The Logic of Typed Feature Structures: With Applications to Unification Grammars, Logic Programs and Constraint Resolution (Cambridge Tracts in Theoretical Computer Science) Review

The Logic of Typed Feature Structures: With Applications to Unification Grammars, Logic Programs and Constraint Resolution (Cambridge Tracts in Theoretical Computer Science)
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An excellent introduction to the logic underlying typed feature structures which is also the logic underlying formal linguistic theories such as HPSG or LFG. This book is a bible for computational linguists!
And Bob Carpenter is a supah kool guy, too...

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This book addresses systems engineering tools and methods needed for building complex systems. Our systems have gotten much more complex, more inter-coupled than they were decades ago --think of the recent (Summer '03) East Coast power failure. Systems Engineering tools, techniques, and education must progress to address the new complexity. This is why Buede's book is invaluable. He has digested much of the current state of thinking regarding systems engineering practices and concepts, and made them available.
This book reflects where systems engineering is going. It is written for practicing systems engineers who deal with complex systems, and for students who have someone leading them through the subject. Persons who engineer complex systems will find this book valuable.

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Applied Regression Analysis and Generalized Linear Models Review

Applied Regression Analysis and Generalized Linear Models
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Now that I have had a few more classes in the subject area, I feel a bit more confident that this book should have an average rating, rather than higher. The explanations of the book are not bad, if you already have a thorough understanding of the topic and are using this is a reference. It does provide a quick overview of most of the major topics in the field and includes a full chapter on the treatment of statistical analysis using matrices and graphical vector visuals.
However, the organization is poor. Linear algebra, matrices and vectors should be introduced in the more accurate place of chapter 3,4 versus far later. Further, as a teaching tool, this book lacks practice problems to help the student through the learning process relative to other pieces that I've used. Further, each topic is addressed in the brief, which is good if you know the topic, but bad if it's the first time you're really looking at the work. The examples used are a bit discipline specific, that while not obscure, would make it somewhat difficult for newbies to the field to really obtain the type of practice and deep understanding that is required to go on to the next topic with confidence.
Higher rated texts should split up the topics into multiple books or provide a greater number of examples and problem sets for students to build their skill set. I have seen some that include an accompanying CD of data and practice examples, that can be of great assistance to students struggling to learn this discipline.

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Combining a modern, data-analytic perspective with a focus on applications in the social sciences, the Second Edition of Applied Regression Analysis and Generalized Linear Models provides in-depth coverage of regression analysis, generalized linear models, and closely related methods. Although the text is largely accessible to readers with a modest background in statistics and mathematics, author John Fox also presents more advanced material throughout the book. Key Updates to the Second Edition:

Provides greatly enhanced coverage of generalized linear models, with an emphasis on models for categorical and count data
Offers new chapters on missing data in regression models and on methods of model selection
Includes expanded treatment of robust regression, time-series regression, nonlinear regression, and nonparametric regression
Incorporates new examples using larger data sets
Includes an extensive Web site at http://www.sagepub.com/fox that presents appendixes, data sets used in the book and for data-analytic exercises, and the data-analytic exercises themselves

Intended Audience: This core text will be a valuable resource for graduate students and researchers in the social sciences (particularly sociology, political science, and psychology) and other disciplines that employ linear and related models for data analysis.




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An Introduction to Database Systems/E-book (7th Edition) Review

An Introduction to Database Systems/E-book (7th Edition)
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If you are into DB theory, and you want to gain a strong understanding of it, this is one of the best avenues to get you there. There's not one single thing about this book that isn't totally great. Everything, everything about it is first rate.

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The Handbook of Marketing Research: Uses, Misuses, and Future Advances Review

The Handbook of Marketing Research: Uses, Misuses, and Future Advances
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This book offers a comprenesive overview of the marketing research discipline. A must read for:
- Anyone who is new to marketing research or deals with research data and research suppliers
- Anyone who wants to become a trusted adviser offering insights your clients can act on
- Anyone who wants to understand how to design effective marketing research studies based on the latest research methodologies and techniques
- Anyone who wants to structure and organize their marketing research departments into powerful change agents
- Anyone who teaches or studies strategic or tactical marketing research

This book does a great job of balancing and bringing together the latest accademic thinking in terms of design, survey methodology, analysis and business application. It offers examples of what any researchers should think of when designing a research study, what the tools are available to analyze the data and how to dissimenate research findings companies can act on. As opposed to some of the other marketing research books this book goes beyond simply explaining the mathematical underpinnings of design, sampling, research techniques and analysis but offers real world applications. It discusses a wide array of topics from ad testing, customer satisfaction, brand measurement to marketing mix optimization.
To keep up with the advances in marketing research such as the use of the Internet to collect and mine data, globalization, the evolution of decision support tools, the organization of the marketing research department and the application of ever more powerful regression techniques this book offers the latest and greatest thinking. In my role as a professional marketing researcher of a fortune 500 company I have applied many of the concepts in this book to guide research suppliers and strenghten my role as a trusted adviser.


