resulting from LZX's declarative approach. It provides developers with the tools to create web-based applications offering the usability and interactivity associated with desktop applications, and the low costs associated with web-based deployment. The cross-platform nature of Laszlo LZX applications allows source code with only minimum modifications to run natively on all popular web browsers, on all desktop operating systems, on the Flash platform, and other platforms in the future.

Written to address the needs of a wide spectrum of developers, ranging from client-side HTML and JavaScript developers all the way to enterprise-class Java or Rails engineers, this book provides a very hands-on approach towards building applications that solve real-world problems across both the Flash and DHTML platforms. Starting with the fundamentals of Laszlo LZX, the authors quickly move towards applying this knowledge to the design and development of a full-scale application called the Laszlo Market. This provides a working context to assist understanding the underlying concepts of Laszlo LZX and, more importantly, how to apply this knowledge in innovative ways. The construction of the Laszlo Market proceeds over the course of the book illustrating topics starting with an initial wireframe and storyboard design to optimization issues dealing with the application's deployment across the Flash and DHTML platforms.

About the Author

Norman Klein, a former consultant with Laszlo Systems, has been a software engineer for over 20 years, and has been involved in internet development since its inceptio. He has also done extensive development work with both web frameworks and other RIA languages such as Adobe's Flex. Max Carlson, one of the founders of Laszlo Systems, is the lead engineer on the OpenLaszlo DHTML 4.0 project. He is also responsible for implementing many of the features of the current 3.X Open Laszlo release. Glenn MacEwen, after 26 years on the Computing Science faculty of Queen's University in Canada, retired to Princeton, New Jersey, to work out of his home office as a technical writer and editor. When not writing or editing, Glenn plays bagpipes, flies small aircraft, and homebrews beer.

Parsing the Turing Test is a landmark exploration of both the philosophical and methodological issues surrounding the search for true artificial intelligence. Will computers and robots ever think and communicate the way humans do? When a computer crosses the threshold into self-consciousness, will it immediately jump into the Internet and create a World Mind? Will intelligent computers someday recognize the rather doubtful intelligence of human beings? Distinguished psychologists, computer scientists, philosophers, and programmers from around the world debate these weighty issues and, in effect, the future of the human race in this important volume.

This book is about what will probably be humankind’s most impressive – and perhaps final – achievement: the creation of an entity whose intelligence equals or exceeds our own.

Not all will agree, but I for one have no doubt that this landmark will be achieved in the fairly near future. Nearly four decades ago, when I had the odd experience of being able to interact over a teletype with one of the first conversational computer programs – Joseph Weizenbaum’s “ELIZA” – I would have conjectured that truly intelligent machines were just around the corner. I was wrong. In fact, by some measures, conversational computer programs have made relatively little progress since ELIZA. But they are coming nonetheless, by one means or another, and because of advances in a number of computer-related technologies – most especially the creation of the Internet – their impact on the human race will be far greater and more immediate than anyone could have foreseen a few decades ago.

This book is about writing software that makes the most effective use of the system you're running on -- code that interfaces directly with the kernel and core system libraries, including the shell, text editor, compiler, debugger, core utilities, and system daemons. The majority of both Unix and Linux code is still written at the system level, and Linux System Programming focuses on everything above the kernel, where applications such as Apache, bash, cp, vim, Emacs, gcc, gdb, glibc, ls, mv, and X exist.

Written primarily for engineers looking to program (better) at the low level, this book is an ideal teaching tool for any programmer. Even with the trend toward high-level development, either through web software (such as PHP) or managed code (C#), someone still has to write the PHP interpreter and the C# virtual machine. Linux System Programming gives you an understanding of core internals that makes for better code, no matter where it appears in the stack. Debugging high-level code often requires you to understand the system calls and kernel behavior of your operating system, too.

Key topics include:

• An overview of Linux, the kernel, the C library, and the C compiler
• Reading from and writing to files, along with other basic file I/O operations, including how the Linux kernel implements and manages file I/O
• Buffer size management, including the Standard I/O library
• Advanced I/O interfaces, memory mappings, and optimization techniques
• The family of system calls for basic process management
• Advanced process management, including real-time processes
• File and directories-creating, moving, copying, deleting, and managing them
• Memory management -- interfaces for allocating memory, managing the memory you have, and optimizing your memory access
• Signals and their role on a Unix system, plus basic and advanced signal interfaces
• Time, sleeping, and clock management, starting with the basics and continuing through POSIX clocks and high resolution timers

With Linux System Programming, you will be able to take an in-depth look at Linux from both a theoretical and an applied perspective as you cover a wide range of programming topics.

About the Author

Robert Love has been a Linux user and hacker since the early days. He is active in, and passionate about, both the Linux kernel and GNOME desktop communities. His recent contributions to the Linux kernel include work on the kernel event layer and inotify. GNOME-related contributions include Beagle, GNOME Volume Manager, NetworkManager, and Project Utopia. Currently Robert works in the Open Source Program Office at Google.

As an author, Robert is responsible for Linux Kernel Development (SAMS), now in its second edition, and Linux System Programming (O'Reilly). He is also a coauthor of the fifth edition of O'Reilly's Linux in a Nutshell. He's a Contributing Editor for Linux Journal, has written numerous articles, and has been invited to speak around the world on Linux.

Robert graduated from the University of Florida with a B.A. in Mathematics and a B.S. in Computer Science. Hailing from South Florida, he currently calls Boston home.

In recent years, much work has been put into creating programming languages that embody a blend of many of the most admired characteristics of their predecessors. One such language is D, which provides developers with the speed of languages such as C and C++ combined with the power and flexibility of languages such as Ruby and Python.

Learning to Tango with D introduces you to the powerful D language, with special attention given to the Tango software library. A concise yet thorough overview of the language’s syntax and features is presented, followed by an introduction to Tango, the popular general–purpose library you’ll return to time and again when building your D applications.

Authored by prominent D developers Kris Bell, Lars Ivar Igesund, Sean Kelly, and Michael Parker, this book supplies not only the knowledge required to begin building your own D applications, but also the insight these authors have acquired due to their extensive experience working with and participating in the development of the D language.

What you’ll learn

• Uuse D’s fundamental syntax and features to quickly begin building your own applications.
• Master D’s object–oriented approach en route to creating reusable, easily understandable applications.
• Take advantage of the Tango library to build applications faster than you ever thought possible.

Who is this book for?

Programmers wishing to learn more about the D language

About the Author

Kris Bell is a Scottish pirate and wannabe musician, part–time photographer, avid traveler, open–source advocate, miscreant techie dweeb and a principal Tango contributor. He enjoys swimming, cycling, sailing, occasional hikes and recently took up rock climbing. Previously he dabbled in a bit of car–racing and skydiving, and once took a flying–trapeze course where the latter served only to cement his vocation of choice. He currently lives in California, though hails from the Scottish West Coast and has a dodgy set of Bagpipes to remind him of home.

OLAP (On-Line Analytical Processing) is the most powerful business intelligence tool currently available and Microsoft's Analysis Manager makes OLAP cubes incredibly easy to build and deploy. However, the real power of OLAP lies in its ability to help you solve real-life business problems; to release that power you need to use the language that controls the cubes and allows them to be queried. That language is MDX (Multi Dimensional eXpressions). Fast Track to MDX gives you all the necessary background to let you write useful, powerful MDX expressions and introduces the most frequently used MDX functions and constructs. No prior knowledge is assumed and examples are used throughout the book to rapidly develop your MDX skills to the point where you can solve real business problems. Mark Whitehorn, co-author of the best-selling "Inside Relational Databases", is renowned for his enthusiasm towards data handling and for the lucidity of his writing. Robert Zare is a program manager for Analysis Services at Microsoft: his inspiring talks on MDX sowed the seeds from which this book grew. Mosha Pasumansky was one of the authors of the OLEDB for OLAP specification that defined the MDX language and later he was the developer in charge of the first implementation of MDX in the Microsoft OLAP Services 7.0 product. He is currently the development lead of the Analysis Services engine team. A CD-ROM containing examples from within the book, and a time-limited version of ProClarity, is included.

About the Author

Mark Whitehorn, co-author of the best-selling Inside "Relational Databases," is renowned for his enthusiasm towards data handling and for the lucidity of his writing.

Robert Zare is a Program Manager for Analysis Services at Microsoft: his inspiring talks on MDX sowed the seeds from which this book grew.

Mosha Pasumansky was one of the authors of the OLEDB for OLAP specification that defined the MDX language and later he was the developer in charge of the first implementation of MDX in the Microsoft OLAP Services 7.0 product. He is currently the development lead of the Analysis Services engine team.

Apache Struts has long provided Java developers with a powerful framework for building extensible, maintainable web applications. Yet the latest version 2 release takes developers’ capabilities to the next level, having integrated Ajax support, the ability to easily integration with the Spring framework, and the ability to take full advantage of POJOs. Practical Apache Struts 2 Web 2.0 Projects shows you how to capitalize upon these new features to build next-generation web applications that both enthrall and empower your users.

• Gain an in-depth understanding of the Struts framework, with special attention paid to key version 2 features.
• Learn how to take advantage of Web 2.0 concepts alongside Struts 2 to build next-generation web sites.
• Follow along with the introduction of important concepts and development techniques by way of a web site project closely resembling what you might encounter in any enterprise environment.

What you’ll learn

• Build a practical Struts 2 Web 2.0--enabled application project from the ground up.
• Enable participation by manipulating data.
• Share data by implementing powerful search utilities.
• Syndicate web content created using RSS and REST.
• Discover advanced features available in Struts 2 web framework.
• Integrate Ajax frameworks to produce user-friendly, responsive interfaces.
• Integrate and use Struts 2 with other frameworks such as Spring to form a broader enterprise Java application stack.

Who is this book for?

Developers who want a hands-on practical book demonstrating how Web 2.0 features are implemented in Struts 2. The audience could range from beginner to advanced, as the configuration and basic framework usage will be explained, as well as the advanced extension features.

The book would also appeal to developers who wish to understand the Web 2.0 development paradigm from an implementation standpoint.

About the Author

Ian Roughley is an Apache Struts 2 user and developer, and has been developing Java web applications for years using Struts web technology.

Spring has made a remarkable rise since its conception in 2002. Users find Spring the ideal framework to build their applications in J2EE environments. Beginning Spring 2 is the first and only Spring-authorized book that takes you through the first steps of using Spring, and requires no prior J2EE experience. It discusses relevant integrated technologies that you should be aware of, and illustrates how Spring makes using them easier.

The book teaches the correct usage of Spring in applications, and lowers the learning curve on J2EE standards. It covers useful features of Spring without delving too far into complicated features. The authors take advantage of less complex alternatives whenever possible, and shows how Spring can make you more productive in complicated environments where J2EE technologies need to be applied. The book covers the complete Spring web tools portfolio and deals with persistence and transaction management. It also introduces 3-tier application design and how to test these designs.

About the Author

Dave Minter has adored computers since he was small enough to play in the boxes they came in. He built his first PC from discarded, faulty, and obsolete components, and considers that to be the foundation of his career as an integration consultant. Dave is based in London, where he helps large and small companies build systems that "just work." He co-authored Building Portals with the Java Portlet API and Pro Hibernate 3.

As a web developer, you’ll already know that JavaScript™ is a powerful language, allowing you to add an impressive array of dynamic functionality to otherwise static web sites. But there is more power waiting to be unlocked--JavaScript is capable of full object-oriented capabilities, and by applying OOP principles, best practices, and design patterns to your code, you can make it more powerful, more efficient, and easier to work with alone or as part of a team.

With Pro JavaScript Design Patterns, you’ll start with the basics of object-oriented programming in JavaScript applicable to design patterns, including making JavaScript more expressive, inheritance, encapsulation, information hiding, and more. With that covered, you can kick-start your JavaScript development in the second part of the book, where you’ll find detail on how to implement and take advantage of several design patterns in JavaScript, including composites, decorators, façades, adapters, and many more.

Each chapter is packed with real-world examples of how the design patterns are best used and expert advice on writing better code, as well as what to watch out for. Along the way you’ll discover how to create your own libraries and APIs for even more efficient coding.

• Master the basics of object-oriented programming in JavaScript, as they apply to design patterns.
• Apply design patterns to your kick-start your JavaScript development.
• Work through several real-world examples.

What you’ll learn

• How to apply object-oriented programming techniques in JavaScript
• How to take advantage of inheritance, interfaces, and encapsulation and information hiding to kick-start your JavaScript development
• How to implement several design patterns in your JavaScript projects, including factory, façade, bridge, composite, adapter, decorator, flyweight, proxy, command, observer, and chain of responsibility
• How to make your code easier to manage in a team environment, as well as on your own
• How to create your own libraries and APIs

This book will be an invaluable learning tool for any experienced JavaScript developer.

About the Author

Ross Harmes works as a frontend engineer in Sunnyvale, California, where he creates modular and reusable JavaScript components for Yahoo! Small Business.

Dustin Diaz is a user interface engineer for Google in Mountain View, California. He enjoys writing JavaScript, CSS, and HTML, as well as making interactive and usable interfaces to inspire passionate users.

The rapid growth in mobile communications has led to an increasing demand for wideband high data rate communications services. In recent years, the Distributed Antenna System (DAS) has emerged as a promising candidate beyond 3G and 4G mobile communications. Distributed Antenna Systems: Open Architecture for Future Wireless Communications is a comprehensive technical guide that covers the fundamental concepts, recent advances and open issues of the DAS. The topic is explored with various key challenges in diverse scenarios, including architecture, capacity, connectivity, scalability, medium access control, scheduling, dynamic channel assignment and cross-layer optimization. The primary focus of this book is the introduction of concepts, effective protocols, system integration, performance analysis techniques, simulations and experiments, and more importantly, future research directions in the DAS. The first part of the book introduces DAS fundamentals, including channel models and theoretical issues, examining the capacity of the DAS with different structures. Concentrating on the MAC and protocols for the DAS, the second part of the book includes information on distributed signal processing, optimal resource allocation, cooperative MAC protocols, cross layer design, and distributed organization. The third part presents case studies and applications of the DAS, including experiment, RF engineering, and applications.

The expert guide to building Ruby on Rails applications

 

Ruby on Rails strips complexity from the development process, enabling professional developers to focus on what matters most: delivering business value. Now, for the first time, there’s a comprehensive, authoritative guide to building production-quality software with Rails. Pioneering Rails developer Obie Fernandez and a team of experts illuminate the entire Rails API, along with the Ruby idioms, design approaches, libraries, and plug-ins that make Rails so valuable. Drawing on their unsurpassed experience, they address the real challenges development teams face, showing how to use Rails’ tools and best practices to maximize productivity and build polished applications users will enjoy.

 

Using detailed code examples, Obie systematically covers Rails’ key capabilities and subsystems. He presents advanced programming techniques, introduces open source libraries that facilitate easy Rails adoption, and offers important insights into testing and production deployment. Dive deep into the Rails codebase together, discovering why Rails behaves as it does– and how to make it behave the way you want it to.

 

About the Author

Obie Fernandez is a recognized tech industry leader and independent consultant. He has been hacking computers since he got his first Commodore VIC-20 in the eighties, and found himself in the right place and time as a programmer on some of the first Java enterprise projects of the mid-nineties. He moved to Atlanta, Georgia, in 1998 and gained prominence as lead architect of local startup success MediaOcean. He also founded the Extreme Programming (later Agile Atlanta) User Group and was that group’s president and organizer for several years. In 2004, he made the move back into the enterprise, tackling high-risk, progressive projects for world-renowned consultancy ThoughtWorks. He has been evangelizing Ruby and Rails online via blog posts and publications since early 2005, and earned himself quite a bit of notoriety (and trash talking) from his old friends in the Java open-source community. Since then, he has presented on a regular basis at numerous industry events and user group meetings, and even does the occasional training gig for corporations and groups wanting to get into Rails development. Nowadays, Obie specializes in the development and marketing of large-scale, web-based applications. 

 

Clay tablets have been used to keep records from the earliest times. However, they were used for archives rather than libraries and consisted mainly of administrative records.Private and personal libraries containing books first appeared in Greece in the 5th century BC.The Royal Library of Alexandria was founded in the 3rd century BC and was reputedly the largest library in the world. It was linked to amuseum,or research centre, and appeared to be primarily devoted to editing Greek texts on papyrus scrolls. The library was initially organized by Demetrius Phalereus who wrote about history, rhetoric, and literary criticism, and was a student of Aristotle.

One of the most important libraries in Persia established in the 7th century was that associated with the Academy of Gundisaphur, which offered training in medicine, philosophy, theology and science. It was the most important medical centre of the ancient world during the 6th and 7th centuries. In the 8th century Iranians and Arabs imported the skill of paper-making from China, and by the 9th century, public libraries started to appear in many Islamic cities, although they were later destroyed by invaders. However, the contents of the texts were copied by Christian monks and were added to texts from Roman, Greek, and Byzantine works.Library design at the time reflected the labour intensive process of hand-copying of texts and the need to keep them secure.Thus librarians chained books to lecterns or shelves. Today Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) can be used if we wish to know where a book is located.

Frustrated by the lack of instructions and documentation that came with your new iPod? Don't throw it out the window! Instead, consult Easy iPod and iTunes, a full-color, visually oriented book that covers iPod and iTunes usage from the beginner's point of view. With step-by-step instructions and visual elements on every page, you will go from opening the iPod box and installing its software, to ripping music in iTunes, syncing with the iPod and beyond. You will learn to work with music files, podcasts, audio books and Internet radio, and you'll discover the iTunes Music Store and how it works with iTunes and iPod. As long as you have a current model iPod (including the new Nano and video models), this book will work for you.

About the Author

Shelly Brisbin (http://brisbin.net) has written about technology for eighteen years. She is the author of eleven books, including two editions of The MacAddict Guide to Living the iLife, Build Your Own Wi-Fi Network, Adobe GoLive 6 for Macintosh and Windows Visual QuickStart Guide. She has also written hundreds of articles for magazines including Macworld, MacWeek, NetProfessional, The Net, NewMedia, WebTechniques, and SunWorld In her free time, she manages a music-related Web site and mailing list.

