That's right, two stars, I would have given it more but only two thirds of the book was readable. Any one that has read my other reviews knows that I'm not the biggest Nancy Varian Berberick fan, and this book didn't help her score any points to win me over. You should remember before buying this that it is a source book, if you are coming in expecting some story that gives info on the Fifth Age as it goes along than you are wrong.

What you get is good old information, in a half way cool fashion. The way that the authors did that is that they made it as if they themselves were working for Bertrem in Ansalon, and he was nice enough to give a foreword, notes on the writings, and an afterword. I liked this better than just throwing out info and stats like most source books do.

Now the authors themselves, best to worst (and we all know who that is). First is Paul Thompson, he did a great job, the section about Politics is one of the most interesting source readings about Ansalon ever. Stan as always was funny and solid, but nothing that really kept me reading.

Last of course is Mrs. Berberick. She's not a bad writer, I just don't think she is a dragonlance writer, she is way too descriptive and flowery. An example is "Can we say with certainty that they yet pile up their lovely tresses of silver and golden so they may wear the shimmering veils of sheerest silks flowing from their coiffures as clouds stream round the glimmering sun-shining mountains?"...excuse me? I mean does that really belong in dragonlance? I personally think it is a bit overboard for DL, good for some other novel (romance?), but not in the Dragonlance shared world.

Final Thought: You really have to love the Fifth Age to get this and enjoy it totally, if you have money and want to buy a DL book then go ahead, but don't expect something that will change your view of Krynn.

For die-hard fans (like myself) this book is good, I did like the Arms and Armor section, and the games and stuff are cool. What really bothers me is some loss of continuity with the rest of the Dragonlance world. The most glaring example comes as a footnote in the aformentioned Arms and Armor section where Laurana was supposedly standing next to Sturm Brightblade while shooting a dark knight, I assume that means knights of Takhisis/Neraka which did not exist until 20 yr after Sturm died. Also, elves getting married at 20 yrs old or something, I thought they weren't even adults until the age of 80. If you can get past these few problems, though, it really can be an enjoyable read, but for the best filler information pick up one of the Leaves From the Inn of the Last Home titles.

If you're new to Krynn and you want to learn more about it , go straight ahead an buy this book , it explains a lot of stuff , including a nice amount of history about the various races in the book . However if you have been with Dragonlance for a while and , then pass it up , it has some nice stuff , but it doesn't describe a lot of stuff on the land of the Dragon overlords, talks a LOT about culinary stuff . Doesn't say anything about gnomes or gully dwarves but talks a lot about elves and kenders and ogres and humans , interresting but doesn't fo much for those who read the books and already knew everything about the current situation for the races listed above(except for the ogres) . The authors who wrote this did include a bunch of games and some celebrations and that was a litle original . All in all it is sort of entertaining but if you want to learn about the Legion of steell or the Knights of Nerak or any group ( except the knights of Solamnia) then don't bother picking this book up. I could go on about the weapon section simply talking about clubs and swords, nothing on weapons found only in Ansalon, such as the Hoopack , but I'll just let you choose for yourself....

This books barely covers the basics of the now old V4 version. It does a just average review in a non-detailed manner of a handful of commands. It doesn't begin to cover what you'd expect in a book that costs [$$] dollars. None of the pictures are color either. My CD was cracked but the models described in the book are so basic why would you want to use it? You can teach yourself with the CD help that ships with CATIA better than use this books. It merely shows a little something about the program.
Take my advice. Don't buy this book! If I didn't care I wouldn't write this review.

I bought this book becourse I read "Inside Solidworks" from David Murray which i liked a lot.

This book was not what I expected. The backcover says: beginner:yes, intermediate:yes, advanced:yes. To my opinion it only provides beginners information. But for a beginner it may be hard to understand in the way it's given.

A lot of pages only cover tables with descriptions of commands accompanied with a half-page-high screenshot of Catia (version 4.1.6? for unix?) for those commands. The examples are very basic with no "inside"-tricks or tips.

I am pretty new to Catia so it's hard to judge what the difference is between unix-Catia4.1.6 and the current windows-Catia5.4 but if i look in the book and on the screen the book looks very outdated.

This book reminded me of some books a read about autocad 9 or 10 years ago. Nowadays I think u may expect more then a summary of commands and poor examples from a not so cheap book.

good but not for a advaced student more like an intro to book

I am asking myself why Ms. Sebba would devote an entire book to criticizing a woman who has given up any material possessions she may have had, located herself in an area stricken with poverty and disease (such as leprosy), and spent her life helping the destitute. It is offensive to read this knowing that the author sits in a comfortable residence in England as she searches to find fault with Mother Teresa. Has Ms. Sebba done more for the poor and destitute than Mother Teresa?

