When I purchased this book I was looking for a dictionary full of words that a novice would not understand reguarding computers. Instead I ended up with a book with limited definitions and silly jokes ! If I had time I would have returned it ! Half the definitions I look up arent even in the book. Save your money and buy a better dictionary.

This book is exactly what the title implies. If you find yourself having little difficulty describing a computer term, then you can turn to this reference. Everything is in alphabetical order and comes with simple illustrations. Before the alphabet that are medic characters any of these are described.

Due to the accelerating advances in technology many terms are not in this edition.

Computer language and fun would so like an oxymororn. However, in this funny, informative and usefull title, this is exatcly what one gets. For instance algorithm is explained in a easy, yet informative way and has a silly and funny joked tacked on at the end. Highly Recommended.

This ranks among the most shallow, factually incorrect jazz biographies I have read. As someone who knew Lil Armsrong well, I was struck by how far off the mark this alleged portrait of her is. The author hasn't a clue when it comes to Lil's personality, the fabric of her life, and her place in jazz. Lil deserves better than this hack job, which I gave one star because none is not an option.

As a lifelong jazz researcher, I was indeed thrilled when I discovered the first attempt at a Lil Hardin-Armstrong bio, but I must say that this one was a disappointment. Resources for jazz research are richer than they have ever been and jazz history books are finally starting to rise to the level of quality scholarship. but that is not evident here. The author seems to have assembled much of the previously published information on Lil, drawn some odd conclusions (exposing a lack of knowledge of early jazz music) and left it at that. Lil was a significant presence in the 1920's Chicago scene and in the life of her second husband, Louis; she was a fine composer and an above-average instrumentalist. She most certainly did not, as the author suggests, write out Louis' magnificent introduction to West End Blues!
There is also a strange, and somewhat unfair characterization of Louis Armstrong in this book. While much is made of Louis' infidelities, little or nothing is mentioned of Lil's (which have been documented elsewhere). Such inconsistencies damage the credibility of the book.
I love Lil Armstrong's music, and I wish that there was a better biography of her out there. She certainly deserves better!

James L. Dickerson focuses upon Lillian 'Lil' Hardin as a
highly educated, multi-talented, and prestigious individual from
stardom in the early part of the Twentieth Century--when it was
not "cool" to be both a black female and a vocalist/instrumental-
ist--to her last recording. The biographer depicts Lil as one who
was willing to neglect opportunities that would foster her own
additional success in order to promote her husband, Louis Arm-
strong in his musical endeavors as a soloist and instrumentalist.

The conflicts in management, the shifts from city to city, and
the rocky marriage, which eventually involved "the other woman,"
took a toll on the relationship between Lil and Louis. However,
as Dickerson vividly emphasizes, Lil never lost her love for her
musical soulmate, with whom she nurtured their only child--jazz.

This book is definitely for the novice. Newcomers to Windows operating systems will find it helpful in basic tasks such as the Start Menu, windows explorer, etc., but do not look for detailed information on just about any topic here. Even where help is offered, it is scant, as in the example of removing an icon from the task bar tray: one specific example is used, with no reference to the general topic of how to access and/or close task bar tray icons in general. For someone new to Windows, this book could be a good value, inasmuch as it walks the user through elementary tasks. For the intermediate to advanced Windows user looking for somewhat more detailed explanations of the 'how' or 'why' of Windows 2000, look elsewhere.

Dab Gookin's 'DOS For Dummies' was great ... way back when DOS was hot. This Windows 2000 book it writen the same. I expected a more in depth look at things. Definetly not a book if youwish to go for the MCSE 2000 Track.

The Gookins made this topic extremly easy to understand with this book. The hand holding approach was excellent and they didn't bog me down with a bunch of technical information that I wouldn't use. This book is a great buy and something you'll continually refer to.

