Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet


Andrew Blum - 2012
    But what is it physically? And where is it really? Our mental map of the network is as blank as the map of the ocean that Columbus carried on his first Atlantic voyage. The Internet, its material nuts and bolts, is an unexplored territory. Until now.In Tubes, journalist Andrew Blum goes inside the Internet's physical infrastructure and flips on the lights, revealing an utterly fresh look at the online world we think we know. It is a shockingly tactile realm of unmarked compounds, populated by a special caste of engineer who pieces together our networks by hand; where glass fibers pulse with light and creaky telegraph buildings, tortuously rewired, become communication hubs once again. From the room in Los Angeles where the Internet first flickered to life to the caverns beneath Manhattan where new fiber-optic cable is buried; from the coast of Portugal, where a ten-thousand-mile undersea cable just two thumbs wide connects Europe and Africa, to the wilds of the Pacific Northwest, where Google, Microsoft, and Facebook have built monumental data centers—Blum chronicles the dramatic story of the Internet's development, explains how it all works, and takes the first-ever in-depth look inside its hidden monuments.This is a book about real places on the map: their sounds and smells, their storied pasts, their physical details, and the people who live there. For all the talk of the "placelessness" of our digital age, the Internet is as fixed in real, physical spaces as the railroad or telephone. You can map it and touch it, and you can visit it. Is the Internet in fact "a series of tubes" as Ted Stevens, the late senator from Alaska, once famously described it? How can we know the Internet's possibilities if we don't know its parts?Like Tracy Kidder's classic The Soul of a New Machine or Tom Vanderbilt's recent bestseller Traffic, Tubes combines on-the-ground reporting and lucid explanation into an engaging, mind-bending narrative to help us understand the physical world that underlies our digital lives.

JavaScript: The Good Parts


Douglas Crockford - 2008
    This authoritative book scrapes away these bad features to reveal a subset of JavaScript that's more reliable, readable, and maintainable than the language as a whole--a subset you can use to create truly extensible and efficient code.Considered the JavaScript expert by many people in the development community, author Douglas Crockford identifies the abundance of good ideas that make JavaScript an outstanding object-oriented programming language-ideas such as functions, loose typing, dynamic objects, and an expressive object literal notation. Unfortunately, these good ideas are mixed in with bad and downright awful ideas, like a programming model based on global variables.When Java applets failed, JavaScript became the language of the Web by default, making its popularity almost completely independent of its qualities as a programming language. In JavaScript: The Good Parts, Crockford finally digs through the steaming pile of good intentions and blunders to give you a detailed look at all the genuinely elegant parts of JavaScript, including:SyntaxObjectsFunctionsInheritanceArraysRegular expressionsMethodsStyleBeautiful featuresThe real beauty? As you move ahead with the subset of JavaScript that this book presents, you'll also sidestep the need to unlearn all the bad parts. Of course, if you want to find out more about the bad parts and how to use them badly, simply consult any other JavaScript book.With JavaScript: The Good Parts, you'll discover a beautiful, elegant, lightweight and highly expressive language that lets you create effective code, whether you're managing object libraries or just trying to get Ajax to run fast. If you develop sites or applications for the Web, this book is an absolute must.

The Practice of Network Security Monitoring: Understanding Incident Detection and Response


Richard Bejtlich - 2013
    The most effective computer security strategies integrate network security monitoring (NSM): the collection and analysis of data to help you detect and respond to intrusions.In The Practice of Network Security Monitoring, Mandiant CSO Richard Bejtlich shows you how to use NSM to add a robust layer of protection around your networks — no prior experience required. To help you avoid costly and inflexible solutions, he teaches you how to deploy, build, and run an NSM operation using open source software and vendor-neutral tools.You'll learn how to:Determine where to deploy NSM platforms, and size them for the monitored networks Deploy stand-alone or distributed NSM installations Use command line and graphical packet analysis tools, and NSM consoles Interpret network evidence from server-side and client-side intrusions Integrate threat intelligence into NSM software to identify sophisticated adversaries There's no foolproof way to keep attackers out of your network. But when they get in, you'll be prepared. The Practice of Network Security Monitoring will show you how to build a security net to detect, contain, and control them. Attacks are inevitable, but losing sensitive data shouldn't be.

