Once you understand how the microprocessor-or central processing unit (CPU)-works, you'll have a firm grasp of the fundamental concepts at the heart of all modern computing.Inside the Machine, from the co-founder of the highly respected Ars Technica website, explains how microprocessors operate-what they do and how they do it. The book uses analogies, full-color diagrams, and clear language to convey the ideas that form the basis of modern computing. After discussing computers in the abstract, the book examines specific microprocessors from Intel, IBM, and Motorola, from the original models up through today's leading processors. It contains the most comprehensive and up-to-date information available (online or in print) on Intel's latest processors: the Pentium M, Core, and Core 2 Duo. Inside the Machine also explains technology terms and concepts that readers often hear but may not fully understand, such as "pipelining," "L1 cache," "main memory," "superscalar processing," and "out-of-order execution."Includes discussion of:Parts of the computer and microprocessor Programming fundamentals (arithmetic instructions, memory accesses, control flow instructions, and data types) Intermediate and advanced microprocessor concepts (branch prediction and speculative execution) Intermediate and advanced microprocessor concepts (branch prediction and speculative execution) Intermediate and advanced computing concepts (instruction set architectures, RISC and CISC, the memory hierarchy, and encoding and decoding machine language instructions) 64-bit computing vs. 32-bit computing Caching and performance Inside the Machine is perfect for students of science and engineering, IT and business professionals, and the growing community of hardware tinkerers who like to dig into the guts of their machines.

    This book helps you develop websites by integrating and implementing the PHP scripting language and the MySQL database system. It contains real-world examples and working sample projects that give you a foundation to start building your own websites.

    The Web is awash in Ruby code that is now virtually impossible to change or extend. This text helps you solve that problem by using powerful real-world object-oriented design techniques, which it thoroughly explains using simple and practical Ruby examples. Sandi Metz has distilled a lifetime of conversations and presentations about object-oriented design into a set of Ruby-focused practices for crafting manageable, extensible, and pleasing code. She shows you how to build new applications that can survive success and repair existing applications that have become impossible to change. Each technique is illustrated with extended examples, all downloadable from the companion Web site, poodr.info. The first title to focus squarely on object-oriented Ruby application design, Practical Object-Oriented Design in Ruby will guide you to superior outcomes, whatever your previous Ruby experience. Novice Ruby programmers will find specific rules to live by; intermediate Ruby programmers will find valuable principles they can flexibly interpret and apply; and advanced Ruby programmers will find a common language they can use to lead development and guide their colleagues. This guide will help you Understand how object-oriented programming can help you craft Ruby code that is easier to maintain and upgrade Decide what belongs in a single Ruby class Avoid entangling objects that should be kept separate Define flexible interfaces among objects Reduce programming overhead costs with duck typing Successfully apply inheritance Build objects via composition Design cost-effective tests Solve common problems associated with poorly designed Ruby code

    Indeed, that's what computers are for. You can enlist your own computer to automate all of your project's repetitive tasks, ranging from individual builds and running unit tests through to full product release, customer deployment, and monitoring the system.Many teams try to do these tasks by hand. That's usually a really bad idea: people just aren't as good at repetitive tasks as machines. You run the risk of doing it differently the one time it matters, on one machine but not another, or doing it just plain wrong. But the computer can do these tasks for you the same way, time after time, without bothering you. You can transform these labor-intensive, boring and potentially risky chores into automatic, background processes that just work.In this eagerly anticipated book, you'll find a variety of popular, open-source tools to help automate your project. With this book, you will learn: How to make your build processes accurate, reliable, fast, and easy. How to build complex systems at the touch of a button. How to build, test, and release software automatically, with no human intervention. Technologies and tools available for automation: which to use and when. Tricks and tips from the masters (do you know how to have your cell phone tell you that your build just failed?) You'll find easy-to-implement recipes to automate your Java project, using the same popular style as the rest of our Jolt Productivity Award-winning Starter Kit books. Armed with plenty of examples and concrete, pragmatic advice, you'll find it's easy to get started and reap the benefits of modern software development. You can begin to enjoy pragmatic, automatic, unattended software production that's reliable and accurate every time.

    If you want to leverage OpenGL 2.1's major improvements, you really need the Fourth Edition. It's a comprehensive tutorial, systematic API reference, and massive code library, all in one. You'll start with the fundamental techniques every graphics programmer needs: transformations, lighting, texture mapping, and so forth. Then, building on those basics, you'll move towards newer capabilities, from advanced buffers to vertex shaders. Of course, OpenGL's cross-platform availability remains one of its most compelling features. This book's extensive multiplatform coverage has been thoroughly rewritten, and now addresses everything from Windows Vista to OpenGL ES for handhelds. This is stuff you absolutely want the latest edition for. A small but telling point: This book's recently been invited into Addison-Wesley's OpenGL Series, making it an "official" OpenGL book -- and making a powerful statement about its credibility. Bill Camarda, from the August 2007 href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/newslet... Only

    Every page of Linux Pocket Guide lives up to this billing. It clearly explains how to get up to speed quickly on day-to-day Linux use. Once you're up and running, Linux Pocket Guide provides an easy-to-use reference that you can keep by your keyboard for those times when you want a fast, useful answer, not hours in the man pages.Linux Pocket Guide is organized the way you use Linux: by function, not just alphabetically. It's not the 'bible of Linux; it's a practical and concise guide to the options and commands you need most. It starts with general concepts like files and directories, the shell, and X windows, and then presents detailed overviews of the most essential commands, with clear examples. You'll learn each command's purpose, usage, options, location on disk, and even the RPM package that installed it.The Linux Pocket Guide is tailored to Fedora Linux--the latest spin-off of Red Hat Linux--but most of the information applies to any Linux system.Throw in a host of valuable power user tips and a friendly and accessible style, and you'll quickly find this practical, to-the-point book a small but mighty resource for Linux users.