The subject clearly is an interesting one: colour, thought and language: how are they connected? Do we percieve colours differently? However, this book is based on Berlin and Kay's approach. In the lates 60s these two scientists suggested that societies acquire colur terms in a certain order. First, a distinction between black and white is made. Red comes next, then blue or green and so on. However, as research findings came in, Berlin and Kay's model had to be changed continously to accomodate new facts. By now it is so complex that it is hardly a model at all. Furthermore, it might have been the case that the scholar's own views influenced their thesis.

Rather than admit they are mistaken the model was kept and twisted around. Lucy's article at the end of the book clearly shows the fallacy of their approach. All the other articles, however, are based on Berlin and Kay's approach and thus rather worthless.

An outstanding edited collection that summarizes the state of research on the linkages among visual neurophysiology and neuropsychology, color perception, color categories, and color naming. Although the emphasis is on the integration of contemporary opponent process theories of color vision and findings from the World Color Survey (WCS) of color terms in a large sample of languages, the volume is unusual in its inclusion of a range of positions, including researchers who strongly question the methods and initial conclusions of the WCS. Several of the individual papers in the collection are among the best brief, clear, and rigorous treatments of important topics in the physiology, psychology, and linguistics of color. The book as a whole is superb case study in how research evolves, in science generally, and in cognitive science more specifically. Advanced undergraduate to graduate level.

Virginia Abernethy's attempt to form an understanding of problems felt in the US regarding population growth misses the point on several levels. Her continual blame of immigration and putting forth of Buchanistic ideas revolving around an "us versus them" mentality border on racist.

The book has its place, but the reader must be aware that it concentrates much emphasis on negativity towards those with different skin and cultural background. Also, she states clearly that there is no global population problem. The problem only exists in the US. Open your eyes Mrs. Abernethy, take a look around the world, do some traveling!

But where she really misses the boat is in her fear that US emphasis on multi-culturalism may lead to Kosovo like problems. Quite the contrary, multi-culturalism is all about living together as one nation/one-world, not separatism as she appears to be preaching.

The essential point of this work is the Demographic Transition Model (DTM) is false and worse is contributing to above reasonable fertility rates in many countries and an over all rate of positive population growth world wide. The author does an excellent job of putting forward both the strong case for the DTM (education and affluence => zero growth) and the weak case for the DTM (education and affluence => some reduction in growth). She then shows that niether contingency is supported by various important sources of empirical data. Even worse, policies based on the DTM may even increase fertility. The arguments put forward are coherent,cogent, and reasonably sound. If the DTM is false then this has very far ranging implications for all sorts of ecconomic and aid policies . But more importantly,if the DTM is false there are extremely dire consequences for the health of humanity and the environment. This will mean that the much vuanted "logistic curve" of the DTM will not come to pass and population may easily over shoot ten billion (e.g. will not level off via birth prevention). The issues and arguments put forward in this work are really the essential bench mark for future discussion.

Hardin's writing is engorged with creative descriptions
of unattractive things. I like really excellent descriptions
of unattractive things. Full and creative descriptive writing
used to good effect can make for engrossing and vivid stories.

Unfortunately, all Hardin gives us in Distorture are full
and creative descriptions tossed at the reader like chang
being thrown to a street creature. You see what I mean?
If he can learn to string these evocative phrases into a
cohesive picture, he will be a force to be reckoned with.
His choices of subject for his vignettes are intriguing and
his take on the subjects interesting.

I will be keeping an eye out for his future work, but
Distorture was not worth the time I spent reading it.

My brain has been reduced to a pool of clear liquid; as I type this it is dripping methodically out of my ears. I hope it doesn't stain the carpet. Rob Hardin is to blame for this, and really, it's an experience I wish I could repeat over and over again. Distorture is pure, distilled intelligence blended with the most basic of human emotions to create a collection of stories that scarify the mind and leave the reader in utter awe. Excuse me while my head implodes.

Witness today's overhip lit: rock lyric quoting, gutter-worshipping fiction by those who mistake posture for content. As if fiction must reverberate with the quirks and affectations of fleeting fads to ensure its validity. As if it can't stand on its own without a crutch of trendy reference. As if literature is not itself a genuine art form, but a pallid lifestyle slide-show, its anemic screen earning merit only when it throws off the correct volley of shabby-pop imagery: Crack. Prostitutes. Meaningful alterna-tunes. Painfully conscious yet infuriatingly unexamined slouching.