Beautiful Code: Leading Programmers Explain How They Think


Andy OramLincoln Stein - 2007
    You will be able to look over the shoulder of major coding and design experts to see problems through their eyes.This is not simply another design patterns book, or another software engineering treatise on the right and wrong way to do things. The authors think aloud as they work through their project's architecture, the tradeoffs made in its construction, and when it was important to break rules. Beautiful Code is an opportunity for master coders to tell their story. All author royalties will be donated to Amnesty International.

Python Machine Learning


Sebastian Raschka - 2015
    We are living in an age where data comes in abundance, and thanks to the self-learning algorithms from the field of machine learning, we can turn this data into knowledge. Automated speech recognition on our smart phones, web search engines, e-mail spam filters, the recommendation systems of our favorite movie streaming services – machine learning makes it all possible.Thanks to the many powerful open-source libraries that have been developed in recent years, machine learning is now right at our fingertips. Python provides the perfect environment to build machine learning systems productively.This book will teach you the fundamentals of machine learning and how to utilize these in real-world applications using Python. Step-by-step, you will expand your skill set with the best practices for transforming raw data into useful information, developing learning algorithms efficiently, and evaluating results.You will discover the different problem categories that machine learning can solve and explore how to classify objects, predict continuous outcomes with regression analysis, and find hidden structures in data via clustering. You will build your own machine learning system for sentiment analysis and finally, learn how to embed your model into a web app to share with the world

iWoz: Computer Geek to Cult Icon: How I Invented the Personal Computer, Co-Founded Apple, and Had Fun Doing It


Steve Wozniak - 2006
    individual whose contributions to the scientific, business and cultural realms are extensive."—BookpageBefore slim laptops that fit into briefcases, computers looked like strange, alien vending machines. But in "the most staggering burst of technical invention by a single person in high-tech history" (BusinessWeek​) Steve Wozniak invented the first true personal computer. Wozniak teamed up with Steve Jobs, and Apple Computer was born, igniting the computer revolution and transforming the world. Here, thirty years later, the mischievous genius with the low profile treats readers to a rollicking, no-holds-barred account of his life—for once, in the voice of the wizard himself.

Free as in Freedom: Richard Stallman's Crusade for Free Software


Sam Williams - 2002
    It examines Stallman's unique personality and how that personality has been at turns a driving force and a drawback in terms of the movement's overall success.Free as in Freedom examines one man's 20-year attempt to codify and communicate the ethics of 1970s era "hacking" culture in such a way that later generations might easily share and build upon the knowledge of their computing forebears. The book documents Stallman's personal evolution from teenage misfit to prescient adult hacker to political leader and examines how that evolution has shaped the free software movement. Like Alan Greenspan in the financial sector, Richard Stallman has assumed the role of tribal elder within the hacking community, a community that bills itself as anarchic and averse to central leadership or authority. How did this paradox come about? Free as in Freedom provides an answer. It also looks at how the latest twists and turns in the software marketplace have diminished Stallman's leadership role in some areas while augmenting it in others.Finally, Free as in Freedom examines both Stallman and the free software movement from historical viewpoint. Will future generations see Stallman as a genius or crackpot? The answer to that question depends partly on which side of the free software debate the reader currently stands and partly upon the reader's own outlook for the future. 100 years from now, when terms such as "computer," "operating system" and perhaps even "software" itself seem hopelessly quaint, will Richard Stallman's particular vision of freedom still resonate, or will it have taken its place alongside other utopian concepts on the 'ash-heap of history?'