In 2005, the U.S. Government Accountability Office recommended that all agencies begin planning a coherent transition to IPv6. IPv6 will solve the problem of limited IP addresses and improve internetworking capabilities. This promising protocol is gaining momentum and it is only a matter of time before the transition will have to occur globally. The problem is that during the three-to-six year transition period, IPv6 and its predecessor, IPv4, will have to successfully coexist in order to ensure service continuity.

Not only federal agencies, but corporations and institutions must start planning the transition to IPv6 now to maintain the operation, security, and interoperability of their networks.
The implementation of IPv6 is essential to the continued growth of the internet and the development of new applications. The Handbook of IPv4 to IPv6 Transition Methodologies provides a wealth of best practices and procedures that will help corporations plan and implement a smooth transition to IPv6.

The Wireless Metropolitan Area Network (WirelessMAN) is a promising Broadband Wireless Access (BWA) technology that provides high-speed, high-bandwidth efficiency and high-capacity multimedia services for both residential and enterprise applications. Mobile WiMAX: Toward Broadband Wireless Metropolitan Area Networks examines the basic concepts, recent advances, and latest standard specifications pertinent to WirelessMANs, placing emphasis on IEEE 802.16-based WiMAX. After introducing the basics of WirelessMAN, the book addresses topics in three accessible parts. The first part focuses on radio frequency (RF), signal processing, multiple in-multiple out (MIMO) technology, and identifying challenges and possible solutions in the physical layer. An examination of protocol issues follows, including those involving medium access control (MAC), quality of service (QoS) in point-to-multi-point (PMP) and mesh networks, cross layer optimization, mobility management, handoff in heterogeneous networks, energy management, and link adaptation mechanisms. The final part considers issues regarding security, economy, and system capacity in the WiMAX. Mobile WiMAX: Toward Broadband Wireless Metropolitan Area Networks is an important resource for those interested in understanding all aspects relevant to the technical, practical, economic, and policy issues concerning WirelessMANs. It offers comprehensive practical and technical guidance on the fundamentals and recent advances in general WirelessMAN, as well as the latest standard specifications in IEEE 802.16a/c/d/e families.

The Definitive Guide to the Microsoft Enterprise Library introduces one of the most exciting and popular .NET-oriented initiatives, the Enterprise Library. The EL offers nine classes of reusable code, or blocks, that are used to solve a variety of common problem spaces. These problems cover a number of topics, including configuration, data access, exception management, caching, application updates, UI separation, asynchronous invocation, logging, security, and XML-based information aggregation.

Author Keenan Newton, a senior consultant for noted Microsoft Partner Magenic, begins the book with an introduction to common challenges, explaining the conditions that brought about the creation of the EL. After an EL overview, subsequent chapters offer detailed information about each of the nine blocks. The book concludes by outlining the framework available for creating custom application blocks.

You'll be able to build .NET applications faster and more efficiently by taking advantage of readily available code developed and released by Microsoft's Patterns and Practices group. All book examples are based on a theme project that develops a point-of-sale application for a cosmetics company. You will be introduced to these technologies in conjunction with real-world scenarios.

About the Author

Keenan Newton has over 10 years’ experience designing, architecting, and developing N–tier applications for both Windows and web environments, with an emphasis on Web Services, ADO.NET, and SOA. He is a speaker at local .NET user groups, and has been published in CoDe Magazine. Keenan is employed as a senior consultant for Microsoft Consulting Services.

Real Application Clusters (RAC) and the Grid architecture are Oracle's strategy for scaling out enterprise systems to cope with bigger workloads and more users. Many books limit themselves by conceptualizing and theorizing about RAC technology, but this book is the first to portray implementing and administering an Oracle 10g RAC system in a Linux environment. This book features basic concepts underlying Linux and Oracle RAC, design strategies, hardware procurement and configuration, and many other topics.

The RAC-specific technologies described include configuration of the interconnect, OCFS, ASM, Cluster Ready Services, and Grid Control. The Oracle features RMAN and Data Guard are also discussed, along with available hardware options. The authors include practical examples and configuration information, so that upon reading this book, you'll be armed with the information you need to build an Oracle RAC database on Linux, whether it is on a single laptop or a 64-node Itanium cluster.

About the Author

Julian Dyke is an independent consultant specializing in Oracle Database technology. He has over 20 years of database experience, including more than 15 years as an Oracle DBA, developer, and consultant. He is chair of the UK Oracle User Group Real Application Clusters Special Interest Group (UKOUG RAC SIG) and a member of the Oak Table Network. He regularly presents at conferences, seminars, and usergroup meetings in the UK, Europe, and the US. He also maintains www.juliandyke.com, which specializes in Oracle diagnostics, optimization, and internals. He is an Oracle Certified Professional and holds a bachelor of science degree in computation from the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST), UK. Steve Shaw is the lead Oracle technologist for Intel Corporation in EMEA (Europe, the Middle East, and Africa). Steve has over 12 years of commercial IT experience with 8 years dedicated to working with the Oracle Database, including a period of time with Oracle Corporation. Steve is the author of Hammerora, the open source Oracle load-test tool, and an expert on Oracle benchmarks and performance. Steve has contributed articles to many Oracle publications and web sites and presents regularly at Oracle seminars, conferences, and special-interest group meetings. He is an Oracle Certified Professional and holds a master of science degree in computing from the University of Bradford, UK.

Cell-based design methodologies have dominated layout generation of digital circuits. Unfortunately, the growing demands for transparent process portability, increased performance, and low-level device sizing for timing/power are poorly handled in a fixed cell library.

Direct Transistor-Level Layout For Digital Blocks proposes a direct transistor-level layout approach for small blocks of custom digital logic as an alternative that better accommodates demands for device-level flexibility. This approach captures essential shape-level optimizations, yet scales easily to netlists with thousands of devices, and incorporates timing optimization during layout. The key idea is early identification of essential diffusion-merged MOS device groups, and their preservation in an uncommitted geometric form until the very end of detailed placement. Roughly speaking, essential groups are extracted early from the transistor-level netlist, placed globally, optimized locally, and then finally committed each to a specific shape-level form while concurrently optimizing for both density and routability.
The essential flaw in prior efforts is an over-reliance on geometric assumptions from large-scale cell-based layout algorithms. Individual transistors may seem simple, but they do not pack as gates do. Algorithms that ignore these shape-level issues suffer the consequences when thousands of devices are poorly packed. The approach described in this book can pack devices much more densely than a typical cell-based layout.

Direct Transistor-Level Layout For Digital Blocks is a comprehensive reference work on device-level layout optimization, which will be valuable to CAD tool and circuit designers.

"This book discusses IT supply and demand, analyzing functional requirements and operational processes, using methods such as those defined in the IT infrastructure library (ITIL). This book will be useful for understanding the key concepts behind modern service-oriented IT organizations. In a nutshell, this is a good book and a good starting point for learning more about modern customer-oriented processes and service delivery." (Alessandro Berni, Computing Reviews, April, 2006)In the network economy almost every organization depends on perfect IT facilities. Every organization is forced to reflect on its IT demand. Realizing the organization of supply and demand is the subject of this book.

The book consists of five parts. In the first part, IT management tasks and the objects involved are discussed. The execution of these tasks has to meet with functional and performance demands. These requirements are more easily met when an organization has a transparent IT architecture at its disposal.

The second part outlines traditional IT management. The starting point is a process-oriented functioning of the IT organization. This goes for both the IT demand organization as well as the IT supply organization. In this part, methods like BISML, ASL, ITIL, MOF, MSF, TMN and eTOM are discussed.

The third part deals with controlling IT. The aim of this control is diverse. Control is different when striving for efficiency and complying with accountants requirements, compared to the control as used when IT is a means to comply with customers and/or chain partners wishes. In the latter case, innovation of IT processes is an issue.

Part four tackles aspects of IT management. Amongst other things, the financial, personnel, purchasing, legal and security aspect in IT are discussed. Besides this, attention is paid to entering service agreements and achieving standardization. The book ends with a look into the future. The effects of striving for "utility computing" and better control of IT by means of "IT portfolio management" are explained.

The book is supported by the website www.ict-management.com. On this site every chapter can be found in the form of a presentation. Lecturers using the book have access to suggestions with solutions for all of the 17 smaller and 8 larger cases included in the book.

PHP and MySQL are quickly becoming the de facto standard for rapid development of dynamic, database-driven web sites. This book is perfect for newcomers to programming as well as hobbyists who are intimidated by harder-to-follow books. With concepts explained in plain English, the new edition starts with the basics of the PHP language, and explains how to work with MySQL, the popular open source database. You then learn how to put the two together to generate dynamic content.

If you come from a web design or graphics design background and know your way around HTML, Learning PHP & MySQL is the book you've been looking for. The content includes:

• PHP basics such as strings and arrays, and pattern matching
• A detailed discussion of the variances in different PHP versions
• MySQL data fundamentals like tables and statements
• Information on SQL data access for language
• A new chapter on XHTML
• Error handling, security, HTTP authentication, and more

Learning PHP & MySQL explains everything from fundamental concepts to the nuts and bolts of performing specific tasks. As part of O'Reilly's bestselling Learning series, the book is an easy-to-use resource designed specifically for beginners. It's a launching pad for future learning, providing you with a solid foundation for more advanced development.

About the Author

Michele E. Davis has co-authored and authored over 11 books and has owned a technical writing and software training company since 1988. Michele contributed to the "HTML Bible 4.0" (Wiley), and has an MFA in Writing from Hamline University. Jon A. Phillips is a software engineer who loves Open Source technology. He's been working with web development and databases for over 12 years and is always exploring new technology. Additionally, he co-authored "Dreamweaver 8 All-in-One Desk Reference For Dummies" with Michele Davis and others in July 2006.

Make the move to IIS 7 with this practical guide

Microsoft's IIS 7 is a radical departure from previous versions of IIS, and it promises administrators a new level of control over their Web servers, with its modular design and a flexible, extensible architecture that creates new opportunities for customization. This book guides you beyond the networking technology and concepts you already know and teaches you the crucial new features of IIS 7 that will help you succeed with this dramatically different Web server.

From navigating the new interface to adjusting settings entirely in XML to configuring IIS 7 for maximum security, this book covers the techniques, tricks, and basic instruction you need to take full advantage of IIS 7. Special sidebars provide information that can help developers coordinate efforts with administrators right from the start of projects to get the best outcomes.

• Learn how administrators and developers work together in IIS 7

• Understand the fundamentally different architecture in IIS 7

• Manage Web sites and all ASP.NET functionality in one location

• Move existing ASP applications to IIS 7

• Click and explore to see how things work with IIS 7's drill-down approach

• Set MIME types, work with handlers, and start building files

• Use apps such as HTML, ASP.NET, CGI, PERL, ColdFusion®, and more

• Explore code-based, role-based, and .NET-based security models

• Modify application configuration files

About the Author

John Paul Mueller, consultant, application developer, writer, and technical editor, has written more than 300 articles and 75 books, including coauthoring Mastering Windows Vista Business: Ultimate, Business, and Enterprise. His topics range from programming and operating systems to home security and accessibility. He has contributed articles to such magazines as DevSource, asp.netPro, InformIT, SQL Server Professional, and Visual C++ Developer, among others. You can reach him at his Web site www.mwt.net/~jmueller/.

Harness Microsoft's Powerful Server Management Tool

If you're an IT professional, you're busy enough trying to manage multiple systems and stay proactive with the technology demands of today's fast-moving companies. System Center Operations Manager 2007 is designed to make your life easier—and this comprehensive book is your one-stop gateway to it all. With intermediate to advanced coverage, this book gives you the information you need to deploy, manage, and maintain SCOM 2007, and use it to monitor your network.

Along with pages of clear explanations and in-depth instruction, this practical guide puts SCOM 2007 into the context of your job role with real-world scenarios and examples. There is also a collection of ready-to-use scripts on the book's Web page at www.sybex.com that you can download and use immediately.

From installation to automating tasks, you'll find the expert guidance you need to get the most out of SCOM 2007.

Coverage includes:

• Identifying system requirements and installing Operations Manager 2007

• Creating Management Pack lifestyle standards

• Monitoring services, servers, and clients with the Operations Console

• Understanding audit collection services

• Setting up agentless exception monitoring

• Backing up, restoring, and recovering from disasters

• Working with complex environments

• Streamlining and automating OpsManager 2007 with scripting

• Using Windows PowerShell with OpsManager 2007 objects

• Master the Components of SCOM 2007

• Create End-to-End Solutions Across Applications, Systems, Software, and Hardware

• Automate Tasks, Improve Reporting, and Increase Efficiency

• Be Proactive in Meeting Your Company's IT Demands

• Understand Microsoft® Office Framework (MOF) and Best Practices

About the Author

Brad Price is an MCT with sixteen years of experience in the IT field, specializing in Active Directory, Exchange Server, Systems Management Server, and Operation Manager. He is the author of several books on Active Directory.

John Paul Mueller, consultant, application developer, writer, and technical editor, has written over 300 articles and 75 books, including the forthcoming IIS7 Implementation and Administration. He has contributed articles to such magazines as DevSource, asp.netPro, InformIT, SQL Server Professional, and Visual C++ Developer.

Scott Fenstermacher is a network engineer for a Microsoft Gold partner. He has over twelve years of experience in IT, including working with systems from Microsoft and Novell to IBM and Linux.

Give your friends and family the shock of their lives! 51 High-Tech Practical Jokes for the Evil Genius has everything you need to pull devastatingly funny (and safe!) technical pranks. From the “evasive beeping thing” to “rats in the walls” to the “rigged lie detector,” you’ll find a plethora of pranks that will feed your inner hacker while you create a state of utter confusion around you!   Using easy-to-find parts and tools that all Evil Geniuses can get their hands on, these well-played yet harmless pranks will confound your unsuspecting targets every time. Plus, every gadget can be mixed and matched, allowing you to create hundreds of larger, even more twisted evil prank devices! 51 High-Tech Practical Jokes for the Evil Genius gives you: 

• Instructions and plans for 51 simple-to-advanced projects, complete with 200 how-to illustrations that let you build each device visually
• Frustration-factor removal—all the needed parts are listed, along with sources
• Video links to many of the practical jokes on YouTube.com

51 High-Tech Practical Jokes for the Evil Genius provides you with all the instructions, parts lists, and sources you need to pull hilarious pranks, such as: 

• Evasive random beeping things
• Dripping faucet simulator
• Hungry garbage can critter
• Humungous dropping spider
• Horrible computer failure
• TV remote control jammer
• Possessed animatronic doll
• Flying Ouija board
• Voices from the grave
• The barbecue box
• Ultrasimple pulse shocker
• Disposable camera taser
• Ghost door knocker
• Radio station blocker
• And many more!

About the Author

Brad Graham is a network engineer, electronics technician,welder,web developer, robotics developer, computer programmer, and inventor. He is coauthor of Atomic Zombie’s Bicycle Builders Bonanza (0-07-142267-6), 101 Spy Gadgets for the Evil Genius (0-07-146894-3), and other titles. Kathy McGowan is a bicycle, robotics, and electronics enthusiast and manages the daily operations of a hi-tech company.

RSA is the first workable and practicable public-key cryptographic system, based on the use of large prime numbers. It is also the most popular and widely-used cryptographic system in today's digital world, for which its three inventors Rivest, Shamir and Adleman received the year 2002 Turing Award, the equivalent Nobel Prize in Computer Science.

Cryptanalytic Attacks on RSA covers almost all major known cryptanalytic attacks and defenses of the RSA cryptographic system and its variants. Since RSA depends heavily on computational complexity theory and number theory, background information on complexity theory and number theory is presented first. This is followed by an account of the RSA cryptographic system and its variants.

Cryptanalytic Attacks on RSA is designed for a professional audience of practitioners and researchers in industry and academia and as a reference or secondary text for advanced level students in computer science, applied mathematics, electrical & communication engineering.

 

It takes a book as versatile as its subject to cover Apache Tomcat, the popular open source Servlet and JSP container and high performance web server. Tomcat: The Definitive Guide is a valuable reference for administrators and webmasters, a useful guide for programmers who want to use Tomcat as their web application server during development or in production, and an excellent introduction for anyone interested in Tomcat.

Updated for the latest version of Tomcat, this new edition offers a complete guide to installing, configuring, maintaining and securing this servlet container. In fact, with such a wealth of new information, this is essentially a new book rather than a simple revision. You will find details for using Tomcat on all major platforms, including Windows, Linux, OS X, Solaris, and FreeBSD, along with specifics on Tomcat configuration files, and step-by-step advice for deploying and running web applications.

This book offers complete information for:

• Installation and startup procedures
• Configuring Tomcat-including realms, roles, users, servlet sessions, and JNDI resources including JDBC DataSources
• Deploying web applications-individual servlets and JSP pages, and web application archive files
• Tuning Tomcat to measure and improve performance
• Integrating Tomcat with Apache Web Server
• Securing Tomcat to keep online thugs at bay
• Tomcat configuration files-server.xml and web.xml, and more
• Debugging and Troubleshooting-diagnosing problems with Tomcat or a web application
• Compiling your own Tomcat, rather than using the pre-built release
• Running two or more Tomcat servlet containers in parallel

About the Author

Jason Brittain is a Senior Principal Software Engineer for Orbital Sciences Corporation, working at NASA's Ames Research Center on the Kepler Space Telescope mission (http://kepler.nasa.gov).

Jason is a co-author of Tomcat: The Definitive Guide, now in its second edition, and has written some web articles for O'Reilly's OnJava.com web site.

Before joining the team on the Kepler mission, Jason was a Senior Software Engineer at Symantec Corporation working on the Brightmail AntiSpam appliance product line's control center web application.

Jason's specialties include Java software development, Tomcat web application development and deployment, scalability and fault tolerance, and Apache Ant build systems, and Linux system administration. He has contributed to many Apache Jakarta projects, and has been an active open source software developer for several years. Ian Darwin has worked in the computer industry for three decades: with Unix since 1980, Java since 1995, and OpenBSD since 1998. He wrote the freeware file(1) command used on Linux and BSD and is the author of "Checking C Programs" with "Lint and Java Cookbook", as well as over 70 articles, in addition to university and commercial course material on C and Unix. Besides programming and consulting, Ian teaches Unix, C, and Java for Learning Tree International, one of the world's largest technical training companies.