    It is a clear, complete introduction to developing network programs (both applets and applications) using Java, covering everything from networking fundamentals to remote method invocation (RMI). Java Network Programming, 3rd Edition includes chapters on TCP and UDP sockets, multicasting protocol and content handlers, servlets, multithreaded network programming, I/O, HTML parsing and display, the Java Mail API, and the Java Secure Sockets Extension. There's also significant information on the New I/O API that was developed in large part because of the needs of network programmers. This invaluable book is a complete, single source guide to writing sophisticated network applications. Packed with useful examples, it is the essential resource for any serious Java developer.

    Whether you're new to Java programming and need something to bridge the gap between theory-laden reference manuals and real-world programs or you're a seasoned Java programmer looking for a new perspective or a different problem-solving context, this book will help you make the most of your Java knowledge. Packed with hundreds of tried-and-true Java recipes covering all of the major APIs from the 1.4 version of Java, this book also offers significant first-look recipes for the most important features of the new 1.5 version, which is in beta release. You get practical solutions to everyday problems, and each is followed by a detailed, ultimately useful explanation of how and why the technology works. Java Cookbook, 2nd Edition includes code segments covering many specialized APIs--like those for working with Struts, Ant and other new popular Open Source tools. It also includes expanded Mac OS X Panther coverage and serves as a great launching point for Java developers who want to get started in areas outside of their specialization. In this major revision, you'll find succinct pieces of code that can be easily incorporated into other programs. Focusing on what's useful or tricky--or what's useful and tricky--Java Cookbook, 2nd Edition is the most practical Java programming book on the market.

    This book helps you use SQL and Excel to extract business information from relational databases and use that data to define business dimensions, store transactions about customers, produce results, and more. Each chapter explains when and why to perform a particular type of business analysis in order to obtain useful results, how to design and perform the analysis using SQL and Excel, and what the results should look like.

    It aims to give readers a fundamental overview of the technologies that make up the telecommunications infrastructure.

    We'll introduce you to various tips, tricks, patterns, code snippets, and techniques that we've picked up over the years.This book is great for:Beginners who have just finished the Django tutorial.Developers with intermediate knowledge of Django who want to improve their Django projects.

    Once you have thoroughly covered the basics, the book returns to each concept to cover more advanced examples and techniques. This book is for web designers who want to create interactive elements for their designs, and for developers who want to create the best user interface for their web applications. Basic JavaScript programming and knowledge of HTML and CSS is required. No knowledge of jQuery is assumed, nor is experience with any other JavaScript libraries.

    This book covers a range of genres, including action, adventure, and puzzle games complete with professional quality sound effects and visuals. It discusses game design theory and features practical examples of how this can be applied to making games that are more fun to play. Game Maker allows games to be created using a simple drag-and-drop interface, so you don't need to have any prior coding experience. It includes an optional programming language for adding advanced features to your games, when you feel ready to do so. You can obtain more information by visiting book.gamemaker.nl. The authors include the creator of the Game Maker tool and a former professional game programmer, so you'll glean understanding from their expertise. The book also includes a DVD containing Game Maker software and all of the game projects that are created in the book—plus a host of professional-quality graphics and sound effects that you can use in your own games.

    Designed as a handy resource when you need quick solutions or techniques, the book offers dozens of short, focused pieces of code and hundreds of worked-out examples for programmers of all levels who don't have the time (or expertise) to solve MySQL problems from scratch.The new edition covers MySQL 5.0 and its powerful new features, as well as the older but still widespread MySQL 4.1. One major emphasis of this book is how to use SQL to formulate queries for particular kinds of questions, using the mysql client program included in MySQL distributions. The other major emphasis is how to write programs that interact with the MySQL server through an API. You'll find plenty of examples using several language APIs in multiple scenarios and situations, including the use of Ruby to retrieve and format data. There are also many new examples for using Perl, PHP, Python, and Java as well.Other recipes in the book teach you to:Access data from multiple tables at the same time Use SQL to select, sort, and summarize rows Find matches or mismatches between rows in two tables Determine intervals between dates or times, including age calculations Store images into MySQL and retrieve them for display in web pages Get LOAD DATA to read your data files properly or find which values in the file are invalid Use strict mode to prevent entry of bad data into your database Copy a table or a database to another server Generate sequence numbers to use as unique row identifiers Create database events that execute according to a schedule And a lot moreMySQL Cookbook doesn't attempt to develop full-fledged, complex applications. Instead, it's intended to assist you in developing applications yourself by helping you get past problems that have you stumped.

    This practical "how-to" handbook, written by experienced programmer Hal Fulton, has been updated to not only explain the newest features of Ruby, but also to show how people use Ruby today, including coverage of Ruby on Rails.