The Elements of Statistical Learning: Data Mining, Inference, and Prediction


Trevor Hastie - 2001
    With it has come vast amounts of data in a variety of fields such as medicine, biology, finance, and marketing. The challenge of understanding these data has led to the development of new tools in the field of statistics, and spawned new areas such as data mining, machine learning, and bioinformatics. Many of these tools have common underpinnings but are often expressed with different terminology. This book describes the important ideas in these areas in a common conceptual framework. While the approach is statistical, the emphasis is on concepts rather than mathematics. Many examples are given, with a liberal use of color graphics. It should be a valuable resource for statisticians and anyone interested in data mining in science or industry. The book's coverage is broad, from supervised learning (prediction) to unsupervised learning. The many topics include neural networks, support vector machines, classification trees and boosting—the first comprehensive treatment of this topic in any book. Trevor Hastie, Robert Tibshirani, and Jerome Friedman are professors of statistics at Stanford University. They are prominent researchers in this area: Hastie and Tibshirani developed generalized additive models and wrote a popular book of that title. Hastie wrote much of the statistical modeling software in S-PLUS and invented principal curves and surfaces. Tibshirani proposed the Lasso and is co-author of the very successful An Introduction to the Bootstrap. Friedman is the co-inventor of many data-mining tools including CART, MARS, and projection pursuit.

Blood, Sweat, and Pixels: The Triumphant, Turbulent Stories Behind How Video Games Are Made


Jason Schreier - 2017
    In Blood, Sweat, and Pixels, Jason Schreier takes readers on a fascinating odyssey behind the scenes of video game development, where the creator may be a team of 600 overworked underdogs or a solitary geek genius. Exploring the artistic challenges, technical impossibilities, marketplace demands, and Donkey Kong-sized monkey wrenches thrown into the works by corporate, Blood, Sweat, and Pixels reveals how bringing any game to completion is more than Sisyphean—it's nothing short of miraculous.Taking some of the most popular, bestselling recent games, Schreier immerses readers in the hellfire of the development process, whether it's RPG studio Bioware's challenge to beat an impossible schedule and overcome countless technical nightmares to build Dragon Age: Inquisition; indie developer Eric Barone's single-handed efforts to grow country-life RPG Stardew Valley from one man's vision into a multi-million-dollar franchise; or Bungie spinning out from their corporate overlords at Microsoft to create Destiny, a brand new universe that they hoped would become as iconic as Star Wars and Lord of the Rings—even as it nearly ripped their studio apart. Documenting the round-the-clock crunches, buggy-eyed burnout, and last-minute saves, Blood, Sweat, and Pixels is a journey through development hell—and ultimately a tribute to the dedicated diehards and unsung heroes who scale mountains of obstacles in their quests to create the best games imaginable.

Building Microservices: Designing Fine-Grained Systems


Sam Newman - 2014
    But developing these systems brings its own set of headaches. With lots of examples and practical advice, this book takes a holistic view of the topics that system architects and administrators must consider when building, managing, and evolving microservice architectures.Microservice technologies are moving quickly. Author Sam Newman provides you with a firm grounding in the concepts while diving into current solutions for modeling, integrating, testing, deploying, and monitoring your own autonomous services. You'll follow a fictional company throughout the book to learn how building a microservice architecture affects a single domain.Discover how microservices allow you to align your system design with your organization's goalsLearn options for integrating a service with the rest of your systemTake an incremental approach when splitting monolithic codebasesDeploy individual microservices through continuous integrationExamine the complexities of testing and monitoring distributed servicesManage security with user-to-service and service-to-service modelsUnderstand the challenges of scaling microservice architectures