This book is titled Practical Ruby Projects. And let me start by saying that the projects are practical. But they might not be quite what you’re used to. Flip through the book. You won’t find any references to enterprise deployment. Not a word about business logic. In fact, hard as it is to believe, there’s no web programming! But if you exclude those things, what’s left? Why, everything else, of course!

Each chapter in this book turns Ruby loose on a new interesting problem or project. They range from creative endeavors to investigative simulations to the exploration of computer programming languages themselves. Ruby is a programming language, but it’s also a tool to create, understand, and entertain. This book is all about Ruby.

Since this book was written with the assumption that you have a basic knowledge of Ruby, odds are you already know about Ruby’s strengths.

Expert F# is about practical programming in a beautiful language that puts the power and elegance of functional programming into the hands of .NET developers. In combination with .NET, F# achieves unrivaled levels of programmer productivity and program clarity. This books serves as

• The authoritative guide to F# by the designer of F#
• A comprehensive reference of F# concepts, syntax, and features
• A treasury of expert F# techniques for practical, real-world programming

While inspired by OCaml, F# isn't just another functional programming language. Drawing on many of the strengths of both OCaml and .NET, it's a general-purpose language ideal for real-world development. F# integrates functional, imperative, and object-oriented programming styles so you can flexibly and elegantly solve programming problems, and brings .NET development alive with interactive execution. Whatever your background, you'll find that F# is easy to learn, fun to use, and extraordinarily powerful. F# will help change the way you think about and go about programming.

Written by F#'s designer and two active contributors, Expert F# is the authoritative, comprehensive, and in-depth guide to the language and its use. Designed to help others become experts, the book gives a thorough introduction to the F# language from quick essentials to in-depth advanced topics such as active pattern matching, aggregate data types and operators, sequence expressions, lazy values, mutable data and side-effects, generics, type augmentations, functional decomposition and code organization.

The second half of the book is devoted to examining the practical application of F#, providing elegant solutions to common programming tasks including UI implementation, data access, web and distributed programming, symbolic and numerical computations, concurrent programming, testing, profiling, and interoperability with other languages. The latest hot developments in F# and .NET are also addressed, including Active Patterns, implicit class construction, integration with LINQ over relational data, meta programming and useful tips for working with Visual Studio and F# command-line tools.

The world's foremost experts in F# show you how to program in F# the way they do!

"I am very glad to see that three people so active in this area of knowledge update are bringing out this book. It should be of great help to graduate students as well as established researchers." Rohit Parikh, Distinguished Professor, City University of New York Dynamic Epistemic Logic is the logic of knowledge change. This is not about one logical system, but about a whole family of logics that allows us to specify static and dynamic aspects of multi-agent systems. This book provides various logics to support such formal specifications, including proof systems. Concrete examples and epistemic puzzles enliven the exposition. The book also contains exercises including answers and is eminently suitable for graduate courses in logic.

A sweeping chapter-wise outline of the content of this book is the following. The chapter 'Introduction' informs the reader about the history of the subject, and its relation to other disciplines. 'Epistemic Logic' is an overview of multi-agent epistemic logic - the logic of knowledge - including modal operators for groups, such as general and common knowledge. 'Belief Revision' is an overview on how to model belief revision, both in the 'traditional' way and in a dynamic epistemic setting. 'Public Announcements' is a detailed and comprehensive introduction to the logic of knowledge to which dynamic operators for truthful public announcement are added. Many interesting applications are also presented in this chapter: a form of cryptography for ideal agents also known as 'the Russian cards problem', the sum-and-product riddle, etc. 'Epistemic Actions' introduces a generalization of public announcement logic to more complex epistemic actions. A different perspective on that matter is independently presented in 'Action Models'. 'Completeness' gives details on the completeness proof for the logics introduced in 'Epistemic Logic', 'Public Announcements', and 'Action Models'. 'Expressivity' discusses various results on the expressive power of the logics presented.

Genetic Programming Theory and Practice V was developed from the fifth workshop at the University of Michigans Center for the Study of Complex Systems to facilitate the exchange of ideas and information related to the rapidly advancing field of Genetic Programming (GP). Contributions from the foremost international researchers and practitioners in the GP arena examine the similarities and differences between theoretical and empirical results on real-world problems. The text explores the synergy between theory and practice, producing a comprehensive view of the state of the art in GP application.

The work covers applications of GP to a wide variety of domains, including bioinformatics, symbolic regression for system modeling, financial modeling, circuit design and robot controllers. This volume is a unique and indispensable tool for academics, researchers and industry professionals involved in GP, evolutionary computation, machine learning and artificial intelligence.

 

Software Engineering Techniques Applied to Agricultural Systems presents cutting-edge software engineering techniques for designing and implementing better agricultural software systems based on the object-oriented paradigm and the Unified Modeling Language (UML). The book is divided in two parts: the first part presents concepts of the object-oriented paradigm and the UML notation of these concepts, and the second part provides a number of examples of applications that use the material presented in the first part. The examples presented illustrate the techniques discussed, focusing on how to construct better models using objects and UML diagrams. More advanced concepts such as distributed systems and examples of how to build these systems are presented in the last chapter of the book.

The book presents a step-by-step approach for modeling agricultural systems, starting with a conceptual diagram representing elements of the system and their relationships. Furthermore, diagrams such as sequential and collaboration diagrams are used to explain the dynamic and static aspects of the software system.

Wireless networks technologies have been dramatically improved by the popularity of third generation (3G) wireless networks, wireless LANs, Bluetooth, and sensor networks. However, security is a major concern for wide deployments of such wireless networks. The contributions to this volume identify various vulnerabilities in the physical layer, the MAC layer, the IP layer, the transport layer, and the application layer, and discuss ways to strengthen security mechanisms and services in all these layers. The topics covered in this book include intrusion detection, secure PHY/MAC/routing protocols, attacks and prevention, immunization, key management, secure group communications/multicast, secure location services, monitoring and surveillance, anonymity, privacy, trust establishment/management, redundancy and security, and dependable wireless networking.

Magnetic Resonance (MR) imaging produces images of the human tissues in a noninvasive manner, revealing the structure, metabolism, and function of tissues and organs. The impact of this image technique in diagnostic radiology is impressive, due to its versatility and flexibility in joining high-quality anatomical images with functional information.

Signal and image processing play a decisive role in the exploitation of MR imaging features, allowing for the extraction of diagnostic and metabolic information from images.This book attempts to cover all updated aspects of MR image processing, ranging from new acquisition techniques to state-of-art imaging techniques. Because the textbook provides the tools necessary to understand the physical and chemical principles, and the basic signal and image processing concepts and applications, it is a valuable reference book for scientists, and an essential source for upper-level undergraduate and graduate students in these disciplines.

The book’s 18 chapters are divided into five sections. The first section focuses on MR signal and image generation and reconstruction, the basics of MR imaging, advanced reconstruction algorithms, and the parallel MRI field. In the second section, the state-of-art techniques for MR images filtering are described. In particular, the second section covers the signal and noise estimation, the inhomogeneities correction and the more advanced image filtering techniques, taking into account the peculiar features of the noise in MR images. Quantitative analysis is a key issue in MR diagnostic imaging. The third section’s topics range from image registration to integration of EEG and MEG techniques with MR imaging. Two chapters cover the cardiac image quantitative analysis issue. In the fourth section, MR spectroscopy is described, from both the signal generation and the data analysis point of view. Diffusion tensor MR imaging and MR elastography are also examined. Finally, in the last section, the functional MR image processing is described in detail. Fundamentals and advanced data analysis (as exploratory approach), bayesian inference, and nonlinear analysis are also depicted.

Webster’s New World Telecom Dictionary, by Ray Horak, is a comprehensive telecommunications dictionary of more than 7,500 terms critical to understanding voice, data, video, and multimedia communications system and network technologies, applications, and regulation. Given the convergence of computing and communications, the book also effectively is a computer dictionary with a telecom focus. It is thoroughly researched, highly objective, absolutely accurate, and includes just about every essential term, abbreviation, acronym, contraction, initialism, and portmanteau you might encounter in the telecom and datacom domains. Although the book is a technical dictionary, Horak’s plain-English, commonsense style yields definitions that are as thoroughly understandable to the business professional or student as they are to the electrical engineer. In fact, many entries are encyclopedic in nature, discussing applications and issues. Horak also injects a bit of his wry sense of humor, sprinkling occasional telecom trivia and marginally related definitions that will have you smiling and chuckling to yourself, but not to the point that they detract from what is an important book on a serious subject. An instant classic, Webster’s New World Telecom Dictionary is the one and only telecom dictionary you will need. It also makes a perfect companion to Horak’s Telecommunications and Data Communications Handbook, published by Wiley-Interscience in October 2007.

About the Author

Ray Horak is an independent consultant who has written more than 100 articles, technical white papers, case studies, and solutions briefs, as well as the bestselling Communications Systems and Networks and the recently published Telecommunications and Data Communications Handbook.

The current attempt to emulate human sapience (wisdom) by artificial means should be a step in the right direction beyond the Artificial/Computational Intelligence and Soft Computing disciplines, but is it warranted? Have humans achieved a level of modeling smart systems that justifies talking about sapience-wisdom?

This book presents computational paradigms describing lower- and higher-level cognitive functions, including mechanisms of concepts, instincts, emotions, situated behavior, language communication and social functioning. Hierarchical organization of the mind is considered, leading to explanations of the highest human capabilities for the beautiful and sublime. A diverse international set of authors discuss Artificial / Computational Sapience and Sapient Systems in this unique and useful volume.

The reader is guided through the subject in a structured and comprehensive manner, and begins with chapters discussing philosophical, historical, and semiotic ideas about what properties are expected from Sapient (Wise) systems. Following that, chapters describe mathematical and engineering views on sapience, relating these to philosophical, semiotic, cognitive, and neuro-biological perspectives.

Features and topics:

Begins with a solid foundation, providing a detailed description of the fundamental concepts and principles of the topic

Discusses concepts and current computational tools that enable the realization, implementation and design of a Sapient System concept

Presents a brief history of the evolution and development of the artificial intelligence, computational intelligence and soft computing fields

Concepts are formalized and extended, as well as compared and differentiated from their counterparts in the Artificial Intelligence and Intelligence Systems disciplines

Explains potential applications of key concepts

Contains discussions and suggestions for future research

This novel, state-of-the-art research volume is the first to focus on and explore Artificial / Computational Sapience and Sapient (Wise) Systems. It will be of real utility to all researchers, graduate students, and professionals in the field who are interested in advancing beyond the usual topics on intelligent systems and artificial intelligence.

Dr Rene V. Mayorga is an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Engineering, at the University of Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada.

Dr Leonid I. Perlovsky is Visiting Scholar at Harvard University and Principal Research Physicist and Technical Advisor at the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory/SNHE, Hanscom.

As game developers a few years from now, we may look back at current generation AI with astonishment and possibly with a hint of nostalgia. We will notice the extreme simplicity of the systems and behaviours we created, asking ourselves whether it was in fact by design or more by necessity. More importantly, we will be surprised by the amount of time taken to prototype such AI. These classical game AI techniques (such as finite-state machines or scripts) appeal to us game developers because they can be easily controlled, but they suffer from this very same property; the content creators must craft each behaviour manually. Any progress in game AI necessarily involves finding a solution to this bottleneck without our designers loosing control over their creations.

This book provides an overview of modern AI techniques that can alleviate the burden. Biologically inspired AI techniques—and machine learning in general—provide us with methods and tools for creating complex in-game behaviours in a manageable way. Not only does this allow designers to prototype simple tasks quickly, but it also means that additional resources can be directed to improving the believability of our characters. While such AI techniques enable the creation of behavioural content in a much more scalable fashion, they are also broadly applicable across the many disciplines of game programming, particularly in off-line tools, as they are already used in parts of the games industry.

If you are a web developer who has already realized the power of Ruby on Rails but wants to take your Rails knowledge further, this book will be invaluable to you. Practical Rails Projects assumes you know the basics of using the framework, concentrating instead on taking you through the creation of a multitude of practical real-world examples, including a blog, a personal organizer, a calendar, a PHP site retrofitted to Rails, and much more. Each example application follows best practices, gives a nod to style as well as functionality, and takes advantage of many Rails plug-ins, Rails engines, and Ruby Gems. There is also discussion of cutting-edge Rails functionality, such as the new REST implementation and Active Resource.

The book starts off by taking you through setup of an ideal development environment as a helpful recap, before diving into the projects straight afterwards.

• Takes you through the creation of several real-world Rails web applications.
• Provides a guide to setting up a perfect development environment with Rails and SQLite or MySQL, supporting Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux operating systems.
• Doesn't waste time on the basics--assumes you know the fundamentals of Ruby and Rails already.
• Covers the newest Rails functionality, such as new plug-ins and engines, as well as the Rails REST implementation and Active Resource.

What you'll learn

• How to set up Rails for Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux
• How to use Rails with both MySQL and SQLite databases
• How to incorporate the latest plug-ins, engines, and Ruby Gems into your applications, saving you hours of development time
• How to make consistent styling of your applications a walk in the park using the Yahoo YUI
• How to retrofit a PHP site to Rails
• How to add sparkle to your applications using Ajax techniques
• How to use cutting-edge Rails functionality such as REST and Active Resource

Who is this book for?

This book is for anyone who has gone beyond the basics of Rails and wants to learn higher-level Rails techniques. It is also useful for those experienced in other disciplines (such as Java and PHP) who want to learn Rails.

About the Author

Eldon Alameda is a web developer who currently resides in the harsh climates of Kansas. He develops Ruby on Rails applications for a small technology startup in downtown Kansas City; prior to this, he did development for a variety of companies including local advertising firms, Sprint PCS, and IBM. During the nineties, he also acquired a nice stack of worthless stock options from working for dot-com companies. When he's not sitting in front of a computer or irritating his wife by describing a new technology as "sexy," Eldon spends most of his time at home playing games with his young daughter.

Smart Cards, Tokens, Security and Applications provides a broad overview of the many card systems and solutions that are in practical use today. This state-of-the art work is written by contributing authors who are active researchers and acknowledged experts in their field. A single book cannot be found to match both the breadth and depth of content.

This book combines a cross-discipline overview of smart cards, tokens and related security and applications plus a technical reference to support further research and study. A step-by-step approach educates the reader in card types, production, operating systems, commercial applications, new technologies, security design, attacks, application development, deployment and lifecycle management. By the end of the book the reader should be able to play an educated role in a smart card related project, even to programming a card application.

Smart Cards, Tokens, Security and Applications is designed for a professional audience of practitioners and researchers.

"Recognition explains the mathematics needed to carry out various aspects of digital imaging through examples, exercises with solutions, pseudocode and sample calculations on images. Suitable for a course or tutorial."
Spectra

"This book explains the mathematics needed to understand and carry out these components in a style at once rigorous and practical, with many worked examples, exercises and solutions, pseudocode, and sample calculations on images."
Bookshelf

"This book covers a lot of ground!"
Jason Dowling, IAPR Newsletter

"...offers both theory and practical applications and exercises. College-level courses will want to consider this as a classroom text on the subject, but specialty libraries will also find it a popular pick for advanced self-study." - California Bookwatch Diane C. Donovan, Midwest Book Review

This major revision of the author's popular book still focuses on foundations and proofs, but now exhibits a shift away from Topology to Probability and Information Theory (with Shannon's source and channel encoding theorems) which are used throughout. Three vital areas for the digital revolution are tackled (compression, restoration and recognition), establishing not only what is true, but why, to facilitate education and research. It will remain a valuable book for computer scientists, engineers and applied mathematicians.

About the Author

Dr S. G. Hoggar is a Research Fellow and formerly a Senior Lecturer in Mathematics at the University of Glasgow.

The purpose of the Embedded Systems Handbook is to provide a reference useful to a broad range of professionals and researchers from industry and academia involved in the evolution of concepts and technologies, as well as development and use of embedded systems and related technologies.

The book provides a comprehensive overview of the field of embedded systems and applications. The emphasis is on advanced material to cover recent significant research results and technology evolution and developments. It is primarily aimed at experienced professionals from industry and academia, but will also be useful to novices with some university background in embedded systems and related areas. Some of the topics presented in the book have received limited coverage in other publications either owing to the fast evolution of the technologies involved, or material confidentiality, or limited circulation in the case of industry-driven developments.

The book covers extensively the design and validation of real-time embedded systems, design and verification languages, operating systems and scheduling, timing and performance analysis, power aware computing, security in embedded systems, the design of application-specific instruction-set processors (ASIPs), system-on-chip (SoC) and network-on-chip (NoC), testing of core-based ICs, network embedded systems and sensor networks, and embedded applications to include in-car embedded electronic systems, intelligent sensors, and embedded web servers for industrial automation.

Microsoft Office Project Server 2007 Unleashed provides a comprehensive and in-depth overview of Microsoft Office Project Server 2007 and Enterprise Project Management (EPM). This book should be used as a reference to guide you through system capabilities and the use of more advanced product features in the context of your business processes. In this book you will find cutting-edge information, including the necessary framework and approach to implement a complex project management software product. Find practical, real-world guidance on how to plan, install, configure, deploy, use, manage, and customize your EPM Implementation. This book is your only in-depth source for Microsoft Office Project Server 2007!

About the Author

QuantumPM, LLC is a project, program, and portfolio management product and services firm that helps its clients create pragmatic and valuable solutions to address real-world problems. The company combines state-of-the-art tools from Microsoft and other technology leaders, its own expertise, and industry best practices to create solutions that support the way its customers work. QuantumPM products and services include management consulting, technical consulting, training, hosting services, earned value management, and business intelligence solutions.

With the boom of Internet, IP-based applications, such as WWW and multimedia, bave been an essential part of our life, and there is an ever-increasing demand for accessing high-speed Internet services anywhere and anytime. This trend unavoidably has huge impacts on the design of the next-generation satellite systems. On the other hand, with its broadcasting nature and unique coverage, satellite systems also can play an important role in the next-generation Internet. For example, satellite systems can be a good driver for the deployment of IPv6 in the Internet, and can provide a fast way to reach end-users because they do not rely on construction of a high-speed terrestrial networks. The workshop proceedings will focus on the IP networking of next-generation satellite systems. Topics include IPv6 over satellites, new architectures of next-generation satellite systems, satellite and terrestrial network integration, network monitoring and measurement, and perfmance enhancement.

