Book Bytes
MyMac Magazine #64

PREFACE

As My Mac online magazine goes through a major transition during the next year, Book Bytes also will be changing. Instead of cranking out endless book reviews on computer topics each month, we will have a mixed bag.

Book Bytes is expanding to cover general interest titles, in addition to our usual diet of Macintosh, Internet, graphics, and technology subjects. I can’t predict how many of each we will publish, so stick around and enjoy the ride.

Please take this opportunity to request new subjects, authors, and publishers, and keep your suggestions pouring in. Thanks!

John Nemerovski
nemo@mymac.com

BOOK BYTES RATING SYSTEM:

MacMice Rating: 5 = AMAZING book, one of a kind, sensational

MacMice Rating: 4 = OUTSTANDING book through and through

MacMice Rating: 3 = GOOD book, worth every penny

MacMice Rating: 2 = OKAY, but nothing special

MacMice Rating: 1 = NOPE, forget it and read something else
Palm Organizers, Visual QuickStart Guide
by Jeff Carlson
http://www.necoffee.com
Peachpit Press
http://www.peachpit.com
ISBN 0-201-70063-8, 322 pages
$16.99 US, $25.50 Canada

A year and a half ago, Book Bytes reviewed the predecessor Visual QuickStart volume from the same author and publisher. They appreciated my comments enough to request a quote for this updated edition, including “I can’t wait to try some of the new tips and procedures in this terrific book.” True, true!

The Palm platform has expanded since February, 1999, and the 70 new pages reflect its many changes and improvements. Jeff Carlson is a high-profile advocate for Palm OS. The week this book arrived one of his many fine articles on the subject appeared in TidBITS http://www.tidbits.com, the distinguished online Mac and Internet publication.

Who should purchase Palm Organizers, Visual QuickStart Guide, and why? My Book Bytes bookshelf contains four competing titles, and I have several others out on loan to friends and colleagues. Quite simply, if you want to maximize the handheld computing experience with your Palm, Handspring Visor, or TRGPro (see page 8 of Palm Organizers, Visual QuickStart Guide for an explanation), this book has a wealth of information for a paltry price.

First you learn hardware, operating system, and HotSync basics, and soon you are comfy with the built-in productivity and personal info applications. Next, in Part Two, you are online. Carlson is at his very best in these middle chapters. Intermediate-level users will appreciate Part Three’s units on creativity, time-and- money management apps, and a few pages on goofing off with “Stress Relievers” and “Notable Diversions.”

Please PLEASE study the three appendices, covering troubleshooting and Internet Palm resources, plus the compulsory Graffiti references. (If you don’t know what Graffiti means, you really need this book!) My personal favorite feature of Palm Organizers, Visual QuickStart Guide is the photographs that appear just when I’m ready for a picture of what is being discussed and described. Thanks for all those photos, Jeff.

I could spend a few more hours singing the praises of this updated edition, but I’ll quit with a punch line. If you are not already a whiz with your Palm or Visor, or if you need to learn how to maximize and enhance the experience, you should buy and start using this HIGHLY RECOMMENDED book today.

MacMice Rating: 4

MP3 for Musicians: Promote Your Music Career Online
by John Hedtke

Home

and Sandy Bradley
Top Floor Publishing
http://www.topfloor.com
ISBN 0-9661-0322-2-X, 307 pages plus CD
$27.95 US

When was this title published? Let’s see: Copyright 2000. Wasn’t SoundJam MP, the dominant Macintosh MP3 workhorse application, alive and kicking last year and this year? I’m sorry to be so picky, but this well-crafted book leaves me feeling something important, and obvious, is missing.

Cool off, Nemo. MP3 for Musicians is really five things all at once: helpful guide for aspiring musicians (as promised), worthwhile primer on all sorts of ways to manage MP3 files (emphasis on Windows, yawn), enormous list of MP3 resources (including a few specific references to the Macintosh), Windows-only software (no comment), and over eleven hours of high-quality complimentary (mostly pop) songs in cross-platform MP3 format.

Author John Hedtke writes:

Additional information on the book can be had at the following addresses:

http://www.hedtke.com/mp3book2.htm

Everyone should buy copies of the CDs at Songs.com to expand their collection of great MP3 files.

There were far more submissions of music than we had room for on the CD. I wish we’d been able to include everyone’s music but there simply wasn’t room on a single CD. Selecting the tracks for the CD was very difficult as I kept having to choose between equally great songs.

Text and screenshots are well-presented, and Windozers who want to be top-dawgs in MP3-land will probably want to bump my rating up to a “4.” Being a hard core Mac guy, my sense of objectivity is somewhat off-kilter this time around, as Book Bytes rates MP3 for Musicians.

