Instead of using sound science, explaining it, and sometimes extending it like in the other fourteen books, this one stoops to one of the oldest premises of B-movie sci-fi - and it isn't even scientifically sound.

Just because it's easy to shrink people on screen doesn't make it possible. Particularly the way it happens here - accidentally falling in the machine, getting dismantled, and waking up in a compressed duplicate (with the originals still in the machine) and then being able to reverse the process and coming out exactly the same size they were before! How did they even survive dismantling? Even if the process worked how were they able to walk?

The whole premise just shakes me up, even twenty years after first reading it. (Might be all those movies and Hanna-Barbera cartoons.) The only reason why I give this two stars is the familiar, endearing characters.

As I say, the book is okay for a beginning writer. Other than that it's, well, slop. Dunn has a gift for capturing moments, but none for holding them together in the novel form.

This is a good book for the beginning reader, particularly one that loves dogs.

I am ordering another copy of My Dog for Aisling because she's almost destroyed her first copy.

Iranian forces - using armed speedboats called "Boghammers" and their Shah-era American jets - make life miserable for Persian Gulf shipping. To counter the threat, a British diplomat comes up with a plausibly deniable plan teaming British pilots in old but still formidable Hawker Hunters and F-14's from a nearby USN carrier.

With all of the elaborate plots of Dale Brown and similar books, "Sidwinder" seems pretty thin - uppity Iranians, an Iranian fighter ace who seems to flip between being a world-class jerk and simple psychosis, stiff British types, and anonymously stalwart Americans. The book keeps the yankee ace and his Persian rival at a distance, not even trying to bring them together sooner without it becoming the battle royale. To fill the time, we have the hero undergo the normal trials of being a carrier-fighter driver, though with less of the depth than you'll find in most other books. Just about everything in this book seems like it was borrowed from other books, or at least generic. Even the name "Sidewinder" - one of the world's most widely used counter-air missiles - doesn't have anything much to do with the plot. ("Dueling Tomcats" - a reference to the airplane flown by both sides, would have been a better title, but would also have required a better book to stamp it on.) Even the F-14 which is at the heart of the story seems even more underwritten than the jets in most other books. Technothriller writers are routinely praised for prose that makes the reader feels as if he's actually riding one of the jets, though few actually earn that praise, and nothing here breaks that depressing pattern. Nothing here reminds of how big, powerful or complicated the big plane is. Both the Iranian F-14 and the Navy Tomcat seem to be in the same condition, even though a US embargo of spare parts had nearly resulted in grounding of all US built jets by the mid 1980's. You'd think that the Iranian plane would have its share of problems. The author could have written a book simply about the Iranian pilot's trvails in the Gulf War without indulging in grandiose air war stories (which readers could have satisfed themselves for simply by buying "Falcon 3.0" which came out at the same time. There's simply not enough detail to satisfy fans of Tom Clancy (or even Patrick Robinson). The Iranian ace is so over-the-top, you almost think this book a parody, but there's not much to him - besides the fact that he's a monster jerk - to make him funny (and a gratuitous rape, though thankfully underwritten, just to remind you that this isn't fun). Instead, read any of the Grafton books, or pick up a copy of "Punk's War" by Ward Carroll.

Picked up on Joe's and the N.C reader, I would have given it 1/2 star if only the rating system goes that low.

Can't imagine that neither the author, nor editor, or anyone else involved in producing this book didn't realize how bad a job they'd done. Like the N.C reviewer said, Chapter 4 started on page 49 on "Constructing the database", then suddenly page 51 starts Chapter 2 and goes on to page 74 about Apache server. Then out of the blue, the next page is numbered 83 talking about XML with the title 'Coding the application' on the page header.
From the summary of contents:
Chapter 4 'Contructing the Database' page 49,
Chapter 5 'Preparing the Design Specification' page 63
Chapter 6 'Coding the Application' page 77.
That means 3 out of 12 chapters are all/partly missing from the book.
On page 3, credits were mentioned with 11 Technical Reviewers, 5 different editors, and Proofreader, Indexer, Production Coordinator and Project Manager. With over 20 names mentioned, and no one caught these "IN YOUR FACE" errors before it went to press is beyond comprehension. Sadly, the author's name went down with this book.

As mentionned in one of the other reviews of this book - parts of the book are missing! In my copy in the middle of Chapter 4 the it skips to a Chapter 2 of some other Wrox book. I returned the book the day I bought it.

I purchased this book to use as a guide for installing MSDE with my current project. The author talks of using his setup project and even explains how to modify it in chapter 12. The only problem is he does not supply any code example. Neither printed code nor a download is available for chapter 12 that gives you everything he talks about. He talks about 8 additional projects that are needed for the book. In Chapter 12 on page 306,
he states and I quote "There are several other projects included in the LazyMan Inventory that we will not have space to detail in this book. The complete solution is available for download, and here is a brief synopsis of each project." I have not been able to acquire this solution nor have I been able to contact anyone. I talked to the publisher WROX and they stated they would have the author handle this problem. But now that will not be done because WROX has gone out business or is being acquired by Wiley Publishing. He constantly refers to all of these projects but does not make them available. So in short I can not recommend this book because it is not complete and the author has not followed thru on promises made in the book.

It's an outdated book covering 1.5 version (ver 3.0 soon to be realesed). It can be best described as a cut & paste operation from the Silverstream manuals. That too version 1.5 manuals!

I know currently this is the ONLY book available in the market but better wait a month or so and buy the NEW book that's being published by SilverStream Journal (check it by using the LINK on www.silverstream.com)

This book has wasted both my time and money. The only good thing I can say about it, is that it comes with a CD containing SS with 60 days license.

Is this book a joke? It appears that the authors closely paraphrased the Silverstream documentation and added gratuitous screen shots for filler. One wonders if Howard Block and Al Dunn even develop applications with Silverstream?

This book is a supplement to the textbook. It doesn't say it is the Assignments version on your website. You really should add that into the title.

I couldn't hardly stand reading it. The Author seems to think that the clinic is the place to do research. It is not, our clients or students aren't research guinea pigs.The problem with OT is the fact that there is no research to support our claims, and this is just an excuse to keep trying other things that aren't based on clinical research. For instance, Sensory Integration..........has never been proven clinically, but everyone uses it. Why not try to prove it with research,then use it?

I bought this book after enjoying the excellent Guide to Texas and the Middle South from the same series. Unfortunately, the guides are all by different authors, and vary widely in the quality of their content. I've bought four of them so far, and this one is the worst of the bunch.

The Texas book is a "Blue Highways" (i.e., off the beaten track) guide, and contains descriptions of fascinating places that you're not likely to find anywhere else. This one, on the other hand, is no better than those free tourist guides that you find on racks in pancake houses and cheap hotels.

Mr. Dunn is both unimaginative and lazy, and this book suffers from it. The National Geographic generally does much better. They should own up to their mistake and pull this turkey off the market.

The book is not meant for a programmer. Very few examples, ... most of them are excerpts anyway. Perhaps this book would be useful as a text book for a "weed-out-the-juniors" class. The included executables work as shown, but there is not much else you can do with them. Bottom Line: Don't waste your money.