About the Author

Dr. Linghang Fan is a research fellow of the Centre for Communication Systems Research in the University of Surrey, UK. He received his B. Eng. in Automatic Control from Southeast University, China, and his M. S. and Ph. D. in Telecommunications from the University of Bradford, UK. From 1998 to 2000, he was a researcher at the University of Bradford and worked on EU projects SINUS and SUMO. In 2003, he joined the University of Surrey and worked on EU projects STRIKE, Ambient Networks, MAESTRO and SATNEX. Currently, he is working on the EU projects SATSIX and ECGIN. He has published more than forty papers in international journals and conferences. 

Dr. Haitham Cruickshank is a lecturer at the University of Surrey. He has worked there since January of 1996 on several European research projects in the ACTS, ESPRIT, TEN-TELECOM, and IST programs. His main research interests are network security, satellite network architectures, VoIP, and IP conferencing over satellites. He also teaches Data and Internet Networking and Satellite Communication courses at the University of Surrey.

Professor Zhili Sun is the Chair of Communication Networking in the Centre for Communication Systems Research, Department of Electronic Engineering, University of Surrey, UK. He received his B. S. in Mathematics from Nanjing University in China and Ph. D. in Computing Science from Lancaster University, UK. He was a Postdoctoral Researcher, from 1989 to 1993, in the Telecommunications Group, Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London before coming to Surrey. He has been a principal investigator and technical coordinator in many European projects including the ESPRIT BISANTE, VIP-TEN, GEOCAST, ICEBERGS, SatLife, SATSIX, and Euro-NGI projects. 

Localization is a critical process in mobile ad hoc networks and wireless sensor networks. Wireless sensor node or MANET devices need to know the network's location or its relative location, with respect to the rest of the network neighbors. However, due to the open spectrum nature of wireless communication, it is subject to attacks and intrusions. Hence the wireless network synchronization needs to be both robust and secure. Furthermore, issues such as energy constraints and mobility make the localization process even more challenging.

Secure Localization and Time Synchronization for Wireless Sensor and Ad Hoc Networks presents the latest research results in the area of secure localization for both wireless mobile ad hoc networks and wireless sensor networks.

An excellent tutorial and practical users guide - far more accessible than the competition.,Professor Alan F. Murray, University of Edinburgh, UK. ... deserves a place on the neural network practitioners bookshelf ...,Proceedings of the Institution of Electrical Engineers,

Neural networks have shown enormous potential for commercial exploitation over the last few years but it is easy to overestimate their capabilities. A few simple algorithms will learn relationships between cause and effect or organise large volumes of data into orderly and informative patterns but they cannot solve every problem and consequently their application must be chosen carefully and appropriately.

This book outlines how best to make use of neural networks. It enables newcomers to the technology to construct robust and meaningful non-linear models and classifiers and benefits the more experienced practitioner who, through over familiarity, might otherwise be inclined to jump to unwarranted conclusions. The book is an invaluable resource not only for those in industry who are interested in neural computing solutions, but also for final year undergraduates or graduate students who are working on neural computing projects. It provides advice which will help make the best use of the growing number of commercial and public domain neural network software products, freeing the specialist from dependence upon external consultants.

About the Author

Professor of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Oxford University, UK

Optical Burst Switching (OBS) is a promising switching architecture to support huge bandwidth demand in optical backbone networks that useWavelength Division Multiplexing (WDM) technology. Due to its special features which combine the merits of optical  circuit switching and packet switching, it can support high-speedtransmission with fine bandwidth granularity using off-the-shelf technologies. OBS has attracted a lot of attention from researchers in the optical networking community. This book is devoted to a comprehensive discussion of the issues related to supporting quality of service (QoS) in OBS networks. Some of these issues include various mechanisms for providing QoS support to multiple traffic classes including absolute as well as relative differentiation frameworks, edge-to-edge QoS provisioning and other non-mainstream variations of mechanisms that have been reported in recent literature. It is hoped that this work will provide individuals interested in QoS provisioning in OBS networks with a comprehensive overview of current research and a view of possible directions for future research.

The database technology landscape has been changing rapidly over the last few years. The server-based relational databases, which were so successful in solving the data-storage problem for traditional client/server and web-based applications, are no longer able to meet the requirements of newer applications, such as handheld devices, appliance-based solutions, and distributed applications. Berkeley DB is not a new technology that was designed to meet the requirements of this new breed of applications, but it is flexible enough to be used in these applications nevertheless. Berkeley DB doesn’t fulfill all the requirements of these applications, so new database technologies will evolve to fill the void. However, its versatility and flexibility will certainly influence the design of any new database product.

This book’s target audience ranges all the way from developers who don’t know anything about Berkeley DB to fairly knowledgeable users. Therefore, I expect that not all readers will be interested in reading the entire book. I have given a brief outline of each chapter below to help you decide which chapters you may want to read or skip.

Database security has been gaining a great deal of importance as industry, military, and government organizations have increasingly adopted Internet-based technologies on a large-scale, because of convenience, ease of use, and the ability to take advantage of rapid advances in the commercial market. Along with the traditional security aspects of data integrity and availability, there is an increasing interest in research and development in data privacy. This is because today’s often missioncritical databases no longer contain only data used for day-to-day processing by organization; as new applications are being added, it is possible for organizations to collect and store vast amounts of data quickly and efficiently and to make the data readily accessible to the public, typically throughWeb-based applications. Unfortunately, if security threats related to the integrity, availability, and privacy of the data are not properly resolved, databases remain vulnerable to malicious attacks and accidental misuse. Such incidents, in turn, may translate into financial losses or losses whose values are obviously high but difficult to quantify, e.g., the loss of the public’s trust in the data management infrastructure and services offered by an organization.

In assembling this handbook, we have had a twofold objective: first, to provide a comprehensive summary of the results of research and development activities in various aspects of database security up to this point, and second, to point toward directions for future work in this important and fruitful field of research.
 
This handbook offers twenty three essays contributed by a selected group ofprominent researchers. Given the dynamic nature of the field of database security, we have attempted to obtain a balance among various viewpoints by inviting multiple contributions on the same topic.We believe that this diversity provides a richness generally not available in one book. In some cases, authors have tried to reconcile their differences by contributing a single essay on a topic.

Probabilistic networks, also known as Bayesian networks and influence diagrams, have become one of the most promising technologies in the area of applied artificial intelligence, offering intuitive, efficient, and reliable methods for diagnosis, prediction, decision making, classification, troubleshooting, and data mining under uncertainty.

Bayesian Networks and Influence Diagrams: A Guide to Construction and Analysis provides a comprehensive guide for practitioners who wish to understand, construct, and analyze intelligent systems for decision support based on probabilistic networks. Intended primarily for practitioners, this book does not require sophisticated mathematical skills or deep understanding of the underlying theory and methods nor does it discuss alternative technologies for reasoning under uncertainty. The theory and methods presented are illustrated through more than 140 examples, and exercises are included for the reader to check his/her level of understanding.

The techniques and methods presented for knowledge elicitation, model construction and verification, modeling techniques and tricks, learning models from data, and analyses of models have all been developed and refined on the basis of numerous courses that the authors have held for practitioners worldwide.

A computer algebra system (CAS) not only has the number crunching" and plotting capability of traditional computing languages such as Fortran and C, but also allows one to perform the symbolic manipulations and derivations required in most mathematically based science and engineering courses. To introduce students in these disciplines to CAS-based mathematical modeling and computation, the authors have previously developed and classroom tested the text Computer Algebra Recipes: A Gourmet's Guide to the Mathematical Models of Science [EM01] based on the Maple CAS. Judging by course evaluations and reader feedback, the response to this book and the computer algebra approach to modeling has been very favorable. With the release of several new versions of Maple since this text was published and the authors' accumulation of many insightful comments and helpful suggestions, a second up-dated edition seemed expedient. However, incorporating all the changes would make an already lengthy book even longer. So the topics of the Gourmet's Guide have been reorganized into two new stand-alone volumes, an already-published Introductory Guide [EM06] and this Advanced Guide.

In this book, we explore mathematical models involving linear and nonlinear ordinary and partial di®erential equations (ODEs and PDEs). This volume, which may be used either as a course text or for self-study, features an eclectic collection of Maple computer algebra worksheets, or recipes," that are systematically organized to illustrate graphical, analytical, and numerical techniques applied to ODE/PDE-based scienti¯c modeling. No prior knowledge of Maple is assumed, the early recipes introducing the reader to the basic Maple syntax, the subsequent recipes introducing further Maple commands and structure on a need-to-know basis.

Sitting in the reading rooms of the Public Record Office in London, a historian is in the center of a museum of organization. Copies of the catalogue to the museum fill several walls (although these are now complemented by online versions). The catalogue lists are dominated by references to objects of one kind: the file. The file has in its lifetime been registered at least twice: once by the government body that produced it and once by the Public Record Office when, after surviving many reviews considering its historical worth, it was selected as worthy of being kept for posterity. If the file is more than 30 years old, the historian notes the latter number, types it into a computer terminal, and waits a while for the pager to beep, indicating that the file has arrived at the collection desk. Although it might be weeded for duplicate or sensitive papers, the file the historian sees is usually the same artefact handled by civil servants and politicians. Typically the file has a card cover, its ruled jacket bearing the signatures of those who have handled it. Inside are notes, letters, minutes, memoranda, or reports, often ordered chronologically and annotated as work was done. At this point nearly every historian forgets about the form of the file and reads the content.1 This historian did not, and the book that follows is the result.

It is clear that Visual Studio Team System is the future of development from Microsoft’s perspective. Development is no longer a personal pursuit by one developer in a darkened room; it is a collective effort by a team of peers. VSTS supports this broader vision by providing a complete collaboration platform for the entire project team. VSTS takes a services-oriented approach leveraging Windows SharePoint Services and SQL Server Business Intelligence Suite. Additionally, VSTS brings the life cycle to life by making it part of the integrated suite.

For those seeking to use test-driven development, VSTS is the tool for you. If you’re an architect, there is a new set of domain-specific modeling tools that makes it easy to visualize systems, determine application relationships, and deploy into a logical datacenter. For testers, Microsoft’s new suite of test tools provides a powerful web testing environment with virtually unlimited extensibility. In addition, the new load tools allow you to perform world-class scalability testing.

Even if you are just considering adopting VSTS, Pro Visual Studio Team System with Team Edition for Database Professionals, Second Edition will provide you with a comprehensive overview. Furthermore, you will be able to dive deep into any area with detailed descriptions, samples, and walkthroughs. Roll up your sleeves and get ready for a new way of developing solutions!

What you’ll learn

This book will guide you through the entire breadth of VSTS. If you are a stakeholder, you have a portal that gives you instant access to project documents, status, and performance indicators. If you are a project manager, you will learn how create, manage, and assess team performance. As VSTS is integrated with MS Office, you can quickly assign tasks and gather work status. With reporting from the data warehouse, you get a real-time view of all project metrics. If you are a developer, you will learn how to write higher-quality code, and ensure that the code works and performs well.

Who is this book for?

This book is for anyone with an interest in Visual Studio 2005 Team System. Whether you’re an architect, developer, tester, or database professional implementing VSTS or just considering it, this book will provide you with the answers that you need.

C# 2008 offers powerful new features, and Accelerated C# 2008 is the fastest path to mastering them, and the rest of C#, for both experienced C# programmers moving to C# 2008 and programmers moving to C# from another object-oriented language. Many books introduce C#, but very few also explain how to use it optimally with the .NET common language runtime (CLR). This book teaches both core C# language concepts and how to wisely employ C# idioms and object-oriented design patterns to exploit the power of C# and the CLR.

This book is both a rapid tutorial and a permanent reference. You’ll quickly master C# syntax while learning how the CLR simplifies many programming tasks. You’ll also learn best practices that ensure your code will be efficient, reusable, and robust. Why spend months or years discovering the best ways to design and code C# when this book will show you how to do things the right way, right from the start?

• Comprehensively and concisely explains both C# 2005 and C# 2008 features
• Focuses on the language itself and on how to use C# 2008 proficiently for all .NET application development
• Concentrates on how C# features work and how to best use them for robust, high-performance code.

About the Author

Trey Nash is a principal software engineer working on PC Bluetooth solutions at Cambridge Silicon Radio. Before focusing on .NET, he specialized in COM/DCOM programming in C, C++, and ATL. Trey earned his bachelor of science and master of engineering degrees in electrical engineering from Texas A&M University.

Optical networks have been in commercial deployment since the early 1980s as a result of advances in optical, photonic, and material technologies. Although the initial deployment was based on silica fiber with a single wavelength modulated at low data rates, it was quickly demonstrated that fiber can deliver much more bandwidth than any other transmission medium, twisted pair wire, coaxial cable, or wireless. Since then, the optical network evolved to include more exciting technologies, gratings, optical filters, optical multiplexers, and optical amplifiers so that today a single fiber can transport an unprecedented aggregate data rate that exceeds Tbps, and this is not the upper limit yet. Thus, the fiber optic network has been the network of choice, and it is expected to remain so for many generations to come, for both synchronous and asynchronous payloads; voice, data, video, interactive video, games, music, text, and more.

In the last few years, we have also witnessed an increase in network attacks as a result of store and forward computer-based nodes. These attacks have many malicious objectives: harvest someone else’s data, impersonate another user, cause denial of service, destroy files, and more. As a result, a new field in communication is becoming important, communication networks and information security. In fact, the network architect and system designer is currently challenged to include enhanced features such as intruder detection, service restoration and countermeasures, intruder avoidance, and so on. In all, the next generation optical network is intelligent and able to detect and outsmart malicious intruders.

This is the first book, to the best of my knowledge, which bridges two disjoint topics, optical networks and network security. It provides a comprehensive treatment of the next generation optical network and a comprehensive treatment of cryptographic algorithms, the quantum optical network, including advanced topics such as teleportation, and how detection and countermeasure strategies may be used. Therefore, we believe that this book differentiates from many others and presents a holistic approach to the treatment of secure optical networks, including fiber to the home (FTTH) and free space optical (FSO).

This book deserves my thanks and appreciation because it came into being after the persistence of Mr. Jason Ward, the expert “literal” eyes of Mrs. Caitlin Womersley, and the many management and production personnel of Springer US anonymous to me.

I hope that the next generation optical network will be intelligent, and when using wireless technologies at the edge, it will enable unlimited and secure communication multi-services with a single and portable device to anyone, anyplace, anytime at low cost.

VMware ESX Server in the Enterprise is the definitive, real-world guide to planning, deploying, and managing today’s leading virtual infrastructure platform in mission-critical environments.

 

Drawing on his extensive experience consulting on large-scale ESX Server implementations, Edward L. Haletky brings together an unprecedented collection of tips, best practices, and field-tested solutions. More than any other author, he illuminates the real issues, tradeoffs, and pitfalls associated with ESX Server–and shows how to make the most of it in your unique environment.

 

Haletky covers the entire lifecycle: planning, installation, system monitoring, tuning, clustering, security, disaster recovery, and much more. Throughout, he supports his recommendations with examples from real-world deployments. He also provides detailed checklists for handling crucial issues such as caching, networking, storage, and hardware selection. Many of his techniques and practices apply to all current virtualization platforms, not just ESX Server.

 

This book will be an indispensable resource for every network architect, administrator, and IT professional who works with virtual servers. ESX Server newcomers will find the soup-to-nuts introduction they desperately need; experienced users will find an unparalleled source of field-tested answers and solutions.

 

In this book, you’ll learn how to:

•    Identify key differences between ESX v3.x.y and ESX v2.5.x and their implications

•    Perform a complete installation–with automated scripting techniques and samples

•    Efficiently audit, monitor, and secure ESX Server

•    Discover SAN storage pitfalls and solutions–with detailed guidance for specific SANs, switches, and fibre-channel adapters

•    Understand ESX Server networking: NIC teaming, vSwitches, network lag, and troubleshooting

•    Configure ESX Server via the Management User Interface, Virtual Center client, and command line interface

•    Install Windows, Linux, and NetWare VMs: prepare media images, place configuration files, handle sizing and swap files, and more

•    Use Dynamic Resource Load Balancing to consistently achieve utilization goals

•    Implement effective backup and disaster recovery procedures

 

Edward L. Haletky owns AstroArch Consulting, Inc., a consultancy specializing in virtualization, security, and networking. He has been rated by his peers on the VMware Discussion Forums as a “virtuoso” for his work in answering VMware security and configuration questions. Prior to establishing AstroArch, Haletky was a member of Hewlett-Packard’s Virtualization, Linux, and High-Performance Technical Computing teams. He holds a degree in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering from Purdue University.

 

About the Author

Edward L. Haletky graduated from Purdue University with a degree in aeronautical and astronautical engineering. Since then, he has worked programming graphics and other lower-level libraries on various UNIX platforms. Edward recently left Hewlett-Packard, where he worked on the Virtualization, Linux, and High- Performance Technical Computing teams. He owns AstroArch Consulting, Inc., providing virtualization, security, and network consulting and development. Edward is very active (rated Virtuoso by his peers) on the VMware discussion forums providing answers to security and configuration questions.

VMware ESX Server in the Enterprise is the definitive, real-world guide to planning, deploying, and managing today’s leading virtual infrastructure platform in mission-critical environments.

 

Drawing on his extensive experience consulting on large-scale ESX Server implementations, Edward L. Haletky brings together an unprecedented collection of tips, best practices, and field-tested solutions. More than any other author, he illuminates the real issues, tradeoffs, and pitfalls associated with ESX Server–and shows how to make the most of it in your unique environment.

 

Haletky covers the entire lifecycle: planning, installation, system monitoring, tuning, clustering, security, disaster recovery, and much more. Throughout, he supports his recommendations with examples from real-world deployments. He also provides detailed checklists for handling crucial issues such as caching, networking, storage, and hardware selection. Many of his techniques and practices apply to all current virtualization platforms, not just ESX Server.

 

This book will be an indispensable resource for every network architect, administrator, and IT professional who works with virtual servers. ESX Server newcomers will find the soup-to-nuts introduction they desperately need; experienced users will find an unparalleled source of field-tested answers and solutions.