A cursory glance at Rob Hardin's short story collection, Distorture, might lead one to identify it with the above. After all, the opening tale, "Knives for a Narcoleptic," seems to have all the attributes in place: a street-level Alphabet City backdrop, delinquent youths with names like "Ratboy;" drugs, music, scarification, mutilation, etc. However, these surface symptoms aren't given the treatment we've come to expect from the slacker hacks: This time around, the characters aren't archetypes or constructs supporting a trite political or cultural stance. Neither grubby angels nor totems of cool, they are instead substantial and ironic explorations. The teens in this story who play grisly doctor with an unconscious woman are each cast in an unsympathetic light that reveals more sinuous personality curves than dreamed of by ten sex-positive pornographers. (And, yes, despite the naturalistic characterization, it's still a very *artificial* scenario -- but why shouldn't it be? This is fiction, not journalism.) Behold adolescent Tim's never-neatly-resolved conflict of lust and scruple: "He's probably only ever lost it about girls with scars. He swabs the blood off her stomach, the edges of the scalpel's lineations still transparent white. He puts his lips to the design, feels horrible, pulls away. Then sneaks another look, lives there for days. He ministers to her back, imagining scenarios in which he alone cares for her-his whispered enchantments resurrecting her health." Clearly, this isn't some simple role-playing fantasy designed to reinforce one's comfy notions of outsider status: Pandering to the reader has no place in serious characterization. Real psychic perspectives are agonizing labyrinths-never pat, never easy. Though a twit, Tim is granted dimension-a brave move, and the best one in this case, even if it means that Hardin's refusal to flatten the story's dynamics into a sermon will be construed by the witless as cruel or unsympathetic. In fact, it's often in this very absence of a comfort level that the author's ambitions are most visible, and we see that this type of debased scenario has at last been put to profound use.

The influences at work in Distorture result in ornate and complex prose that further subverts the familiar subject matter. It's no mistake that names like Dowson, Poe and Beddoes surface sporadically in the texts, and if the autobiographical essay "An Inquiry Into Subjective Evolution" is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, the passage on Baudelaire's significance comes off as earnest. Hardin repeatedly utilizes 19th Century literary aesthetics to achieve effect in a manner that still manages to sound thoroughly modern, thus demonstrating the enduring strengths of Edwardian dissipation and French Decadence. Musical influences abound as well: A trained musician, Hardin is clearly mindful of counterpoint when using articulate, elegant language to verbalize surreal and futuristic imagery: "Fish-eyed, famished, I gaped at addiction's fata morgana; I'd never seen a giant skull before, but there it was, sprouting quads and veinage like the lode that squats on a victim's bulging neck." Composers' names come up often, and one group of pieces, which appear to have been based around musical structures, is gathered in a separate section labeled "Orchestrations." Fortunately, Hardin displays a wide musical palette, ranging from discordant fugues ("Matterland") to darkly harmonious chaconnes ("Val Demar's Pear").

With all of this going for Distorture, it's odd that many of the book's readers seem to notice only its most superficial, sensational qualities-corpses, rough trade, Lower East Side appeal, etc. These elements, integral as they often are to the stories, are still merely the subject matter. The real reason to pick up Distorture is not because it might define your subculture or tell you what it's like on the streets. This is a volume of carefully wrought and revised, icepick-sharp prose. It's the work of an author who invests a great measure of thought into his writing. This may not seem fashionable, but it's what we need.

I didn'd find anything in this book that I could not find in the Windows HELP file that comes with XP
tom

I wasn't sure what kind of book this would be since it has a goofy cover, but the information inside is NOT goofy. Ms. Gookin is thorough and very helpful with her presentation of information. This project oriented book contains enough tasks and information so you can easily learn a lot more about Windows XP and accomplish some fun and helpful tasks.