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The Handbook of Marketing Research: Uses, Misuses, and Future Advances comprehensively explores the approaches for delivering market insights for fact-based decision making in a market-oriented firm. Divided into four parts, the Handbook addresses (1) the different nuances of delivering insights; (2) quantitative, qualitative, and online data gathering techniques; (3) basic and advanced data analysis methods; and (4) the substantial marketing issues that clients are interested in resolving through marketing research.

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The Volatility Surface: A Practitioner's Guide (Wiley Finance) Review

The Volatility Surface: A Practitioner's Guide (Wiley Finance)
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The Volatility Surface is an-ultra modern account of derivatives pricing and hedging. Indeed of the fifty-two bibliographical references a mere twenty were written before 1999. The book makes the case for option pricing models which incorporate randomness into stock price volatility (stochastic volatility) and jumps into stock price movements. By themselves these are not new models, but a coherent understanding of their relationship to the dynamics of the volatility surface and to derivatives valuation is new, and Gatheral does an admirable job of presenting a great deal of the most modern work in this area - including some of his own - in one place.
The topic is necessarily mathematical in nature and Gatheral spares the reader nothing of the full-on mathematical treatment; but he nevertheless manages to distill the essence of the most important mathematics into easily accessible, intuitive explanations that supplement the readers understanding. Thus this book should have broad appeal to practitioners of all levels, especially traders and those familiar with the basics of derivatives valuation. Gatheral succeeds in this vein so well, I believe, because he is a first-rate quant and a a long-time senior quant at Merril Lynch.
The book gives an excellent treatment of the relationship between stock price dynamics which actually explain option prices observed in the market and the necessity of studying the volatility surface to have a complete understanding of derivatives valuation. He does a great job of justifying the key models he reviews and then studies the implications for derivatives valuation.
As an expert practitioner, his choices reflect what is really out there in the market, so readers should pay attention. As a first rate quant, his mathematics and his grasp of the literature on option pricing will expose readers to the best of the best.
Of particular note is his last chapter on volatility instruments, in particular variance swaps, volatility swaps and options on volatility. This is an important market that was just getting started in the late 1990s but has burgeoned into one of the most active and important markets in equity derivatives. This chapter is a must for anyone interested in understanding the subtelties involved in understanding variance swap and volatility swap valuation, and is alone worth the cover price.


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Pottery Basics: Everything You Need to Know to Start Making Beautiful Ceramics Review

Pottery Basics: Everything You Need to Know to Start Making Beautiful Ceramics
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I can't recommend this book enough. It is the perfect book for beginners or someone (as in my case) who has let their skills become a little rusty. It has been years since I worked with clay. This book has it all and then some. It contains clear instructions accompanied by excellent pictures that will inspire you to try some of their great projects.

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100 SOA Questions: Asked and Answered Review

100 SOA Questions: Asked and Answered
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A couple of years ago, I jumped into the SOA world, as my client was sticking their toes into SOA. At the time I was completely new to SOA, and did a fair amount of reading and speaking with other practitioners. The contract ended up being cancelled after several months for unrelated reasons. My next client engagement was completely unrelated to SOA, so I ceased my activities in that area.
Fast forward to today - I find myself back with a client pursuing several services initiatives in their organization. "100 SOA Questions Asked and Answered" was the perfect "Re-introduction" to the topic. I wasn't looking for a book that spent dozens of pages introducing what SOA is and what its advantages are - I just wanted something that would allow me to re-familiarize myself with the issues involved.
The book is very straightforward and well-organized. It is clear that authors Holley and Arsanjani have great experience with multiple SOA implementations. I would recommend this book to anyone beginning an SOA implementation - it will quickly acquaint you with the lessons learned and issues to consider.

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Enterprise Business Architecture: The Formal Link between Strategy and Results Review

Enterprise Business Architecture: The Formal Link between Strategy and Results
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In this book the authors have attempted to provide a methodology for developing an Enterprise Business Architecture (EBA). But the book falls short in its ignorance of industry standard modeling notations such as BPMN and UML--thus making the methodology difficult to apply with any of today's modeling tools--and sites very simplistic examples.
The one pearl contained in this book is the focus on business objects (informational and tangible) being exchanged between business processes as a way of understanding dependencies in the architecture.
In my opinion, the content lacks the breadth and depth I would expect to see in a book describing something as significant as a methodology for developing a Business Architecture.