 

In this book, you’ll learn how to:

•    Identify key differences between ESX v3.x.y and ESX v2.5.x and their implications

•    Perform a complete installation–with automated scripting techniques and samples

•    Efficiently audit, monitor, and secure ESX Server

•    Discover SAN storage pitfalls and solutions–with detailed guidance for specific SANs, switches, and fibre-channel adapters

•    Understand ESX Server networking: NIC teaming, vSwitches, network lag, and troubleshooting

•    Configure ESX Server via the Management User Interface, Virtual Center client, and command line interface

•    Install Windows, Linux, and NetWare VMs: prepare media images, place configuration files, handle sizing and swap files, and more

•    Use Dynamic Resource Load Balancing to consistently achieve utilization goals

•    Implement effective backup and disaster recovery procedures

 

Edward L. Haletky owns AstroArch Consulting, Inc., a consultancy specializing in virtualization, security, and networking. He has been rated by his peers on the VMware Discussion Forums as a “virtuoso” for his work in answering VMware security and configuration questions. Prior to establishing AstroArch, Haletky was a member of Hewlett-Packard’s Virtualization, Linux, and High-Performance Technical Computing teams. He holds a degree in Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering from Purdue University.

 

About the Author

Edward L. Haletky graduated from Purdue University with a degree in aeronautical and astronautical engineering. Since then, he has worked programming graphics and other lower-level libraries on various UNIX platforms. Edward recently left Hewlett-Packard, where he worked on the Virtualization, Linux, and High- Performance Technical Computing teams. He owns AstroArch Consulting, Inc., providing virtualization, security, and network consulting and development. Edward is very active (rated Virtuoso by his peers) on the VMware discussion forums providing answers to security and configuration questions.

Few developments in the world of computers have been embraced as quickly as mashups. The most common mashups remain those that build on the various mapping APIs, but dynamic combinations of data from multiple sources or in multiple formats (the basic definition of a mashup) are all over the Web. Part I of this book provides an introduction to the world of mashups.

Mashups require you to know a little bit about a number of Web technologies, and that is what you will find in Part II. Long books have been written about each of the technologies described in the chapters of Part II, but what you will find here is guidance about the specific parts of those technologies you are likely to use.

In Part III, the technologies are put together to build mashups. The first chapter of this part of the book introduces the basic steps common to building all mashups in the book. Then, you will find pairs of chapters: the first introduces a specific API (eBay, Google Maps, Flickr, and so forth), and the second builds on the technologies of Part II and the specific API to create a mashup.

The code described in most chapters is available on the author’s Web site (www.northcountryconsulting.com—the Downloads link is at the right of the page, just beneath the bio), as well as on the McGraw-Hill Web site (www.mhprofessional.com, or more precisely, http://www.mhprofessional.com/product.php?isbn=0071496270). The downloadable code is in self-extracting ZIP archives and is organized by chapter. Because the examples are built from chapter to chapter, make certain that you are using the right chapter’s code: the mashup from one chapter will have only a fraction of the code as the same mashup in a later chapter.

Note that most of the mashup code requires you to register to use the API involved. (This is described in the book.) The code that you download will not run until you replace placeholders such as myAccountName with your actual account name.

The Parallel Programming Guide for Every Software Developer

From grids and clusters to next-generation game consoles, parallel computing is going mainstream. Innovations such as Hyper-Threading Technology, HyperTransport Technology, and multicore microprocessors from IBM, Intel, and Sun are accelerating the movement's growth. Only one thing is missing: programmers with the skills to meet the soaring demand for parallel software.

That's where Patterns for Parallel Programming comes in. It's the first parallel programming guide written specifically to serve working software developers, not just computer scientists. The authors introduce a complete, highly accessible pattern language that will help any experienced developer "think parallel"-and start writing effective parallel code almost immediately. Instead of formal theory, they deliver proven solutions to the challenges faced by parallel programmers, and pragmatic guidance for using today's parallel APIs in the real world. Coverage includes:

• Understanding the parallel computing landscape and the challenges faced by parallel developers

• Finding the concurrency in a software design problem and decomposing it into concurrent tasks

• Managing the use of data across tasks

• Creating an algorithm structure that effectively exploits the concurrency you've identified

• Connecting your algorithmic structures to the APIs needed to implement them

• Specific software constructs for implementing parallel programs

• Working with today's leading parallel programming environments: OpenMP, MPI, and Java

Patterns have helped thousands of programmers master object-oriented development and other complex programming technologies. With this book, you will learn that they're the best way to master parallel programming too.

About the Author

Timothy G. Mattson is Intel's industry manager for life sciences. His research focuses on technologies that simplify parallel computing for general programmers, with an emphasis on computational biology. He holds a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Beverly A. Sanders is associate professor at the Department of Computer and Information Science and Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville. Her research focuses on techniques to help programmers construct high-quality, correct programs, including formal methods, component systems, and design patterns. She holds a Ph.D. in applied mathematics from Harvard University.

Berna L. Massingill is assistant professor in the Department of Computer Science at Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas. Her research interests include parallel and distributed computing, design patterns, and formal methods. She holds a Ph.D. in computer science from the California Institute of Technology.

In recent years, classical computability has expanded beyond its original scope to address issues related to computability and complexity in algebra, analysis, and physics. The deep interconnection between "computation" and "proof" has originated much of the most significant work in constructive mathematics and mathematical logic of the last 70 years. Moreover, the increasingly compelling necessity to deal with computability in the real world (such as computing on continuous data, biological computing, and physical models) has brought focus to new paradigms of computation that are based on biological and physical models. These models address questions of efficiency in a radically new way and even threaten to move the so-called Turing barrier, i.e. the line between the decidable and the un-decidable.

This book examines new developments in the theory and practice of computation from a mathematical perspective, with topics ranging from classical computability to complexity, from biocomputing to quantum computing. The book opens with an introduction by Alan Hodges, the Turing biographer, who analyzes the pioneering work that anticipated recent developments concerning computations allegedly new paradigms. The remaining material covers traditional topics in computability theory such as relative computability, theory of numberings, and domain theory, in addition to topics on the relationships between proof theory, computability, and complexity theory. New paradigms of computation arising from biology and quantum physics are also discussed, as well as the computability of the real numbers and its related issues.

This book is suitable for researchers and graduate students in mathematics, philosophy, and computer science with a special interest in logic and foundational issues. Most useful to graduate students are the survey papers on computable analysis and biological computing. Logicians and theoretical physicists will also benefit from this book.

This book illustrates how to infuse compelling and realistic action into game programmingeven if you dont have a college-level physics background! This book covers the basic physics and mathematical models and then shows clearly how to implement them basics to accurately simulate the motion and behavior of cars, planes, projectiles, rockets, and boats.

This book is neither code heavy or language-specific, and all chapters include unique, challenging exercises to solve. This fun book also includes historical footnotes and interesting trivia. The style will be light and conversational, and all physics jargon will be properly and clearly explained.

About the Author

Grant Palmer is the author of the acclaimed Java Programmer's Reference and is a recognized expert in both the C# and Java languages. Grant has worked as a scientific programmer in the Space Technology Division at the NASA Ames Research Center for the past 20 years. This has involved working with Java since 1996, developing programs for scientific applications as well as converting older FORTRAN and C applications to the Java and C# platforms.

The fourth edition of this leading text reflects the new direction and growth of the field of hematology as an academic and clinical discipline. Edited and written by practitioners who are the leaders of the field, the book covers both the basic scientific foundations of hematology and its clinical aspects. It provides practitioners with the most comprehensive, authoritative, up-to-date information in hematology. The table of contents has been thoroughly revised with many new chapters added, reflecting the rapidly changing nature of the molecular and cellular areas of the specialty. This definitive resource is the one comprehensive book needed by every practicing hematologist.

Univ. of Illinois, Chicago. Text/reference on the science and practice of hematology. For practitioners, students, residents, fellows, and researchers. Includes many new chapters and over thirty new contributors. Two-tone format with halftone illustrations. Extensive references. DNLM: Hematologic Diseases--diagnosis.

About the Author

Ronald Hoffman, MD, Eileen Heidrick Professor of Oncology, Chief, Section of Hematology-Oncology, Department of Medicine, University of Illinois, College of Medicine, Chicago, IL; Edward J. Benz, Jr., MD, Jack D. Myers Professor and Chairman, Department of Medicine, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine; Attending Physician, Department of Internal Medicine, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, Pittsburgh, PA; Sanford J. Shattil, MD, Professor, Departments of Vascular Biology and Molecular and Experimental Medicine, The Scripps Research Institute, La Jolla, CA, Adjunct Professor of Medicine, University of California at San Diego, San Diego, CA; Bruce Furie, MD, Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School; Chief, Division of Hemostasis and Thrombosis, Department of Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA; Harvey J. Cohen, MD, PhD, Professor and Chairman, Department of Pediatrics, Stanford University Medical Center, Stanford, CA

The debut of small, inexpensive, yet powerful portable computers has coincided with the exponential growth of the Internet, making it possible to access computing resources and information at nearly any location at almost any time. This new trend, mobile computing, is poised to become the main technology driver for a decade to come. There are many challenges that make mobile computing a hot research and development area. Researchers, engineers, and practitioners need a comprehensive resource and reference to aid them in their quest to make the potential of this technology a reality.

The Mobile Computing Handbook explores the benefits and challenges of the field, and includes the latest insight into the major topics of this emerging discipline. It provides, in 40 chapters written by industry experts, technical information about all aspects of mobile computing, from basic concepts to research-level material, with learned analysis of future directions.

This handbook captures the present state of the field and serves as an invaluable source of reference material. Following an introduction and an overview of mobile applications, the book explores location management, location-based services, caching strategies, power management, performance and modeling, security and privacy, and many other subjects.

Geometric Fundamentals of Robotics provides an elegant introduction to the geometric concepts that are important to applications in robotics. This second edition is still unique in providing a deep understanding of the subject: rather than focusing on computational results in kinematics and robotics, it includes significant state-of-the art material that reflects important advances in the field, connecting robotics back to mathematical fundamentals in group theory and geometry.

Key features:

* Begins with a brief survey of basic notions in algebraic and differential geometry, Lie groups and Lie algebras

* Examines how, in a new chapter, Clifford algebra is relevant to robot kinematics and Euclidean geometry in 3D

* Introduces mathematical concepts and methods using examples from robotics

* Solves substantial problems in the design and control of robots via new methods

* Provides solutions to well-known enumerative problems in robot kinematics using intersection theory on the group of rigid body motions

* Extends dynamics, in another new chapter, to robots with end-effector constraints, which lead to equations of motion for parallel manipulators

Geometric Fundamentals of Robotics serves a wide audience of graduate students as well as researchers in a variety of areas, notably mechanical engineering, computer science, and applied mathematics. It is also an invaluable reference text.

 

From the #1 Name in Professional Certification

Get on the fast track to becoming a Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist with this affordable, portable study tool. Inside, Microsoft Certified Trainer Brian Culp will guide you on your career path, providing expert tips and sound advice along the way. With an intensive focus on only what you need to know to pass MCTS Exam 70-620, this certification passport is your ticket to success on exam day.

Featuring:

• Itineraries--List of official exam objectives covered
• ETAs--Amount of time needed to complete each lesson
• Travel Advisories--Expert advice on critical topics
• Local Lingo--Concise definitions of key terms and concepts
• Travel Assistance--Recommended resources for more information
• Exam Tips--Common exam pitfalls and solutions
• Checkpoints--End-of-chapter questions, answers, and explanations
• Career Flight Path--Career options mapped out to maximize the return from your IT journey

 About the Author

Brian Culp, MCT, MCSE, A+  is president and CEO of LANscape, Inc., a computer training and network administration service provider. He is the author of Mike Meyers' MCSE Windows XP Professional Certification Passport.

Oracle Database 11g is the newest release of Oracle’s flagship database product. It contains a number of new innovations, which we cover in the pages of this book. This is my third Oracle “New Features” book for Oracle Press, and I’ve actually been writing them since Oracle 8.0 was released. For each book, it’s been an incredible experience to go through the product, find the new features, and learn how to use them.

It can be difficult to write books about new features. First, you don’t start out running the production product. You write using a beta copy of the software, and just hope that the final release does not change too much. Also, the marketing reality is that publishers want to get books out to market. So there is always this battle between quality and delivery. In fact, the folks at Oracle Press/McGraw Hill are terrific about this, and understand the battle. In this book we have cut no corners. We wrote initially on the beta, and after the production code came out we went over the chapters with the production code looking for any changes.

The first new features book I wrote (in fact, my first book) was for upgrading from Oracle 7.3 to Oracle 8. This first book was written with the upgrade exam in mind. The book was written after Oracle 8 was released, so I had documentation at hand. The first book written from beta code was Oracle9i New Features. The 9i Beta was difficult. The documentation was not complete, and it was difficult to discover any information on the new feature sets that were being released. Oracle Database 10g was easier. The beta was a much easier process and documentation was more plentiful.

Bluetooth® wireless technology is a short-range radio standard that provides new opportunities for wireless devices. This radio standard was designed originally as a way of eliminating the cables currently attached to nearly all consumer electronic devices. However, the goals for Bluetooth wireless technology grew as its designers recognized that it enables a new kind of wireless network between electronic devices.

Recent developments in the Java™ programming language make it possible for Java developers to write applications for wireless devices such as cell phones and personal digital assistants. In 2000, the Java programming community recognized the importance of creating a standard extension to the Java programming language for use with Bluetooth devices. A standard application programming interface (API) for Bluetooth was needed because each Bluetooth software protocol stack had its own API for application programmers. These proprietary APIs meant that a Bluetooth application had to be ported to different Bluetooth stacks to run on different devices. Apart from the work involved in writing the code, interoperability testing on the various devices cost time and money for the involved companies. A standard API would help alleviate all these problems.

A team of experts from across the industry was assembled for this effort under Java Specification Request 82 (JSR-82). The result was a specification for Java APIs for Bluetooth wireless technology (JABWT).

The specification was the result of collaboration of many companies and individuals in the industry. Some helped define the specification by participating in the JSR-82 expert group, and many others contributed by providing valuable comments.

This book introduces and explains to the community of Java programmers the new standard extensions of the Java programming language for Bluetooth wireless technology.

The idea of editing a book on modern software architectures and tools for CAPE (Computer Aided Process Engineering) came about when the editors of this volume realized that existing titles relating to CAPE did not include references to the design and development of CAPE software.

Scientific software is needed to solve CAPE related problems by industry/academia for research and development, for education and training and much more. There are increasing demands for CAPE software to be versatile, flexible, efficient, and reliable. This means that the role of software architecture is also gaining increasing importance. Software architecture needs to reconcile the objectives of the software; the framework defined by the CAPE methods; the computational algorithms; and the user needs and tools (other software) that help to develop the CAPE software. The object of this book is to bring to the reader, the software side of the story with respect to computer aided process engineering.

Software design is a multi-disciplinary activity that develops tools through effective communication of ideas and the use of engineering practices. This text provides an overview and perspective of software design within the context of software development and also of more general thinking about design issues. It examines the nature of design activities, as well as their applications within software development, providing the reader with:

• a non-proprietary view of design issues
• an overview of design representation forms
• a concise review of design practices based on the more widely used design methods
• a strong architectural framework

A particular feature is the strong evidence-based approach used in the analysis and assessment of these issues.

Since the first edition, much progress has been made in the area of software design, with the major changes to the new edition being:

• A much stronger recognition of the role played by the concept of architectural style in helping to structure ideas about design. This is used to provide an underpinning framework throughout the second edition.
• The inclusion of new forms of software and of new approaches to design, ranging from agile methods and design patterns through to the component concept and the use of the Unified Modeling Language (UML).
• An improved formalism to support the analysis of the processes embodied in design methods.

Software Design provides a balanced view of the many and varied software design strategies most widely used by practitioners. By being aware of the strengths and limitations of each one, a student is better able to judge which to adopt when working in the field. The book is also valuable for software engineers and project managers who need an objective guide to the state of the art in this area.

David Budgen

is Professor of Software Engineering at Keele University, UK. A long-term student of software design, he has worked closely with the Software Engineering Institute in Pittsburgh to develop tutorial modules, as well as publishing many research papers on software design topics.

Essential skills for IT professionals

Mike Meyers A+ Guide to Operating Systems Lab Manual, Second Edition features 40-plus lab exercises that challenge you to solve problems based on realistic case studies and step-by-step scenarios that require critical thinking. You'll also get post-lab observation questions that measure your understanding of lab results and key term quizzes that help build vocabulary.

About the Author

Mike Meyers is the industry's leading authority on CompTIA A+ certification and training. He is the president and founder of Total Seminars, LLC, a major provider of PC and network repair seminars for thousands of organizations throughout the world, and a member of CompTIA.

Dennis Haley is the administrator and an instructor for the E2C and Microsoft IT Academy programs at Polytech High School.

This book’s primary objective is to help you prepare for and pass the required Network+ exam so you can begin to reap the career benefi ts of certifi cation. We believe that the only way to do this is to help you increase your knowledge and build your skills. After completing this book, you should feel confi dent that you have thoroughly reviewed all of the objectives that CompTIA has established for the exam.

If you are new to certifi cations, we have some good news and some bad news. The good news is that a computer industry certifi cation is one of the most valuable credentials you can earn. It sets you apart from the crowd and marks you as a valuable asset to your employer. You will gain the respect of your peers, and certifi cation can have a wonderful effect on your income.

The bad news is that certifi cation tests are not easy. You may think you will read through some study material, memorize a few facts, and pass the examinations. After all, these certifi cation exams are just computer-based, multiple-choice tests, so they must be easy. If you believe this, you are wrong. Unlike many “multiple-guess” tests you have been exposed to in school, the questions on certifi cation examinations go beyond simple factual knowledge.

The purpose of this introduction is to teach you how to take a computer certifi cation examination. To be successful, you need to know something about the purpose and structure of these tests. We also look at the latest innovations in computerized testing. Using simulations and adaptive testing, the computer industry is enhancing both the validity and the security of the certifi cation process. These factors have considerable bearing on how you should prepare for an exam, as well as your approach to each question during the test.

We begin by looking at the purpose, focus, and structure of certifi cation tests, and we examine the effect these factors have on the kinds of questions you will face on your certifi cation exams. We defi ne the structure of examination questions and investigate some common formats. Next, we present a strategy for answering these questions. Finally, we give some specifi c guidelines on what you should do on the day of your test.