By way of preface the author wrote the piece before Mother Teresa died and I read the book before publication. I have not seen it since the death of Mother Teresa. Secondly I am not a Catholic nor am I particularly fond of the dogma. However I enjoy biographies that are submissive to the subject and not patronizing to the reader or make me have to think why the author wrote what they did. The good bios are the ones where I am a witness to a person's life and do not even know the shade of the lens or the style of the frame of the glasses through which I am priviliged to observe. As I don't have the time to write with greater detail I wil summarize as follows:

A crack in the sidewalk may be insurmountable to an ant. It does not mean it is insurmonuntable. Mother T. Did what she had to do to save starving people in the most horrible of conditions. Do you judge her because she used every means possible to accomplish this? Do you fault her because her method is more the method of one born in 1910 and a stranger to the political exigencies of the author's agenda or the agenda of those others whom she intimidated by her plainess. To even give print to her very passable shortcommings in the face of her most ordinary training and the enormity of the task she was courageous to undertake is snobbery. Sebba is a snob. She wrote her piece to be counter to the then existing general satisfaction for the work of Mother T. She didn't write her piece to be a biographer.

I already knew much about the life of Mother Teresa so I was particularly interested in reading about how her order works in various countries. I have had some experience here in Slovakia with the Missionaries of Charity. They are wonderful people who work with those that gov't organizations usually ignore. But I agree with the author that treating people in western countries as though they were living in Indian poverty (e.g., no a/c in the hospice in Washington, D.C., no washing machine here for young mothers to use for washing baby diapers and clothes)is to commit these people to a lifestyle which may do wonders for the nuns' souls but not much for those they help. I thought the book bent over backwards to present all sides of controversial issues and to show why Mother Teresa took the stands that she did. No human who ever lived on this earth was perfect (Jesus was both human and divine)and we should understand that even saints had their flaws. It's just that nowadays we can know more about them. I think this was an excellent book; I read it through in a weekend because I found it so interesting.

Read the Microsoft documentation instead. This book is a thinly disguised rip-off of the Microsoft documentation padded with examples of dubious value. In 590 pages this book manages to add no value or information beyond the original documentation. That's quite an achievement.

If you want to learn ISAPI...think again. This was "hot" 2 years ago...now it is all but dead.

ISAPI's big promise was better performance and memory usage...ironic that it has now fallen in favor to the biggest performance pig of all web applications...ASP. In an age of fast machines and small web apps, rapid development and ease of use wins out over performance.

ISAPI is hard to learn, harder to get right, unstable, bug ridden (if written in MFC) and surprisingly inflexible.

Look, you're a smart person. You want to do the right thing. You don't need to subject yourself to the torture of learning ISAPI. Only hard-core programmers who are tasked with writing a custom web app that is going to get some VERY heavy traffic should even bother with ISAPI.

So why did I give this book 4 stars? There are no good ISAPI books out there. This one has the most information in it and will allow you the best chance to actually develop something that works. Get this book and hit Genusa's (now dusty) ISAPI site. Also spend a lot of time in the Microsoft knowledge base...there are plenty of workarounds and bugs to learn about too.

Keep in mind that with ISAPI you had better be a damn good programmer. If your DLL ever crashes...bye bye web server. This is harder than you think if you are doing "serious" web programming which includes database access.

Smart managers will not allow mission-critical web apps to be developed in ISAPI by a web punk who has never done this before. Do everyone a favor and get a clue. There is a reason why nobody is doing this stuff anymore!

Game over. Go home and don't look back. Go off and learn ASP and Cold Fusion like a good little web programmer. You will have a marketable skill and will actually get things done.

ISAPI is Microsoft's approach to adding capabilities to web serving. There are only a few books that describe how to use ISAPI. This book is the best of them, because the author: 1) provides examples in both C and C++, and 2) compares ISAPI with CGI solutions. Unfortunately, ISAPI is a complicated subject, so more and shorter examples would help elucidate the reader.

Don't think this could have been published if not for the Gethsemani name. A great folly and waste of paper.

I have been to Gethsemani many times...know the monks and know that this book is trash. It is poorly edited, poorly put together. Fr.Timothy's section is the only saving part. Don't waste your money...the book does not do justice to this holy place.

Loved the book! Clearly illustrates that humanity and monastic life co-exist. I have been to Gethsemani on many occasions, met several of the Monks there, interracted with them at prayer, meals, and in social settings. These are men of prayer and contemplation, and are also human beings with a gifted outlook on life and a sense of humor. It is very rare for one to see the lighter side of what lies beyond the cloistered walls and monastic enclosures of a life of prayer. Don't hesitate to buy the book, it is a fun and enlightening read and then plan a visit to Gethsemani.

Title says it all. Quit your bitchin! Nobody is making you stay. Transfer of if you can't handle it.

If it was appropriate under any circumstances to devote an entire book to the maggots (other than one detailing their various athletic failings and humiliating defeats at the hands of superior institutions) this seedy little pamphlet would pretty much be the one. However, it isn't.

Instead, I recommend William Shirer's "The Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich".

As a student at this institution, I think it should be clear that Reason 304 would be putting up with delusional people who think they are god-like in intellect and engineering prowess; I'm also amazed the author managed to edit it down to only 303 reasons.