I know a little about Windows XP, but had a difficult time putting the tools together to do fun computer projects. This book was a tremendous help! If you have basic Windows XP knowledge but want a boost in your productivity, get this book!

The central argument of this book is that we are ostriches with our heads in the sand unable to face our problems because facing them would entail confronting taboo, which is socially and politically impossible (at least within earshot of anybody). But Professor Hardin, who is the author of Stalking the Wild Taboo, finds a way around the forbidden by creating a man from Mars who can be objective where we cannot, allowing Hardin to express the taboo point of view. For example on page 106 he has the Martian say (referring to the organization, Zero Population Growth): "it is virtually unheard of outside the learned community... [I]n the long run, it will decrease the relative number of educated people compared with the uneducated." The Martian adds, "Propaganda in favor of reducing fertility must be accompanied by repressive legal measures... Perhaps the first thing to do would be to cancel income deductions for the third child in a family (and beyond)." Hardin himself obliquely gives his point of view on page 61 with these words, "The natural sciences have probably made it possible for millions--probably not billions--of human beings to live sustainably on the earth."

While I (and the natural resources of the planet) would welcome a world with say six hundred million people as opposed to six billion, I must disagree with the man from Mars about the educated and the uneducated. I suspect, regardless of actual numbers, their proportions would stay approximately the same.

However most of this book is not about overpopulation, but about political and economic issues that Professor Hardin is pleased to expound on. There is the problem of "Equity, Equality, and Affirmative Action" (Chapter 14). As Hardin sees it we really need to understand that "no two human beings are created equal" (p. 109) and that "equity" and "equality" are not the same thing. Exactly how he feels about affirmative action however is never stated directly--indeed little in this book is stated directly. Hardin prefers to hint at his position and let the reader figure it out. Since he gives the (absurd) example of laws mandating "the admission of pygmies to professional basketball teams," I am persuaded that he is opposed to affirmative action.

There are some things he does make clear, but not in a manner likely to persuade. For example, he is opposed to one world government, believing that it would be unstable. In support (surprisingly enough) he quotes Bertrand Russell: "A world state, if it were firmly established, would have no enemies to fear, and would therefore be in danger of breaking down through lack of cohesive force." Why a superstate would necessarily lack cohesive force is never explained. One gets the sense that it somehow has to do with another related Hardin idea, namely that multiculturalism within a single society is unstable. (See Chapter 15.) His argument is that the differing cultures would not be able to agree on how to go about their business peaceably and laws could not be formulated that all cultures would find acceptable. He gives the example of somebody from one culture wanting to drive on the right side of the road and somebody from another wanting to drive on the left. In fact, he gives this example a couple of times.

I am at a loss to appreciate these arguments (and some others in the book). That different people could not be persuaded to agree to drive on one side of the road seems silly. That a superstate could not find enemies for the populace to rally against seems naive. After all we have today the phenomena of the U.S. government directing its energies against drug lords and terrorists with the public firmly behind those efforts, as President Bush's high approval ratings attest. Furthermore, there will always be a counter-culture (in a democratic society) that the majority culture can and will rail against (and vice-versa). But I even question the underlying psychological assumption that a state needs enemies to be cohesive. Historically, governments have sought enemies (both within and without) as a means to solidify their power, but that hardly proves that a state necessarily needs enemies to survive. At any rate, perhaps we can dream up nasty little green men from some distant solar system to hate, if need be.

Hardin's style is somewhat off-putting at first and betrays his long years as a teacher. He makes statements with little or no support that encourage readers to evaluate for themselves, and then later on (after readers have presumably had time to think for themselves), he gives his rationale. (Or he doesn't!) The subject of one chapter is concluded in the next and then reopened in another. He sometimes explains the obvious and then fails to explain the cryptic, as for example he informs us that "philosophy" means "love of knowledge" (p. 31 ), but does not reveal why "adding two more lanes to a highway...ultimately increases traffic jams." (p. 39)

Some of Hardin's sentiments, however, I find quite agreeable. For example, "No one expects the physics of 50 B.C. to tell us how to launch a spaceship. But apparently many people are sure that the 2,000-year-old ethics developed in Near Eastern villages is all we need to solve" our moral problems. (pp. 4-5)

The greatest problem facing the planet today (and the root cause of many other problems) is overpopulation. It is a truth that needs a wider and more emphatic expression. I hope in his next book Professor Hardin concentrates on this urgent problem and leaves the political and economic niceties for others to straighten out.