Telecommunications is an old and stable technology if you think only of telephones and telegraph. But in the 1960s came computers and the processing of data. Soon, we needed data communications to transmit data to remote PCs connected by networks. Later, these points of communications increased in number, with the transmission being no longer limited to data but included text, voice and even images and video.

This book explains in clear and simple language the development of this technology, the management of telecommunications and the many applications that are now possible because of telecommunications.

PART ONE deals with an overview of telecommunications technology. Here you will learn about early transmission principles, how data is carried over networks, analogue and digital signals, e-mail, the Internet and the various standards and compression techniques.

PART TWO shows how these technologies are managed and organized as part of the Information Technology structure. This might be a client-server approach on the corporate level, or as part of the regional infrastructure .Security "firewalls" and encryption methods are explained as well as the planning, acquisition and maintenance of resources needed for computers interconnected by telecommunications.

PART THREE is concerned with the very latest applications for telecommunications: multimedia, message handling; teleworking; e-mail; Electronic Data Interchange; teleconferencing; video conferencing; home shopping, distance learning, electronic publishing; movies-on-demand; digital library; telemedicine; information services; cybercash etc. It puts the technology in context and illustrates the new services on offer and changing culture of the telecommunications age.

This is an excellent beginners guide to telecommunications. It explains in a manner that is non baffling to the novice, both the technology in use and its implications for working practices today.

About the Author

Independent IT Consultant/Freelance technical Author

If you're ready to take your knowledge of ArcGIS to the next level, then you need to learn how to work with ArcObjects. But with thousands of objects, properties, and methods, how can you ever hope to sort through the ArcObjects model diagrams?

The first edition of Chang's Programming ArcObjects with VBA: A Task-Oriented Approach gave us the answer. The author's task-oriented approach shows you how to sort through the massive ArcObjects collection by examining only the objects, properties, and methods you need to perform specific tasks.

What's new in the second edition?

This edition adds macros and explanations for the new Geoprocessing object introduced in ArcGIS 9.x. Instead of treating this new feature in separate chapters, the author incorporates Geoprocessing code into the existing chapters. The code appears conveniently in boxes that allow you to easily compare sample macros.

Get Started with Ready-to-Use Code

The companion CD-ROM contains 95 complete ArcObjects macros and 33 Geoprocessing macros, along with datasets to execute the code. Each program begins with a short usage description and a list of key properties and methods, followed by the listing and explanation of the code itself. Regardless of your programming experience, Programming ArcObjects with VBA: A Task-Oriented Approach, Second Edition gives you the key to unlock the power and versatility of using ArcObjects to help you manage GIS activities.

Like other Schaum’s Outlines, this book is intended to be used primarily for self study. It is suitable as a study guide in a course on data structures using the Java programming language. In American universities, this is typically the second course in the computer science major. The book is also serves well as a reference on data structures and the Java Collections Framework.

The book includes more than 200 detailed examples and over 260 solved problems. The author firmly believes that programming is learned best by practice, following a well-constructed collection of examples with complete explanations. This book is designed to provide that support.

This second edition is a major improvement over the original 2001 edition. Most of the chapters have been completely rewritten. Three entirely new chapters have been added, on object-oriented programming, linked structures, and the Java Collections Framework.

You can catch up on the latest developments in the number one, fastest-growing programming language in the world with this fully updated Schaum's guide. Schaum's Outline of Data Structures with Java has been revised to reflect all recent advances and changes in the language.

About the Author

John R. Hubbard, Ph.D.is a professor of mathematics and computer science at the University of Richmond, in Virginia, and has written several of the most successful Schaum's Outlines in computer science.

Bringing together market research reports, business analyst briefings, and technology references into one comprehensive volume, Business Intelligence for Telecommunications identifies those advances in both methods and technology that are being employed to inform decision-making and give companies an edge in the rapidly growing and highly competitive telecommunications industry.

The author provides clear explanations without technical jargon, followed by in-depth descriptions regarding both the collection and use of information. He defines the recognized stages of business intelligence, examines issues arising from the emergence of customer-centric business models, and identifies areas that are likely to require research in the near future.

IPv6 (Internet Protocol version 6) is the future of Internet telephony. And this book is your guide to that future.

IPv6 is the replacement for the currently used IPv4 (Internet Protocol version 4). IPv6 will offer increased IP addresses (full 128-bit addresses, compared to the 32-bit addresses of IPv4), enhanced security, and greater robustness. It will also be fully backwards compatible with existing IPv4 systems. These capabilities will finally make Internet telephony a viable competitor to conventional switched telephone networks. In this book, Dan Minoli clearly explains IPv6 and how telephone networks can be built on its foundations.

This is not just another IPv6 book; instead, it focuses on those aspects of IPv6 relevant to Internet telephony systems and voice networks. Minoli uses a compare/contrast approach, exploring where IPv6 is similar to IPv4 and where it differs, to let you quickly grasp the essence of IPv6 and the similarities (and differences) between current IPv4-based systems and IPv6-based systems.

If you will be designing, implementing, or maintaining the next generation of Internet telephony systems, then you need the information in this book!

*Explains the essential concepts of IPv6 and how they relate to Internet telephony

*Describes how Internet telephony systems using IPv6 are different from, and better than, Internet telephony systems based on the older IPv4 standard

*Discusses how to transition existing IPv4 Internet telephony systems and conventional switched systems to IPv6-based systems

*Extensive treatment of security issues, including IP layer encryption and authentication methods

*Explains connection techniquesincluding plug and play approachesfor equipment used in IPv6 systems

This handy textbook covers all you will need to know to learn to communicate using email and the internet.

Learning Made Simple books give readers skills without frills. They are matched to the main qualifications, in this case ECDL, ICDL and CLAIT, and written by experienced teachers and authors to make often tricky subjects simple to learn. Every book is designed carefully to provide bite-sized lessons matched to learners' needs.

Using full colour throughout, and written by leading teachers and writers, Learning Made Simple books help readers learn new skills and develop their talents.

Whether studying at college, training at work, or reading at home, aiming for a qualification or simply getting up to speed, Learning Made Simple books give readers the advantage of easy, well-organised training materials in a handy volume with two or four-page sections for each topic for ease of use.

About the Author

Mac's first steps into computing came 19 years ago when he taught himself Basic on a ZX81. He started his first book shortly afterwards, when he realised that (a) programming was fun, and (b) no-one was writing simple books on it. Since then he has programmed in, taught and/or written about 9 varieties of Basic, 3 Pascals, 2 Cs, Assembler, Cobol and Java, 5 spreadsheets, 3 databases, 4 word-processors, and 6 operating systems. He is looking forward to the time when developers stop producing new software and books don't go out of date in a couple of years. Mac can usually be found either in the kitchen or running a taxi service for his family. 

"If you need to know the IMS vision you need to read this book....

The IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) is the exciting new technology that will merge the Internet with the cellular world. It will make Internet technologies such as the web, email, instant messaging, presence, and videoconferencing available nearly everywhere.

The 3G IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) provides a thorough overview of the IMS and its technologies. Throughout, the authors first describe how each technology works on the Internet and then explain how the same technology is adapted to work in the IMS, enabling readers to take advantage of any current and future Internet service.

• Presents an introduction to the IMS - its goals, history, vision, the organizations involved in its standardization and architecture
• Discusses the signalling plane of the IMS including protocols, such as SIP and Diameter, used between the IMS architectural entities. Also describes how the IETF developed these protocols and how they are used in the IMS architecture
• Describes the media plane of the IMS and discusses Internet protocols that are not currently used in the IMS but may be in the future
• Provides SIP-based service examples such as presence, instant messaging and Push-to-Talk

Engineers, programmers, business managers, marketing representatives, and technically aware users will all find this book invaluable as it will help them to understand how the IMS works and the business model behind it. "

Like music and movies, video games are rapidly becoming an integral part of our lives. Over the years, you've yearned for every new gaming console, mastered each blockbuster within weeks after its release, and have even won a local gaming competition or two. But lately you've been spending a lot of time thinking about a game idea of your own, or are exploring the possibility of making a career of this vibrant and growing industry. But where should you begin?

Beginning Game Development with Python and Pygame is written with the budding game developer in mind, introducing games development through the Python programming language and the popular Pygame games development library. Authored by industry veteran and Python expert Will McGugan, who most recently worked on the MotorStorm game for Play Station 3, you'll be privy to insights that will not only help you to exploit PyGame to its maximum potential, but also make you a more creative and knowledgeable games developer all round.

• Create advanced games by taking advantage of the popular open source Python programming language and Pygame games development library.
• Learn step-by-step through the creation of a real-world game (tank warfare), involving gaming preferences, sound, visual effects, and joystick/keyboard interaction.
• Discover the concepts that are crucial to success in today's gaming industry, such as support for multiple platforms, and granting users the ability to extend and customize your games.

What you'll learn

• Take advantage of Python and the Pygame library to build compelling cross-platform games.
• Learn to best use these technologies to turn your dream game into reality.
• Create professional games by accounting for sound, special effects, and user interaction through the joystick and keyboard.
• Build both two- and three-dimensional games, and learn more about the factors that contribute to choosing one approach over the other.
• Provide users with the means for extending your games through level creation and custom modifications as a means to build a vibrant community around your product.
• Package your games in a manner that allows even novice computer users to install, use, and update your games with ease.

Who is this book for?

This book has been written for any budding games developer. While knowledge of the Python language helps, it isn't required. To help new programmers along, two early chapters are devoted to an overview of Python.

About the Apress Beginning Series

The Beginning series from Apress is the right choice to get the information you need to land that crucial entry-level job. These books will teach you a standard and important technology from the ground up because they are explicitly designed to take you from "novice to professional." You'll start your journey by seeing what you need to know--but without needless theory and filler. You'll build your skill set by learning how to put together real-world projects step by step. So whether your goal is your next career challenge or a new learning opportunity, the Beginning series from Apress will take you there--it is your trusted guide through unfamiliar territory!

About the Author

Will McGugan is a software developer currently living and working in North West England. He has worked in video games and computer graphics since the early days of 3D and has created several shareware games in his spare time. Currently Will works for Evolution Studios, one of the world’s leading games development studios. He also has extensive experience in application development, having worked in the field of user interface creation and video conferencing. His current interests include application and web development in Python. Outside of work Will enjoys juggling and cycling, although not at the same time. For more information on Will’s current work and various musings, visit his blog at www.willmcgugan.com.

Recent advances in VoIP (Voice over IP) technology have made it the solution of choice for voice service because of its low cost and increased reliability. Voice Over IP Crash Course offers practical technology coverage, while discussing the business, strategic and competitive implications of VoIP deployment in corporations. The book also covers the challenges faced by service providers as they evolve to an IP infrastructure while continuing to operate the PSTN.

A Thorough Introduction to Voice Over IP

Get a solid foundation in VoIP technologies, solutions, and protocols and determine if and when it’s time to introduce VoIP into your network architecture. This essential guide offers complete technology coverage, while discussing the business, strategic, and competitive implications of VoIP deployment in corporations. The challenges faced by service providers as they evolve to an IP infrastructure while continuing to operate the PSTN are also examined.

Practical Migration Strategies

Based on a real-world VoIP implementation case study, Voice Over IP Crash Course explains how to perform a functional audit of your pre-existing network to assess its capabilities and deficiencies. Then, you’ll find out what it takes to migrate from a PSTN-based environment to a converged IP architecture. Details on hardware and software management, quality of service, backups, and security are also included. If you are considering implementing VoIP, read this book first.

Full coverage of VoIP, including: The PSTN * The Challenge of QoS * Enterprise Service Models * Voice Digitization Techniques * The So-Called “Legacy PSTN” * The Evolution to VoIP * The Economic Promise of Converged Network Architectures * High-level Issues and Trends * Changes in the Enterprise Model that Make VoIP Desirable * IP and Wireless * Overview of TCP/IP and Related Protocols * Switching vs. Routing and Layer 2/Layer 3 Conundrum * VoIP Standards * VoIP Networks * IP Protocols vs. PSTN * Network Components * Interworking between SS7 and IP-based Protocols

About the Author

Steven Shepard (Williston, VT) is a professional writer and educator specializing in international telecommunications. Formerly with Hill Associates, he is the author of Telecom Crash Course, the Optical Networking Crash Course, Telecommunications Convergence, and RFID. He teaches and consults all over the world for a wide variety of corporate clients.

Keith's masterful updated survey of what has changed and what remains the same in the dynamic audio industry.
- Christopher Sterling,
George Washington University

The bible for beginning radio professionals. A complete guide to the internal workings of radio stations and the radio industry. The book is now a classic and cornerstone for this topic.

Not only will readers new to radio understand how each job is best performed, they will know how it meshes with those of the rest of the radio station staff. For readers uncertain of career goals, this book provides a solid foundation in who does what, when, and why. The Radio Station details all departments within a radio station.

Topics explained include satellite radio, Web radio, AM stereo, cable and podcasting. Also, mergers and consolidation, future prospects, new digital technologies. This edition is loaded with new illustrations, feature boxes and quotes from industry pros, bringing it all together for the reader.

Going strong after 20 years The Radio Station is now in its seventh edition and long considered the standard work on this audio medium. It remains a concise and candid guide to the internal workings of radio stations and the radio industry, explaining the functions performed successfully within every well-run station.

*Classic and candid guide to the internal workings of radio stations

*Updated to include a discussion of the podcasting boom

*New analysis of satellite radio and its role in radio broadcasting today

About the Author

Michael C. Keith, PhD., ranks among the most prolific authors on the subject of broadcast media, in particular radio. He is Senior Lecturer of Communication at Boston College and is author of over a dozen books including Voices in the Purple Haze, Signals in the Air, Talking Radio, and the classic Focal Press Textbook, The Radio Station. With Robert Hilliard he has coauthored Waves of Rancor, Global Broadcasting Systems, and The Hidden Screen. He is the author of numerous journal articles and served in a number of editorial positions. He is the past Chair of Education for the Museum of Broadcast Communication and a former broadcaster.

"Although the book is directed toward technology courses...it makes for interesting, thought-provoking reading." - Monitoring Times

As new communications applications are developed and brought to market, it is vital for communications professionals to keep abreast of these issues. Since the technologies and applications also affect our daily lives, it is important to understand how they will shape the country and, by extension, the world at large. International censorship, the impact of the Internet and wireless tools, and th legisation following the World Trade Center bombing all fall into this category.

The New Communications Technologies, Fifth Edition, provides vital information on the new and emerging technologies that will shape the way communicators do business. The book explores the new communications technologies and covers topics ranging from multimedia and production to satellites to digital communication. Just as important, the book examines the social, economic, and political impact brought about by the adoption of such technologies and applications; this fallout includes privacy concerns, First Amendment issues, and the implications raised by biometric systems.

* Expanded coverage of emerging technologies, and legal issues
* Completely reorganized to enhance the information flow from topic to topic
* The authors' Instructor's Manual is available from the Publisher

New to this edition are chapters on information services (the internet and the world wide web), wireless communications, email and privacy, the new technologies and the first amendment. The book also includes coverage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996.

About the Author

Michael Mirabito is a Professor and supervises the Distance Education and other academic information units at Marywood University in Pennsylvania. He is also a consultant specializing in the new communications technologies, and has written a book about video cameras on NASA's space probes. Barbara Morgenstern is a Professor at the Park School of Communications at Ithaca College in New York and specializes in teaching media law. She is also involved in curriculum development, particularly as it pertains to communications law.

Computers are the most pervasive tools of modern society. Their deployment relies on advanced methods of software and systems engineering. Based on repeated and consistent observations, key lessons of these fields can now be formulated into rules or even laws, providing initial building blocks towards a theoretical foundation that is essential for further research, for teaching and for the practice of software development.

Intended as a handbook for students and professionals alike, this book is the first to identify and discuss such rules and laws. They are largely independent of technologies, and thus form a basis for the principles underlying software and systems engineering. Software and system engineers should be aware of this proven body of knowledge, to ensure professionalism and due diligence of their work.

The book is structured around the software development lifecycle. It begins with requirements definition and goes on to maintenance and withdrawal. In different process models, these tasks have different importance or are applied in a different sequence, or even cyclically. The book provides the reader with:

* clear statements of software and systems engineering laws and their applicability,

* empirical evidence that proves the usefulness of the material covered,

* unique knowledge to apply in an industrial setting.

Albert Endres had a long and distinguished career in industrial software development with IBM Germany, with responsibilities for compiler, operating system, and software tools development. He is an honorary professor in computer science at the University of Stuttgart, Germany; and was full professor of computer science at the Technical University of Munich, Germany from 1993 to 1997. He was the founding chairman of the German chapter of the ACM, is a senior member of IEEE and a member of the German Informatics Society (GI).

Dieter Rombach holds the Chair of Software Engineering in the department of computer science at the University of Kaiserslautern, Germany, and he is also the Executive Director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE). Together, these two organizations form one of the largest centers for Software Engineering research in Europe. He was formerly a faculty member of the department of computer science at the University of Maryland at College Park, MD, USA. There, he was a Project Leader in the Software Engineering Laboratory, a joint venture between NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, the Computer Sciences Corporation, and the University of Maryland. He is an IEEE Fellow and a member of ACM as well as of the German Informatics Society (GI).

About the Author

Albert Endres has lived, worked and taught all over the world. Before retiring from IBM in 1992, Endres worked for the company in Germany, France and New York, mostly dealing with software engineering. He was a professor of computer science at the Technical University of Munich and a member of ACM and IEEE. Currently he concentrates on his hobbies.

Dieter Romabch is the director of software engineering at Fraunhofer Institut Experimentelles in Germany. The institute is the leading center for applied research and technology transfer in experimental software engineering. He is also the head of a software engineering research group for AGSE.

Build and manage a scalable storage infrastructure with Oracle Automatic Storage Management

Streamline data management and provisioning using Oracle Automatic Storage Management (Oracle ASM) and the detailed information contained in this exclusive Oracle Press resource. Written by a team of database experts, Oracle Automatic Storage Management: Under-the-Hood & Practical Deployment Guide explains how to build and maintain a dynamic, highly available Oracle database storage environment. Inside, you'll learn how to configure storage for Oracle ASM, build disk groups, use data striping and mirroring, and optimize performance. You'll also learn how to ensure consistency across server and storage platforms, maximize data redundancy, and administer Oracle ASM from the command line.

This book is intended for technical managers, DBAs, system administrators, and storage architects who want to understand ASM concepts or who will be implementing ASM.