MacMice Rating: 2

Hedtke tells Book Bytes:

The first four chapters in the book address the goals of the independent musician. They describe how you can use the Web to create and solidify your identity as an independent musician or band. You’ll learn how to attract listeners, advertise appearances, develop a mailing list, and pitch your music to new listeners. The book does focus on Windows products by and large and will be of less use to the Mac user than the Windows user.
Poker for Dummies:
Your fun and easy guide to winning at poker
by Richard D. Harroch and Lou Krieger
Dummies Press
http://www.dummies.com
ISBN 0-7645-5232-5, 298 pages
$14.99 US, $22.99 CN, £13.99 UK

Fifteen bucks? I lost twice that amount last month in my friendly low-stakes poker game, by failing miserably at a new strategy: bluffing blindly to distract opponents from my really good hands (which never materialized); staying in the game longer than I should with weak hands; and leaving a game too early with potentially strong hands. Oh, well. I’m still in the $$$ (by a few dollars) since beginning two years ago.

In the fresh spirit of reviewing books I personally enjoy and use, instead of plowing through nearly everything that plops on my doorstep, Book Bytes plans to enter the infinitely deep waters of Dummies titles on consumer (non-techie) topics. Recommending Poker for Dummies is easy, because I learned enough from the tear-out card inside the front cover to make a purchase worthwhile.

Do you already play poker? If not, don’t be a dummy: take up something easy, like fishing or bowling. Being good at poker may requires more concentration than you (and I) are prepared to furnish. Having said that, armed with Poker for Dummies, my monthly opponents are now in mortal danger. I have learned the errors of my flaky strategies, and pledge to follow these authors’ advice with no exceptions.

If you play poker for money more than once a year you will write me a long, glowing letter thanking me for telling you about this outstanding book. Name your game, Buster: stud, hold-em, Omaha (my favorite); plus tournament, Internet, computer, and video poker. These authors have been there and won it.

I’ll give you one important hint. “Avoid bluffing players who are either experts or brain dead.” The style and content in this book are masterful. You won’t become an expert merely by reading Poker for Dummies. You will need to read and play, play and read, read and play some more. If this prospect excites you, get yourself to the bookstore, Chump, and plop fifteen smackers on the formica. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

MacMice Rating: 5

A Viking Voyage
by W. Hodding Carter
Ballantine Books
http://www.randomhouse.com/BB
ISBN 0-345-42003-9, 305 pages
$25.00 US, $35 CN

Book Bytes has a diverse range of comments on this unusual expeditionary tale. If I appear to be unnecessarily critical, please keep reading for eventual balance in my assessment.

A basic outline of the story:

An adventurous young man comes up with a screwball fantasy idea; he locates a sponsor, boat builder, and crew members; and they sail a Viking replica open boat across Arctic waters from Greenland to Canada.

Sounds like potential for a great story, right?

W. Hodding Carter has problems as a writer to mirror the countless setbacks he encounters as expedition leader. His uneven prose ranges from whiny and self-serving to poetic and evocative.

A greater difficulty is the composite portrait of the crew. The comparison is unfair, but in Jon Krakauer’s outstanding Into Thin Air, the people on the trek and tragic climb become real. Carter’s cohorts probably have plenty of individuality in person, but they remain outline characters from a literary perspective.

More than a modern Viking saga or a men-overcome-nature epic, A Viking Voyage turns out to be Carter’s quest for his own perennial sense of adventure. He is a lousy leader, but grows into the role. He yearns for his expanding nuclear family, but makes the same tearful points way too often. He bonds for life with his crew, but leaves us guessing how those bonds will evolve.

More complaints: not enough maps or photos. I became very frustrated with the inadequate single map, and the pictures of the boat and crewmen are too little too late. In the hands of a superior writer I might not have missed the pictures and maps, but I did.

The book succeeds in three ways:

• Carter pulls the project together against mammoth obstacles, and never claims or appears to be larger than life.

• His portrait of the North Atlantic people and scenery is richly heart-felt.

• Viking were human too,1000 years ago, and Carter gives us a realistically speculative guesstimate of what they experienced during their ocean crossings.

It took me nearly as long to complete A Viking Voyage as the voyagers required to sail their passage, which is not a good recommendation for Carter’s momentum as a writer. If you love stories about boats, or North Atlantic flora and fauna, or modern Vikings, or neurotic excursion leaders, then you can bump my rating up to “3.” If you like your yarns to be spun with a bit more skill, then you can read this book and pass it on to a more appreciative sea mate.

MacMice Rating: 3

 

Websites mentioned:
http://www.necoffee.com
http://www.peachpit.com
http://www.tidbits.com

Home

http://www.topfloor.com
http://www.hedtke.com/mp3book2.htm
http://www.dummies.com
http://www.randomhouse.com/BB