The author pointed out the absurdity of our belief in "sustainable growth". Unfortunately his solutions to the problem is the same as the title of this book--be an ostrich. Hardin just told us to shut the door and go on enjoying our last feast of Malthus.

This book has more in it than meets the eye and it infers many things that readers may not pick up on. One of the ideas I thought was useful not just for the population problem but for many other problems that humas are facing his his ideas about all the investments in failure that we are making in many of our "solutions". I think Hardin implies the solution which is that limits have to be set and that our basic ancient mythology which was set at a time when population growth was extreemly useful is now no longer useful. His solution is to argue this point again and again because so many people still have their heads in the sand. Until people can come to some of the realities of our world population problem it is pointless to try to implement any solution which those with their heads in the sand will continue to oppose. His solution is very difficult to swallow for people who are holding on to the ideals of the past which are now fatal so this book is very vital. I like that he leaves it to the inventiveness of the reader to pursue the results of his findings. Details about any of his infered solutions are not in this book. This book is a work of genious from someone who has been in the field of population control for over 30 years. He knows what he's up to. He opens up so many possibilities for creative readers or political thinkers. His ideas on coercion, equality, multiculturalism, and altruism will be invaluable for any solution to take place. This book is just brimming with discussions and it makes for a great book for a class to read and discuss which is what I think Hardin ment it for mostly to be used in his classes and used to launch many discussions. That is why is is so bare in many ways and leaves the conclusions up to the reader. The thing I dislike about the book the most is that the inside cover says "sure to spark controversy." It just goes to show how many in our society have there heads in the sand!

As a graduate art therapy student who has been working with children for years, I found this book to have very few realistic examples of children's artwork. Many of the images were clearly created by an adult and therefore provided very little help as to what to look for in childrens art. In addition to the poor images, I didn't find much of the information to have therapeutic value.

As a Board Registered Art Therapist and instructor, I made the error of recommending this book to students before I actually laid eyes on it. What a mistake! When one of my students, also a trained art therapist, received it, we literally laughed. This is such a poor example of literature on how to understand children's art. Even more disturbing were the strange pseudo-drawings of children's art made by the authors. Clearly not recommended when there are so many better books available.

Hey, it is erroneous to say that these are "new techniques," when in fact they are 50 to 60 years old. What the authors did was do a new study with these techniques and then try to offer a convincing book on analyzing children's drawings. The problem is, it is not very convincing. One cannot use the indicators the authors note to establish child abuse in a slick fashion. We already know that the techniques the authors based this study on are not reliable, so they really just built on what was already unreliable to begin with. I understand their need to help children in distress, but that was not really accomplished here.

As stated in an earlier review, this book's scope is too narrow. Its focus on weapons is distracting; if you're trying to recreate an 18th century environment, you need to know about more than muskets. When did people start using the Franklin Stove? How available was printed material? How did people get around? How did they climb mountains, how did their ships work, how accessible was glass?

This is a handy book about weapons up through the 20th century, but not much else.

If you buy this book hoping it will be about high tech things for GURPS, you will be disappointed. It should be called GURPS guns or something. It is basically the history of firearms, with a few things about explosives and other sundry pieces of information thrown in. It is really quite interesting and well researched. However, it only goes up to modern times, and much of the text is devoted to ancient cannon, guns and so forth.

There are a few peices of information that could be useful to a campaign in here, but mostly it is just background material, and is more geared towards being interesting reading than essential game rules. If you like this kind of GURPS book, you would probably give it more stars than I did.