We have designed this book to provide the reader with the essentials of ASM and the best practices for implementation. This design includes a chapter-by-chapter process flow for enabling, configuring, and managing ASM in any environment, as well as ensuring that the databases (relational database management system [RDBMS] instances) are configured correctly to leverage ASM. For those eager to delve “under the hood” of ASM, this book also defines critical ASM internal operations and structures. The last chapter, “From Discussion to Deployment,” covers a very important aspect of getting ASM into the user infrastructure and navigating all the organization boundaries affected by introducing this new technology.

 

No statistical model is "true" or "false," "right" or "wrong"; the models just have varying performance, which can be assessed. The main theme in this book is to teach modeling based on the principle that the objective is to extract the information from data that can be learned with suggested classes of probability models. The intuitive and fundamental concepts of complexity, learnable information, and noise are formalized, which provides a firm information theoretic foundation for statistical modeling. Inspired by Kolmogorov's structure function in the algorithmic theory of complexity, this is accomplished by finding the shortest code length, called the stochastic complexity, with which the data can be encoded when advantage is taken of the models in a suggested class, which amounts to the MDL (Minimum Description Length) principle. The complexity, in turn, breaks up into the shortest code length for the optimal model in a set of models that can be optimally distinguished from the given data and the rest, which defines "noise" as the incompressible part in the data without useful information.

Such a view of the modeling problem permits a unified treatment of any type of parameters, their number, and even their structure. Since only optimally distinguished models are worthy of testing, we get a logically sound and straightforward treatment of hypothesis testing, in which for the first time the confidence in the test result can be assessed. Although the prerequisites include only basic probability calculus and statistics, a moderate level of mathematical proficiency would be beneficial. The different and logically unassailable view of statistical modelling should provide excellent grounds for further research and suggest topics for graduate students in all fields of modern engineering, including and not restricted to signal and image processing, bioinformatics, pattern recognition, and machine learning to mention just a few.

Smart antennas boost the power of a wireless network, saving energy and money and greatly increasing the range of wireless broadband. Smart Antennas is a rigorous textbook on smart antenna design and deployment.

A Complete Overview of the Basic Electromagnetics, Propagation, and Signal Processing Behind Smart Antenna Design

This advanced level text and reference thoroughly details the operating principles of smart antennas and utilizes a multidisciplinary approach to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of this growing subject. An equal emphasis is placed on electromagnetic principles, array signal processing, random processes, channel characterization, spectral estimation, and adaptive algorithms. The author expertly relates these principles to the real world market demands of the wireless communication field -- including both military and commercial applications -- and includes valuable case studies and examples solved using MATLAB.

Rigorous smart antenna-focused coverage includes:

• Electromagnetic basics
• Antenna fundamentals
• Random processes
• Channel characterization
• Array signal processing
• Sidelobe cancellation
• Angle-of-arrival estimation
• Adaptive methodologies

Smart antennas are firmly established as one of the key technologies helping to transform the wireless market. You will find this book essential to understanding their fundamental behavior and real world application.

About the Author

Frank Gross, Ph.D. (Tallahassee, FL) is Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering at Florida State University. He previously served as Lead Engineer for the Mitre Corp. and a Senior Research Engineer at the Georgia Tech Research Institute. He holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Ohio State University, has authored over 50 professional papers in electro-magnetics, and contributed to Wiley’s Encyclopedia of Electrical Engineering.

This book discusses the management challenges associated with ad hoc networks, and provides an in-depth description of how policy-based network management can be used for increasing automation in the management of mobile ad hoc networks. It describes the required components of a network management solution for such networks, using a policy-based management framework that integrates the traditional network management components (FCAPS, i.e. Fault, Configuration, Accounting, Performance, and Security management).

"This book should be immensely interesting to those trying to decide what MANET research is worth undertaking and why."

—J. Christopher Ramming, Program Manager, Defense Advanced Research

Projects Agency (DARPA) Strategic Technology Office

A thorough, comprehensive treatment of mobile ad hoc network management

Mobile ad hoc networking is a hot topic, gaining importance in both commercial and military arenas. Now that the basics in the field have settled and standards are emerging, the time is right for a book on management of these networks. From two experts in the field, Policy-Driven Mobile Ad hoc Network Management provides comprehensive coverage of the management challenges associated with mobile ad hoc networks(MANETs) and includes an in-depth discussion of how policy-based network management can be used for increasing automation in the management of mobile ad hoc networks.

This book provides readers with a complete understanding of mobile ad hoc network management and many related topics, including:

Network management requirements for MANETs, with an emphasis on the differences between the management requirements for MANETs as compared to static, wireline networks

The use of policies for managing MANETs to increase automation and to tie together management components via policies

Policy conflict detection and resolution

Aspects of MANETs that need to be configured and reconfigured at all layers of the protocol stack

Methodologies for providing survivability in the face of both hard and soft failures in MANETs

The components of a Quality of Service (QoS) management solution for MANETs based on the widely used Differentiated Services (DiffServ) paradigm

Important open research issues in the area of MANET management

Policy-Driven Mobile Ad hoc Network Management is an ideal resource for professionals, researchers, and advanced graduate students in the field of IP network management who are interested in mobile ad hoc networks.

About the Author

Ritu Chadha, PhD, is Chief Scientist and Director of the Policy Management Research Group in Applied Research at Telcordia. She is currently leading multiple projects addressing network management challenges for military ad hoc networks. Dr. Chadha is a well-known expert in the area of policy-based network management and has presented numerous tutorials and papers on the subject at industry conferences.

Latha Kant, PhD, is a Senior Scientist and Director in the Mobility Management Research Department in Applied Research at Telcordia. Dr. Kant has presented and published in over forty conferences and journals, and holds a patent on self-healing mechanisms in packet-switched networks.

The Best Introduction to Wireless--Completely Revised and Updated

Get a complete overview of the rapidly evolving field of wireless telecommunications, including the basics of wireless networks, essential technologies, applications, and markets. The new, completely updated edition of this practical resource offers clear, easy-to-follow explanations of fundamental design and operation concepts, and delves into the very latest advancements in the field. Real-world examples, photos, and diagrams from the wireless industry are included throughout the book.

The Latest Developments

Wireless Crash Course covers all aspects of wireless system operations and features all-new information on digital wireless technologies, including 3G (UMTS and CDMA 3X), Bluetooth, Ultra Wideband (UWB), Wi-Fi, Wi-MAX, GPRS, SMS, and a multitude of new applications and services driving wireless growth. This is a must-have resource for all current and aspiring wireless telecommunications professionals, including IT staff, business decision-makers, marketing and sales staff, and students.

EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT WIRELESS

About the Author

Paul Bedell (Rosemont, IL) is currently Associate Director, Product Management on GigaMAN, for SBC/Ameritech Communications. Previously he designed and engineered fixed and interconnected networks geographically covering over 65% of the US as a Network Engineer with U.S. Cellular. In 1995 he designed and has since taught the cellular and wireless courses at DePaul University.

This book gathers the latest research on the structure of computer-based systems from computer scientists, sociologists, statisticians and psychologists and combines it into a readable overview of the latest work in dependable computer-based systems.

Previous work in this area has tended to come from the viewpoint of a single discipline, focusing on computer systems to the exclusion of social and human aspects. The interdisciplinary approach taken in this book demonstrates that complex computer-based systems cannot be achieved without considering all the aspects. Stakeholders and system designers as well as the scientific community now agree that human and social issues have to be covered jointly with technical issues. This book highlights issues that stand aside of traditional technical concerns. Topics include fault tolerance, evolution, software development, HCI, architecture certification, dependability arguments, organisations diagrams, time and procedures.

System developers, stakeholders, decision makers, policymakers and academics will find this book highlights the core issues for all those involved in dependability in a complex computer-based environment.

"TCP/IP sockets in C# is an excellent book for anyone interested in writing network applications using Microsoft .Net frameworks. It is a unique combination of well written concise text and rich carefully selected set of working examples. For the beginner of network programming, it's a good starting book; on the other hand professionals could also take advantage of excellent handy sample code snippets and material on topics like message parsing and asynchronous programming."
Adarsh Khare, SDT, .Net Frameworks Team, Microsoft Corporation

The popularity of the C# language and the .NET framework is ever rising due to its ease of use, the extensive class libraries available in the .NET Framework, and the ubiquity of the Microsoft Windows operating system, to name a few advantages. TCP/IP Sockets in C# focuses on the Sockets API, the de facto standard for writing network applications in any programming language. Starting with simple client and server programs that use TCP/IP (the Internet protocol suite), students and practitioners quickly learn the basics and move on to firsthand experience with advanced topics including non-blocking sockets, multiplexing, threads, asynchronous programming, and multicasting. Key network programming concepts such as framing, performance and deadlocks are illustrated through hands-on examples. Using a detailed yet clear, concise approach, this book includes numerous code examples and focused discussions to provide a solid understanding of programming TCP/IP sockets in C#.

Features

*Tutorial-based instruction in key sockets programming techniques complemented by numerous code examples throughout
*Discussion moves quickly into the C# Sockets API definition and code examples, desirable for those who want to get up-to-speed quickly
*Important coverage of "under the hood" details that developers will find useful when creating and using a socket or a higher level TCP class that utilizes sockets
*Includes end-of-chapter exercises to facilitate learning, as well as sample code available for download at the books companion web site

About the Author

David Makofske has over ten years experience as a software engineer and consultant, with an emphasis on IP network and web development. He received his Masters degree in computer science from the University of California at Santa Barbara, and is currently a senior solutions architect at Akamai Technologies.

Michael J. Donahoo teaches networking to undergraduate and graduate students at Baylor University, where he is an assistant professor. He received his Ph.D. in computer science from the Georgia Institute of Technology. His research interests are in large-scale information dissemination and management.

Kenneth L. Calvert is an associate professor at University of Kentucky, where he teaches and does research on the design and implementation of computer network protocols. He has been doing networking research since 1987, and teaching since 1991. He holds degrees from MIT, Stanford, and the University of Texas at Austin.

Convergence in Broadcast and Communications Media offers concise and accurate information for engineers and technicians tackling products and systems combining audio, video, data processing and communications. Without adequate fundamental knowledge of the core technologies, products could be flawed or even fail. John Watkinson has provided a definitive professional guide, designed as a standard point of reference for engineers, whether you are from an audio, video, computer or communications background.

Without assuming any background and starting from first principles, the four core technologies of image reproduction, sound reproduction, data processing and communications are described. Covering everything from digital fundamentals to conversion methods, sound and image technologies, compression techniques, digital coding principles, storage devices and the latest communications systems, the book shows how these technologies operate together and the necessary conversions that take place between them. Acronyms and buzzwords are introduced only after their purpose has been described in plain English - as the book serves to give a reliable grasp of the fundamentals. The criteria involved in determining image and sound quality are based on a thorough treatment of the human senses, a unique description of how motion portrayal works in managing systems.

John Watkinson is an international consultant in audio video and data recording. He is a Fellow of the AES, a member of the British Computer Society and a chartered information systems practitioner. He presents lectures, seminars, conference papers and training courses worldwide and writes for many industry magazines. His other books for Focal Press are widely acknowledged as standard reference works and industry `bibles'. John is author of MPEG2, The Art of Digital Video and the Art of Digital Audio, An Introduction to Digital Video, An Introduction to Digital Audio, The Art of Sound Reproduction, Television Fundamentals, Co-author of The Digital Interface Handbook and Contributor to The Loudspeaker and Headphone Handbook.

A fundamental approach to audio, video, data processing and communications systemsWritten for engineers of any discipline (audio, video, computers, communications)Demonstrates audio and video principles alongside the essential communications technologies: MPEG transport streams, DVB, Networks, Telephony, ADSL, Firewire, ATM

Without assuming any background and starting from first principles, the four core technologies of image reproduction, sound reproduction, data processing and communications are described. Covering everything from digital fundamentals to conversion methods, sound and image technologies, compression techniques, digital coding principles, storage devices and the latest communications systems, the book shows how these technologies operate together and the necessary conversions that take place between them. Acronyms and buzzwords are introduced only after their purpose has been described in plain English - as the book serves to give a reliable grasp of the fundamentals. The criteria involved in determining image and sound quality are based on a thorough treatment of the human senses, a unique description of how motion portrayal works in managing systems.

About the Author

John Watkinson is an international consultant in audio video and data recording. He is a Fellow of the AES, a member of the British Computer Society and a chartered information systems practitioner. He presents lectures, seminars, conference papers and training courses worldwide and writes for many industry magazines. His other books for Focal Press are widely acknowledged as standard reference works and industry `bibles'. John is author of MPEG2, The Art of Digital Video and the Art of Digital Audio, An Introduction to Digital Video, An Introduction to Digital Audio, The Art of Sound Reproduction, Television Fundamentals, Co-author of The Digital Interface Handbook and Contributor to The Loudspeaker and Headphone Handbook.

ASP.NET is Microsoft’s platform for developing web applications. Using ASP.NET, you can create e-commerce shops, data-driven portal sites, and just about anything else you can find on the Internet. Best of all, you don’t need to paste together a jumble of HTML and script code in order to program the Web. Instead, you can create full-scale web applications using nothing but code and a design tool such as Visual Studio 2008.

The cost of all this innovation is the learning curve. To master ASP.NET, you need to learn how to use an advanced design tool (Visual Studio), a toolkit of objects (the .NET Framework), and an object-oriented programming language (such as C# 2008). Taken together, these topics provide more than enough to overwhelm any first-time web developer.

Beginning ASP.NET 3.5 in C# 2008 assumes you want to master ASP.NET, starting from the basics. Using this book, you’ll build your knowledge until you understand the concepts, techniques, and best practices for writing sophisticated web applications. The journey is long, but it’s also satisfying. At the end of the day, you’ll find that ASP.NET allows you to tackle challenges that are simply out of reach on many other platforms.

Who is this book for?

This book is written for the proficient C# developer, but you do not need to be up on all the latest C# features to understand the material. When you finish this book, you will be up on all the latest C# features. About the Apress Pro Series

The Apress Pro series books are practical, professional tutorials to keep you on and moving up the professional ladder.

You have gotten the job, now you need to hone your skills in these tough competitive times. The Apress Pro series expands your skills and expertise in exactly the areas you need. Master the content of a Pro book, and you will always be able to get the job done in a professional development project. Written by experts in their field, Pro series books from Apress give you the hard-won solutions to problems you will face in your professional programming career.

About the Author

Joseph C. Rattz, Jr., unknowingly began his career in software development in 1990 when a friend asked him for assistance writing an ANSI text editor named ANSI Master for the Commodore Amiga. A hangman game (The Gallows) soon followed. From these compiled Basic programs, he moved on to programming in C for more speed and power. Joe then developed applications that were sold to JumpDisk, an Amiga disk magazine, as well as Amiga World magazine. Due to developing in a small town on a fairly isolated platform, Joe learned all the wrong ways to write code. It was while trying to upgrade his poorly written applications that he gained respect for the importance of easily maintainable code. It was love at first sight when Joe spotted a source–level debugger in use for the first time.

Two years later, Joe obtained his first software development opportunity at Policy Management Systems Corporation as an entry–level programmer developing a client/server insurance application for OS/2 and Presentation Manager. Through the years, he added C++, Unix, Java, ASP, ASP.NET, C#, HTML, DHTML, and XML to his skill set while developing applications for SCT, DocuCorp, IBM and the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games, CheckFree, NCR, EDS, Delta Technology, Radiant Systems, and the Genuine Parts Company. Joe enjoys the creative aspects of user interface design, and he appreciates the discipline necessary for server–side development. But, given his druthers, his favorite development pastime is debugging code.Joe can be found working for the Genuine Parts Company—the parent company of NAPA—in the Automotive Parts Group Information Systems department, where he works on his baby, the Storefront web site. This site for NAPA provides the stores a view into their accounts and data on a network of AS/400s.

Silverlight—the hot new web technology based on the powerful WPF graphics platform that ships with Windows Vista—is the web developer's choice for creating cross-platform interactive applications that work in multiple browsers. This one-of-a-kindreference shows you, with full-color illustrations, how to create rich interactive apps with Silverlight.

In these color-filled pages, a crack team of Wrox experts gives you a comprehensive introduction to Silverlight. You'll see the vivid graphics and video images you can achieve. You will learn to use the component languages, tools, and techniques of Silverlight to create applications that enhance the user experience. You'll also discover how to leverage existing technologies, such as JavaScript®, XAML, ASP.NET, and AJAX, and incorporate them with development tools like Visual Studio®, Expression® Encoder, and Expression Blend. Soon you'll be building everything from basic static pages to Internet applications that integrate rich media and animation.

What you will learn from this book

• Easy ways to incorporate graphics, animation, audio, and video into Internet applications

• Methods for creating rich media apps that run on Windows® and Mac®, as well as in Internet Explorer, Firefox®, and Safari

• How to write standard JavaScript within an HTML page to manipulate and program against any XAML DOM element, storyline animation, or video

• Ways to integrate Silverlight within existing HTML pages, web sites, and ASP.NET applications

• How to handle data access in Silverlight applications using AJAX

Who this book is for

This book is for professional web developers who want to take advantage of Silverlight's capabilities to create rich interactive applications.

"[This book] makes a great companion for anyone who wants to learn the fundamentals of Silverlight without wading through the reference material in the SDK. If you're looking for a trustworthy guide to show you how Silverlight can light up your web applications, you'll find this book a great starting point."
—Tim Sneath, Group Manager for Client Platform Evangelism, Microsoft Corporation

About the Author

Devin Rader is a Product Manager on the Infragistics Web Client team, responsible for leading the creation of Infragistics ASP.NET and Silverlight products. Devin is also an active proponent and member of the .NET developer community, being a co-founder of the St. Louis .NET User Group, an active member of the New Jersey .NET User Group, a former board member of the International .NET Association (INETA), and a regular speaker at user groups. He is also a contributing author on the Wrox title Professional ASP.NET 2.0 and a technical editor for several other Wrox publications and has written columns for ASP.NET Pro magazine, as well as .NET technology articles for MSDN Online. You can find more of Devin’s musings at www.geekswithblogs.com/devin.