The Practice of System and Network Administration


Thomas A. Limoncelli - 2001
    Whether you use Linux, Unix, or Windows, this newly revised edition describes the essential practices previously handed down only from mentor to protege. This wonderfully lucid, often funny cornucopia of information introduces beginners to advanced frameworks valuable for their entire career, yet is structured to help even the most advanced experts through difficult projects.The book's four major sections build your knowledge with the foundational elements of system administration. These sections guide you through better techniques for upgrades and change management, catalog best practices for IT services, and explore various management topics. Chapters are divided into The Basics and The Icing. When you get the Basics right it makes every other aspect of the job easier--such as automating the right things first. The Icing sections contain all the powerful things that can be done on top of the basics to wow customers and managers.Inside, you'll find advice on topics such asThe key elements your networks and systems need in order to make all other services run better Building and running reliable, scalable services, including web, storage, email, printing, and remote access Creating and enforcing security policies Upgrading multiple hosts at one time without creating havoc Planning for and performing flawless scheduled maintenance windows Managing superior helpdesks and customer care Avoiding the -temporary fix- trap Building data centers that improve server uptime Designing networks for speed and reliability Web scaling and security issues Why building a backup system isn't about backups Monitoring what you have and predicting what you will need How technically oriented workers can maintain their job's technical focus (and avoid an unwanted management role) Technical management issues, including morale, organization building, coaching, and maintaining positive visibility Personal skill techniques, including secrets for getting more done each day, ethical dilemmas, managing your boss, and loving your job System administration salary negotiation It's no wonder the first edition received Usenix SAGE's 2005 Outstanding Achievement Award!This eagerly anticipated second edition updates this time-proven classic:Chapters reordered for easier navigationThousands of updates and clarifications based on reader feedbackPlus three entirely new chapters: Web Services, Data Storage, and Documentation

The C# Programming Yellow Book


Rob Miles - 2010
    With jokes, puns, and a rigorous problem solving based approach. You can download all the code samples used in the book from here: http://www.robmiles.com/s/Yellow-Book...

Algorithms in C, Parts 1-4: Fundamentals, Data Structures, Sorting, Searching


Robert Sedgewick - 1997
    Many new algorithms are presented, and the explanations of each algorithm are much more detailed than in previous editions. A new text design and detailed, innovative figures, with accompanying commentary, greatly enhance the presentation. The third edition retains the successful blend of theory and practice that has made Sedgewick's work an invaluable resource for more than 250,000 programmers! Whether you are a student learning the algorithms for the first time or a professional interested in having up-to-date reference material, you will find a wealth of useful information in this book.

Game Engine Architecture


Jason Gregory - 2009
    The concepts and techniques described are the actual ones used by real game studios like Electronic Arts and Naughty Dog. The examples are often grounded in specific technologies, but the discussion extends way beyond any particular engine or API. The references and citations make it a great jumping off point for those who wish to dig deeper into any particular aspect of the game development process.Intended as the text for a college level series in game programming, this book can also be used by amateur software engineers, hobbyists, self-taught game programmers, and existing members of the game industry. Junior game engineers can use it to solidify their understanding of game technology and engine architecture. Even senior engineers who specialize in one particular field of game development can benefit from the bigger picture presented in these pages.

Learn Windows PowerShell 3 in a Month of Lunches


Don Jones - 2011
    Just set aside one hour a day—lunchtime would be perfect—for a month, and you'll be automating Windows tasks faster than you ever thought possible. You'll start with the basics—what is PowerShell and what can you do with it. Then, you'll move systematically through the techniques and features you'll use to make your job easier and your day shorter. This totally revised second edition covers new PowerShell 3 features designed for Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012.Purchase of the print book comes with an offer of a free PDF, ePub, and Kindle eBook from Manning. Also available is all code from the book.What's InsideLearn PowerShell from the beginning—no experience required! Covers PowerShell 3, Windows 8, and Windows Server 2012 Each lesson should take you one hour or lessAbout the TechnologyPowerShell is both a language and an administrative shell with which you can control and automate nearly every aspect of Windows. It accepts and executes commands immediately, and you can write scripts to manage most Windows servers like Exchange, IIS, and SharePoint.Experience with Windows administration is helpful. No programming experience is assumed.Table of ContentsBefore you begin Meet PowerShell Using the help system Running commands Working with providers The pipeline: connecting commands Adding commands Objects: data by another name The pipeline, deeper Formatting—and why it's done on the right Filtering and comparisons A practical interlude Remote control: one to one, and one to many Using Windows Management Instrumentation Multitasking with background jobs Working with many objects, one at a time Security alert! Variables: a place to store your stuff Input and output Sessions: remote control with less work You call this scripting? Improving your parameterized script Advanced remoting configuration Using regular expressions to parse text files Additional random tips, tricks, and techniques Using someone else's script Never the end PowerShell cheat sheet