What is the matter with this man? If he dislikes Paul Newman so much, why did he even bother to spend time and energy to write this book? Perhaps he should just take out an ad in the newspaper to show the world his disdain for the actor. This biography is by far the worst, most subjective of all the biographies I have ever read. Please stay away from this book, whether you're a Paul Newman fan or not. If you're a fan, you will most likely want to call up the author and demand an explaination and perhaps moeny back for the crap you've just read. If you're not Paul's fan, you shouldn't even read this book because it is full of personal prejudice and thin evidence.

If you are looking for an objective account of Paul Newman's life and work stay far away from this book. Quirk takes every chance to discredit Newman's acting ability and personality. At the begining of each paragraph, you begin to anticipate another stab at Newman and without fail it would come in one form or another. Quirk over and over again reveals his disdain for the actor when he should of been more concerned with the facts and the story.

Quirk, the author of more than 20 film-star biographies, reveals a Newman that might be unfamiliar to his adoring fans. Book reveals something of Newman's dark side and takes a sharp look at his acting as well. Hard-hitting and not written for members of Newman's cult following. A must-have for the Newman completist.

This book is very colorful and full of wonderful photos. Yet photos and color alone will not help you learn physics. The example problems they give are not explained step-by-step in a way that makes the application clearer. Worse yet the problems may be wrong some of the time. There are a few chapters that could be combined instead of splitting them up. Also, Newton's Laws are totally isolated from each other instead of being grouped together. The only way (at least that I know) to suceed in phyiscs is to work the problems. The book has a wonderful assortment of problems- yet no solutions or even answers are found in the back. Since most physics teachers won't give credit without work I don't see why putting the answers in the back could hurt. Overall the book is weak. I would read this book and do the homework assigned from the book, but my preparation for a test would come from a review book and a practice book with hundreds of solved problems (Schaum's or REA). That seems to work best for me. Oh and the last part in any physics course that determines how good you do is the teacher. For me I am not so lucky. But to you I wish the best of luck. You may have the same problems with this book that my whole class and apparantly other schools have had, or you will do well.

This is acually Jonathan Ray of Midlothian Virginia. I have spent many a late night pondering over the absutities I have read in my physics book. I am atempting to learn physics from this book but it seems that all I am learning is how to draw silly little pictures. The answers in the back of the book to the practice problems are wrong tothe point that I am woried when I get an answer that agrees with the the back of the book. On top of this there are numerous typeos on the text. On top of this there is no actual organization in the book as one has to read several chapters to understan Newton's laws which are presented out of order I might add. Overall a very confusing text that is not worth the paper it is printed on.

I am a highschool senior and am using this text for my honors physics class. I would consider myself a strong science student but this textbook is making physics extremely frustrating. We have only covered the first six chapters, but I am already noticing serious problems. The book is far from strait forward, with pages dedicated to superflous examples of things that seem to be common sense, while other pages are filled with silly diagrams that do little to help me understand the material. In many chapters the author dedicates more space to explaining how to draw diagrams of problems than he does explaining how to solve them. Consequently I often find that after reading a chapter I understand little more than how to draw pictures. The book is clearly oriented towards visual learners with little left over for the rest of us. In other chapters the material is organized in a way that seems irrational. Newton's Laws, for example, are not placed together as one would expect, rather they are scattered out of order over a 20 page chapter, making it more difficult to put the pieces together and get the big picture. The books one redeeming feature (and the reason it got the second star) is that it contains plenty of practice problems with more available online. Some of the problems even have detailed explanations and answers in the back, but often these answers are wrong, which only adds to my frustration. As I said I have only been through the first six chapter but if they are any indication, this is not a good text for an honors physics class.

Penn State has the most beautiful campus, revered professors, and formidable sports teams in this country. It is an institution I am proud to be associated with.

Mr. Finebaum needs to find more productive ways to express his anger. Therapy, maybe?

WE ARE PENN STATE!

Why was this book even written. I think that it was a waste of good trees, and well that is about all that I have to say. I was just wondering, did the author get rejected at Penn State?

You'd think that the author would be specific enough. Clearly he doesn't hate Penn (the Ivy League in Philadelphia that has an awful football team). He hates Penn STATE (the giant state school that is located in the middle of nowhere and belongs to the Big 10 -- you know, the ones that are good at sports).

They are NOT synonymous... so why does the book have this title?

That anyone could take this bit of literary garbage seriously is incredible. It consists wholy of speculation, lies, and propaganda promulgated by small-minded people. Don't waste your time on this rubbish.

It is amazing how some will prostitute the truth to sell a book. Books such as Born in Blood are more accurate speculations of the nature and roots of the Masonic fraternity, which is all that the organization is. What is truely sad is that these falsehoods take on a life of their own. The book was written from ingnorance and has only perpetuated ignorance.

The book should be boot, it is a sinister evilness that try's to hurt and offend a socieity of brotherhood thru the all seeing eye of God.

I wasted my time reading about lies.