Jason Beres is the Director of Product Management for Infragistics, the world's leading publisher of presentation layer tools. Jason is also one of the founders of Florida .NET User Groups, he is founder of the New Jersey .NET User Group, he is a Visual Basic .NET MVP, he is on the INETA Speakers Bureau, and he is on the INETA Board of Directors. Jason is the author of several books on .NET development, an international speaker, and a frequent columnist for several .NET publications. He also keeps very active in the .NET community.

J. Ambrose Little is the User Experience and Guidance group lead at Infragistics. He is a Microsoft Solutions Architect MVP, an ASPInsider, author of numerous articles, co-author of Professional ADO.NET 2 and ASP.NET 2.0 MVP Hacks and Tips from Wrox, and he has spoken at various user groups, events, and conferences. He’s been designing and developing web sites and applications professionally for more than 8 years.

Grant Hinkson is Director of Visual Design at Infragistics, a software company specializing in reusable interface components and application design. He is passionate about design, usability, and technology and is rewarded by working with a team of people who share similar passions. He loves both design and development and thrives in the worlds of Silverlight and WPF, where he gets to exercise both sides of his brain. Grant has been involved with both WPF and Silverlight since their pre-Beta days, working with Expression Blend when it was affectionately known by its codename Sparkle. Grant is author of the Fireworks to XAML Exporter, is a frequent contributor to Adobe’s Developer Center site, and has spoken at major industry design events.

This book is for any telecommunications-convergence professional who needs to understand the structure of the industry, the structure of telephony networks and services, and the equipment involved.With the growing variety of networks and technologies now on offer it is inevitable that some convergence will take place between different networks, services and products. New VOIP (voice over internet protocol) networks must interwork with traditional networks. For instance, mobile phones can offer data services; wireless broadband connections to laptops will allow VOIP phone calls away from base; users could have the option of convergent phones that can be used on a landline when at home or business, but which can be used as a mobile when on the move, and so on.

* AUTHORITATIVE: All contributors are recognized experts in their field and come from leading institutions.

* INTERNATIONAL: In this age of globalization and standardization, special attention has been paidboth topically and authorially--to ensure the broad applicability and relevance of this material.

* EXHAUSTIVE: A thorough reference covering the structure of the telecommunications industry, telephony networks and services, and equipment.

The use of optoelectronics for data communication is becoming increasingly important in the 1990s. Much of the base technology needed for this field was developed by the telecommunications industry, but there are important differences that are covered in this text.

This is the first book to focus on the critical technology and application issues that are necessary to understand the optoelectronics for data communication industry, which is expected to grow exponentially during the coming years. Optoelectronics for Data Communication is an excellent reference for both researchers and engineers because it emphasizes fundamentals rather than more easily dated topics. The book focuses particular attention on practical engineering issues, making it invaluable to those who have worked or studied in the field of optoelectronics for telecommunication and are now moving to optoelectronics for data communication.

Organizations are discovering with increasing frequency that the vast majority of their information assets have a spatial component, for example, the location of customers, shipments, facilities, personnel, competitors, and so on. The ability to use this information properly is fundamental to reducing operational costs, optimizing production efficiency, and increasing the quality of service. Evidence of the benefits that can be achieved by exploiting spatial information is plentiful, and many organizations are looking at ways of harvesting these benefits.

We have been professionally involved in a variety of projects that introduced spatial information management into public and private organizations. The idea of writing this book came from these projects and from discussing spatial information management with the software developers and architects involved in them. We noticed a clear gap between the knowledge and skills necessary for successful spatial information management projects and the common background of the technical personnel usually involved in large IT and database developments.

The vast majority of these staff members had backgrounds in such diverse areas as database technology, Java, C++, PL/SQL, data models, security, availability, and scalability. However, only a small number had some experience with spatial data—for most, working with spatial data was completely new. It was easy to discover that spatial objects, geocoding, and map projections, for example, were foreign terms to most (and, of course, spatial information management is not about processing signals from space probes). Tools such as Google Maps and Google Earth have introduced few of these concepts to a large audience, but the majority of spatial technology still remains an esoteric subject.

Looking at new developments and trends, it explains the shortcomings and strong points and looks at the work being done to deliver the requirements of the digital audio environment. Proprietary and open systems developed within the audio industry are examined, with each case being supported with appropriate history and clear technical explanation.

The book helps readers build a better understanding of the issues surrounding the transfer of real-time audio digital data. Touching on the history of the Internet, and the technologies it spawned, it explains the theory and possibilities for the same technologies to support inter-device communications within a studio environment. Looking at commercial and ratified standards both current and developing, this book also looks at digital architectural solutions such as IEEE 1394 (Firewire), USB, SCSI and Fibre Channel alongside their counterparts within the audio industry.

The lower level mechanisms of time-code and audio communication and synchronization are often overlooked within the professional A/V studio, and so, proprietary and open systems, such as S/PDIF, TDIF and ADAT from the audio industry are explained and solutions are contrasted.

Includes:

* Token Ring, Ethernet, FDDI

* Firewire (IEEE 1394), USB, SCSI and Fibre Channel

* S/P DIF and ADAT also discussed from the audio industry standpoint

* Quotes from Vint Cerf and Donald Davies - inventors of packet switching

About the Author

IT expert with Gedas UK Ltd. His specialist field is audio. He is a regular contributor to Audio Media magazine.

Compression schemes can be divided into two major classes: lossless compression schemes and lossy compression schemes. Data compressed using lossless compression schemes can be recovered exactly, while lossy compression introduces some loss of information in the reconstruction.

While the first modern compression scheme, Huffman coding, was a lossless compression scheme, most of the initial activity in the compression area focused on lossy compression. One reason was that the "data" being considered for compression was analognprimarily samples of speech waveforms. Another reason was that the device which would be used to provide the reconstructed speech to the user, namely, the telephone, introduced so much distortion of its own that it was relatively easy to design compression schemes which introduced less distortion than that to which the user was already being subjected.

In the past two decades the situation has changed dramatically. There is a significant amount of discrete data in the form of text, graphics, images, video, and audio that needs to be stored or transmitted, and display devices are of such quality that very little distortion can be tolerated. This has resulted in a resurgence of interest in lossless compressionnhence this handbook. We have tried to put together, in an accessible form, some of the most important aspects of lossless compression. The idea was to have a volume which would allow the reader to get an idea of both the depth and the breadth of the field while at the same time fulfilling the usual function of a handbookmthat of being a convenient repository of information about a topic. This combination will, we hope, be useful to both the novice reader who wishes to learn more about the subject, as well as the practitioner who needs an accessible reference book.

Mike Meyers, the industry expert on professional certification, brings you this concise, affordable, and portable study tool for exam 70-293. With an intensive focus on only what you need to know to pass this challenging exam plus practice exam software on CD, this Certification Passport is your ticket to success on exam day.

From the #1 Name in Professional Certification

Get on the road to becoming an MCSE with this concise, affordable, and portable study tool. Certification training guru Mike Meyers, along with Martin Brown and Chris McCain, will guide you on your career path, providing expert tips and sound advice along the way. With an intensive focus on only what you need to know to pass the test, this Certification Passport is your ticket to success on exam day.

Inside:

• Itineraries--List of official exam objectives covered
• ETAs--Amount of time needed to complete each lesson
• Travel Advisories--Expert advice on critical topics
• Local Lingo--Concise definitions of key terms and concepts
• Travel Assistance--Recommended resources for more information
• Exam Tips--Common exam pitfalls and solutions
• Checkpoints--End-of-chapter questions, answers, and explanations
• Career Flight Path--Career options mapped out to maximize the return from your IT journey

200 Practice Questions

Complete Practice Exam on CD powered by LearnKey logo

About the Series Editor:

Mike Meyers is the best-selling author of five editions of the #1 A+ Certification All-in-One Exam Guide and several other computer books. He is the president and founder of Total Seminars, LLC, a major provider of PC and network repair seminars for thousands of organizations throughout the world, and a member of CompTIA.

About the Authors:

Martin Brown is a professional author specializing in operating system technologies. He has worked as a Subject Matter Expert (SME) for Microsoft on a number of certification exams.

Chris McCain, MCSE, MCDBA, MCT, CCNA, CCSE, CISSP, is an information technology trainer and consultant focused on Microsoft's core operating systems and server products. He is founder of the National Information Technology Training and Certification Institute.

Mobility is the key to the success of wireless networks. Roaming has extended the definition of mobility beyond the technology, network, and country boundaries. Is not it fascinating to make or receive calls anywhere in the world using the same phone and identity? International roaming is already proven to be one of the most popular features of today’s wireless network. With the advent and widespread deployment of GSM technology, the mobile users have flexibility to use services in more than 500 networks. Inter-standard roaming has also made significant progress in recent years. Roaming capability in GPRS and 3G networks is progressively being implemented. The convergence of wireless mobility with Wi-Fi/WiMax is on card. The day is not far when a mobile user will be able to seamlessly roam anywhere regardless of the network, location, and device.

Interworking technology and operation and the business processes that enable roaming are complex. The main purpose of this book is to provide readers a comprehensive overview of roaming implementation, architecture, and protocols and its evolution from voice roaming in GSM to data roaming in GPRS and 3G networks. It can also be used as a guidebook to those who are responsible for roaming testing, maintenance, and management.

Binary Digital Image Processing: A Discrete Approach is a comprehensive book on the mathematical foundations of binary digital image processing. It provides a unified theoretical coverage of digital topology, discrete geometry, mathematical morphology and algorithmic graph theory and their applications in image analysis.

The book:

* outlines the theoretical framework underpinning the study of digital image processing with particular reference to binary line image processing
* addresses low-level binary image processing, reviewing a number of essential characteristics of binary digital images and providing solution procedures and algorithms
* includes detailed reviews of topics in binary digital image processing with up-to-date research references in relation to each of the problems under study
* includes some practical applications of this work by reviewing some common applications
* covers a range of topics, organised by theoretical field rather than being driven by problem definitions

This book is aimed at researchers in image processing and analysis working in computer science, electrical engineering or mathematics departments and at industrial practitioners in computer vision laboratories. It is also appropriate for postgraduate and advanced undergraduate students in computer science, image processing or pattern recognition, presenting a detailed step-by-step introduction to the field of digital image processing. The theoretical concepts are reinforced by detailed algorithmic procedures for the practical problems under study.

About the Author

Stéphane Marchand-Maillet is affiliated with the Department of Multimedia Communications at Institut Eurecom, Sophia-Antipolis, France - a consortium between academic and industrial partners. Yazid M. Sharaiha received his B.Sc. (Eng) and PhD (1991)from Imperial College, London. He also holds Master degrees in Engineering (1987) and Management Science (1988) from University of California, Berkeley and Imperial College respectively. He was a University Lecturer in Information Management at Imperial College from 1991 to 1997. He is currently a visiting fellow at Imperial College and working in Quantitative Strategies at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. His research publications and interests include combinatorial optimisation, graph theory, computational geometry, and their applications in image analysis, scheduling and financial modeling.

ASP.NET 3.5 is the latest version of Microsoft’s revolutionary ASP.NET technology. It is the principal standard for creating dynamic web pages on the Windows platform. Pro ASP.NET 3.5 in C# 2008 raises the bar for high-quality, practical advice on learning and deploying Microsoft’s dynamic web solution.

Seasoned .NET professionals Matthew MacDonald and Mario Szpuszta explain how you can get the most from this groundbreaking new technology. They cover ASP.NET 3.5 as a whole, illustrating both the brand-new features and the functionality carried over from previous versions of ASP. This book will give you the knowledge you need to code real ASP.NET 3.5 applications in the best possible style.

The book will teach you ASP.NET 3.5 starting with core concepts to more advanced topics. You will learn

• Core concepts of ASP.NET 3.5. Why it’s special. What it’s fundamental principals are. The basics of Visual Studio. How ASP.NET 3.5 controls are created, and how they fit into ASP.NET 3.5 pages, ultimately creating full applications
• Data access details. The intricacies of ADO.NET and how to perform data binding to many sources from databases to file streams to XML. We include LINQ coverage so you’re on the bleeding edge
• Security. Once considered the Achilles heel of all Windows web applications, security has vastly improved and is a cornerstone of ASP.NET 3.5. This section explains the various forms of available security, and how to best apply them
• Taking things further using advanced user interface techniques. This includes user controls, customer server controls, client-side JavaScript, and GDI+.
• Web services. In an increasingly connected world, working with web services grows in importance. This book will show you how to work with them.
• ASP.NET AJAX, with an emphasis on comtemporary web development techniques
• Development using Internet Information Services 7, Microsoft’s premier web hosting platform.
• And much more.

About the Author

Matthew MacDonald is an author, educator, and MCSD developer who has a passion for emerging technologies. He is a regular writer for developer journals such as Inside Visual Basic, ASPToday, and Hardcore Visual Studio .NET, and he's the author of several books about programming with .NET, including User Interfaces in VB .NET: Windows Forms and Custom Controls, The Book of VB .NET, and .NET Distributed Applications. In a dimly remembered past life, he studied English literature and theoretical physics. Send e-mail to him with praise, condemnation, and everything in between, to p2p@prosetech.com. Mario Szpuszta is working in the Developer and Platform Group of Microsoft Austria. Before he started working for Microsoft, Mario was involved in several projects based on COM+ and DCOM with Visual Basic and Visual C++ as well as projects based on Java and J2SE. With Beta 2 of the .NET Framework, he started developing Web applications with ASP.NET. Right now, as developer evangelist for Microsoft Austria, he is doing workshops, trainings, and proof-of-concept projects together with independent software vendors in Austria based on .NET, Web Services, and Office 2003 technologies.

Computational Intelligence: An Introduction, Second Edition offers an in-depth exploration into the adaptive mechanisms that enable intelligent behaviour in complex and changing environments. The main focus of this text is centred on the computational modelling of biological and natural intelligent systems, encompassing swarm intelligence, fuzzy systems, artificial neutral networks, artificial immune systems and evolutionary computation.

Engelbrecht provides readers with a wide knowledge of Computational Intelligence (CI) paradigms and algorithms; inviting readers to implement and problem solve real-world, complex problems within the CI development framework. This implementation framework will enable readers to tackle new problems without any difficulty through a single Java class as part of the CI library.

Key features of this second edition include:

• A tutorial, hands-on based presentation of the material.

• State-of-the-art coverage of the most recent developments in computational intelligence with more elaborate discussions on intelligence and artificial intelligence (AI).

• New discussion of Darwinian evolution versus Lamarckian evolution, also including swarm robotics, hybrid systems and artificial immune systems.

• A section on how to perform empirical studies; topics including statistical analysis of stochastic algorithms, and an open source library of CI algorithms.

• Tables, illustrations, graphs, examples, assignments, Java code implementing the algorithms, and a complete CI implementation and experimental framework.

Computational Intelligence: An Introduction, Second Edition is essential reading for third and fourth year undergraduate and postgraduate students studying CI. The first edition has been prescribed by a number of overseas universities and is thus a valuable teaching tool. In addition, it will also be a useful resource for researchers in Computational Intelligence and Artificial Intelligence, as well as engineers, statisticians, operational researchers, and bioinformaticians with an interest in applying AI or CI to solve problems in their domains.

Check out www.http://ci.cs.up.ac.za for examples, assignments and Java code implementing the algorithms.

Covers the essential fundamentals of digital video: from video principles, to conversion, compression, coding, interfaces and output.

Written for television professionals needing to apply digital video systems, equipment and techniques to multimedia and /or digital TV applications, as well as for computer system designers, engineers, programmers, or technicians needing to learn how to apply digital video to computer systems and applications. The text is based on the acclaimed industry `bible' The Art of Digital Video, but covers only the essential parts of this larger reference work.

It starts right from the basics from what a digital signal is to the how digital video can be applied.

John Watkinson is an international consultant in Audio, Video and Data Recording. He is a fellow of the AES, a member of the British Computer Society and Chartered Information Systems Practitioner. He presents lectures, seminars, conference papers and training courses worldwide. He is author of many other Focal press books including MPEG2, Art of Digital Video, Art of Digital Audio, Art of Sound Reporduction, Introduction to Digital Audio, Television Fundamentals and Audio for Television. He is also co-author of the Digital Interface Handbook and a contributor to The Loudspeaker and Headphone Handbook.

new edition has more on the computing aspects of videoincludes extra material on digital video broadcasting and video principlescovers more basic colorimetry and picture principles as well as progressive versus interface scanning

Written for television professionals needing to apply digital video systems, equipment and techniques to multimedia and /or digital TV applications, as well as for computer system designers, engineers, programmers, or technicians needing to learn how to apply digital video to computer systems and applications. The text is based on the acclaimed industry `bible' The Art of Digital Video, but covers only the essential parts of this larger reference work. It starts right from the basics from what a digital signal is to the how digital video can be applied.

About the Author

John Watkinson is an international consultant in audio video and data recording. He is a Fellow of the AES, a member of the British Computer Society and a chartered information systems practitioner. He presents lectures, seminars, conference papers and training courses worldwide and writes for many industry magazines. His other books for Focal Press are widely acknowledged as standard reference works and industry `bibles'. John is author of MPEG2, The Art of Digital Video and the Art of Digital Audio, An Introduction to Digital Video, An Introduction to Digital Audio, The Art of Sound Reproduction, Television Fundamentals, Co-author of The Digital Interface Handbook and Contributor to The Loudspeaker and Headphone Handbook.

The most unique part of Windows Vista, Windows Media Center is a key component of the Windows Vista Home Premium and Ultimate editions of Microsoft’s newest operating system. You can use Media Center to watch live television; record TV shows and series; rewind, pause, stop, and fast-forward through TV shows; listen to music and radio; and much, much more.

Media Center builds on the previous versions of the application to deliver powerful functionality and many new features, along with an eye-catching and easy-to-use interface. If you’re new to Media Center, you’ve got a lot to discover. If you’re coming to Media Center as an experienced user of earlier versions, there’s still plenty to experience, because the newest version included with Home Premium and Ultimate editions offers lots of new features and changes. Whatever the case may be for you, this book will get you up to speed quickly.

Who Is This Book For?

This book is designed to help beginning and intermediate users get the most out of Windows Vista Media Center in the shortest time possible. If you fall into either of those categories, you’ll benefit from this book’s comprehensive coverage, focused approach, and helpful advice. If you’re an expert seeking super-advanced tips, tweaks, and hacks, you’ll want to visit newsgroups and Media Center communities for that kind of information.