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A critical part of any company's successful strategic planning is the creation of an Enterprise Business Architecture (EBA) with its formal linkages. Strategic research and analysis firms have recognized the importance of an integrated enterprise architecture and they have frequently reported on its increasing value to successful companies. Enterprise Business Architecture: The Formal Link between Strategy and Results explains the approach needed for the development of a formal but pragmatic EBA.Part I introduces EBA concepts and terms, and emphasizes the importance of architectures in reaching business goals. This section challenges you to research and analyze the architectural needs of your business. This analysis enables you to understand both your chosen architecture and the behaviors and discipline needed to maximize its potential. Part II illustrates a high-level approach for building the EBA. It provides you with a richly illustrated case study and guidance for relating the value of this approach to your enterprise. Part III provides suggestions derived from successful engagements that implemented the formal EBA approach with integrated enterprise architectures. This section demonstrates that success does not result from a one-time project, but instead emerges from a new EBA-based corporate behavior.

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Introduction to Probability Models, Ninth Edition Review

Introduction to Probability Models, Ninth Edition
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The first four chapters alone (intro, random variables, conditonal probability, markov chains) are worth the price of the book. The author packs each chapter with very interesting examples and problems. The one I found most interesting was his probabilistic analysis of the 2-SAT and SAT problems of computer science. Here he gives an informal math argument as to why 2-SAT is polynomial time decidable and why SAT should be intractable.
On the other hand, I think someone relatively new to probability theory may find his neat problems and examples a bit too much with a first reading. The book is in its seventh edition, and I think Ross has taken advantage of this by providing newer insights and more interesting problems, but in doing so it may overwhelm the novice.
If you are learning probability for the first or second time, I recommend you supplement this book with Roussas "A Course in Mathematical Statistics". Despite its title, the first 9 chapters give a calculus-based intro to probability. And the rest of the book is *excellent* for a calculus-based intro to statistics.

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Statistical Multisource-Multitarget Information Fusion Review

Statistical Multisource-Multitarget Information Fusion
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Mahler's book is an outstanding effort to lay down a unified framework for data and information fusion. Admittedly it is a difficult book, very comprehensive, probably too applied for mathematicians and too mathematical for engineers. But it contains a very well thought out and technical vision of what it takes to process vast amounts of data, especially data of disparate types, and extract useful and correct information. Written by someone who has worked in the field for many years, I believe this book is a guide to the future of data and information fusion.

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The Marketing Accountability Imperative: Driving Superior Returns on Marketing Investments Review

The Marketing Accountability Imperative: Driving Superior Returns on Marketing Investments
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I enjoyed the book. It took key elements of any business plan and explored how each elemant needs to work and be accountable for results. It generated a ton of good thoughts and was written in an easy to read style. I recomend this for any marketer or busness executive.

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Ship Models From Kits: Basic and Advanced Techniques for Small Scales Review

Ship Models From Kits: Basic and Advanced Techniques for Small Scales
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Ship models from Kits By David Griffith is a great resource for the begining as well as expert ship modeler. David reviews techniques for both injection molded plastic and resin models. He does a particularly good job showing how to handle and install photo etch partys even the "fiddly" bits as he puts it. He also demonstrates how to make rigging to scale using fly fishing filament and scale anchor "chain" from plaited thin metal wire.
He reviews the strengths and weaknesses of most major resin, injection molded plastic ship model suppliers as well as well as after market PE and resin part suppliers. The photographs in this book are virtually all in color and stunning. All in all, certainly the best plastic and resin ship model "how to" book in a long time. Highly recommended

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The world of model kits has undergone a revolution, with new techniques in injection molding vastly improving the scale accuracy and surface detail of the standard plastic kit and new material producing top-quality resin models. In ship modeling, this has resulted in a new form of the hobby midway between traditional build-from-the-box simplicity and the time-consuming demands of fabricating everything from scratch. This new manual comprehensively demonstrates these new innovative techniques. Designed for modelers wishing to achieve the best results from their ship kits in the 1:700 to 1:350 range of scales, it uses 200 step-by-step color photographs to take the reader through the building of two models, one in plastic and one in resin, from basic construction, fittings, and detailing, to painting, finishing, and display. This book is an essential guide to a contemporary approach to model making.

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Understanding Credit Derivatives and Related Instruments (Academic Press Advanced Finance) Review

Understanding Credit Derivatives and Related Instruments (Academic Press Advanced Finance)
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I am a financial engineering graduate student with professional experience in corporate and structured finance. I first read this book before I knew anything about the subject and found it very accessible. This is not a technical introduction to credit derivatives, nor will it be particularly useful to quants (other than perhaps as a quick reference to a couple concepts), however this book does an admirable job of explaining and linking the world of CD practice with academic theory. For anyone who doesn't have a derivatives background, but is able to understand mid-level mathematical concepts, this book is very good. It is clear, concise and is a great place to start for an introduction to CD that is not overly pedantic and offers motivation for further inquiry into the area.
If you are looking for a more technical and comprehensive book on credit modeling (which forms the basis of most CD valuation) then I recommend Jeff Bohn's "Active Credit Portfolio Management in Practice" which has in depth discussions about many of the issues in Bonfim's book as well as much more.
Nonetheless, having read and purchased many books on CD this one is one of the best due to its brevity, concision and practical robustness.

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Standard & Poor's Fundamentals of Corporate Credit Analysis Review

Standard and Poor's Fundamentals of Corporate Credit Analysis
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I had the pleasure of working with one of the authors 15 years ago. But don't let that sway you. I truly appreciate the scope and effort put into this book. We will use it as an outline for how our analysts should approach analyzing a credit. Chapter 3 alone is worth the price of admission as the authors list the elusive "qualitative" factors that go into a credit rating, beyond what the ratios tell you it should be. While the book barely scratches the surface of certain analytical methods (the Merton Model got 1/2 a page), and it is written more for the layman or student, I still learned many things. And I've been in the business 20+ years. The prior reviewer, and many others will say they wished they wrote this book. I will too. I even briefly started my own version recently. But I first turned to S&P's ratings criteria as an outline. As such, the right people wrote this book. The authors fully used the vast resources and data mining of S&P. This certainly feels like a team effort. The telecom analyst wrote a piece on the rapid decline of telecom credits in 2000-2002, and other professionals added real life examples. The book organizes itself in the top down approach to analysis. It starts with sovereign risk, then moves to industry, then company business/competitive risk. It then highlights the ratios to look for, and also gives data on seniority and recovery values for specific levels of debt. It then uses these tools to analyze a fictional company. It ends with case studies that cover M&A, sovereign risk and other topical reviews that act as a real life summary to what you just learned. Highly recommended. Well done.

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An authoritative, in-depth guide to all aspects of credit analysis from the experts at Standard & Poor's

Credit analysis--gauging an issuer's ability to repay interest and principal on a bond issue--plays an essential role in determining how bond issues are rated and priced. Fundamentals of Corporate Credit Analysis provides both analysts and investors with the practical, up-to-date information they need, backed by Standard & Poor's research, data, and experience, to properly assess the credit risk of virtually any entity.

Whether used as a handy all-in-one guide or as a comprehensive training tool, it will give anyone the knowledge and tools needed to dig beneath standard ratings and determine an organization's true creditworthiness.


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Bill Horan's Military Modelling Masterclass Review

Bill Horan's Military Modelling Masterclass
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It's difficult to quantify Bill Horan's contribution to historical figure modelling. His sculpting and painting set a standard by which other work was judged for at least a decade and this title continues to be a source of inspiration for me six years on. The author's steady improvement over the years (including his early, modest, efforts) is documented, which I found fascinating and should provide a spur to improvement for any dedicated modeller.
This is well written in the author's distinctive style and extensively illustrated with colour photos including a number of step-by-step sequences. In addition to many of Bill's incredible 54mm single figures, vignettes and dioramas there are numerous pictures of the work of other noted miniaturists.
Beginning with a chapter on painting a single stock figure (David Grieve's 100mm Sergeant, 79th Highlanders) the progressive photos clearly show the author's enamel-painting style, complementing the detailed written account and 15 pages showing the work of other artists round off the chapter. Chapter two covers conversion and scratchbuilding, beginning with one of the author's trademark 54mm sculpts (a Confederate infantryman in this case) built from a commercial head, resin parts, wire and putty. The text covers materials, tools and posing before detailing the techniques used. The finished figure (shown approximately four times lifesize in one view) highlights the extremely high finish and just how much additional detail can be achieved at the painting stage. 25 pages of single figures by the author and others finish off the chapter. Chapter three is on vignettes, with a detailed look at the creation of the author's "Fight For The Flag" with 13 pages of additional photos of vignettes rounding out the chapter. Chapter four covers perhaps the most impressive side of figure modelling, dioramas, with an in-depth look at the creation of the noted "Ghosts Of Chillianwallah" and also includes photos of the author's legendary "Last Stand At Gandamak" from 1988. The final chapter is on mounted figures and dioramas with "A Cloud Of Red", an exquisite three-horse vignette depicting the charge of the 16th Lancers at Aliwal, covered in detail. Eight pages of photos of top-notch mounted subjects complete the book. Although only touched on lightly in the text, careful study of the groundwork on the author's pieces will benefit the reader in this under-appreciated area of the hobby.
For anyone interested in figure modelling, an absolute must-have from an acknowledged master.

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Regional and Urban GIS: A Decision Support Approach Review

Regional and Urban GIS: A Decision Support Approach
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I bought this book and read it on Christmas, which could save my eyesight from sitting in front of harmful machine---computer...
This book is a very nice GIS book from urban perspective. It may be not easy to understand from a new GIS user. Instead, this is very nice reference book for decision makers who are using GIS technologies and techniques.
I strongly recommend this book.

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