Database Processing: Fundamentals, Design, and Implementation, Ninth Edition Review

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(More customer reviews)This textbook is, without question, one of the WORST I've ever come across - and I've read many. Not only have I had a significant amount of education (I'm currently working on a second master's degree) but have also spent many years teaching others (including graduate level courses). Considering that this is the ninth edition, it's hard to understand why anyone would continue to use it as an "introductory" text. Even the headings found on Amazon reviews from the last edition clearly highlight just some of the numerous problems that remain in this obscenely overpriced book; these include statements such as:

*Miserable Book
*Avoid - do NOT use book as reference do NOT use in a class!
*Not for the faint of heart
*Author knows, the rest of us guess
*NOT a good book for beginners


There have been so many complaints in my own introductory database class, that our instructor is now actively seeking another text to use instead of this one.

So, what exactly is wrong with this book? Plenty! Examples:

1.Verbose to an extreme - rambling discussions regarding topics that are only remotely related to the topic being covered.
2.Examples are filled with mistakes or are just plain wrong. My copy is now filled with corrections and comments from my instructor to NOT use the examples provided.
3.Chapter "summaries" are, more often than not, two or more full pages of solid text - and these are just the "summaries." Neither the author nor the editors of this book seem cognizant of just what a summary is - ever heard of bullet points, guys?
4.One of the most basic, primary, characteristics of quality teaching is the ability to "teach a little and then apply it." Instead, Kroenke bombards the senses with an ENORMOUS number of concepts in every single chapter, there is simply so much, that it is not possible to assimilate everything that is covered. Kroenke even has the audacity to note, in the introduction of one chapter near the beginning of the book, that readers should read the chapter "several times" in order to understand the material! Sure, it is often important to re-read SOME things but not entire chapters! Regardless of how many times you do attempt to get through the material - much remains incomprehensible due to horribly imcomprehensible presentation of the material!
5.Diagrams and other graphic materials are spread all over each chapter, although usually on pages other than their explanation. Not only does this make things extremely difficult when trying to understand them but the very fact that one must read an extensive amount of text just to even begin understanding what the example provides, before trying to figure out the exact concept that the example is trying the demonstrate, defeats the entire purpose of graphic examples in the first place!

I've now resorted to buying other books in order to understand what we're covering in our class. That has, without question, been FAR more useful than wasting anymore time with this nightmare.

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Information Design Review

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(More customer reviews)Don't read this book with the wrong expectations. This isn't a book about how to do information design. This is a book about being an information designer: theories, ethics, political and cultural issues, etc. I agree, the visual design is less than eloquent: standard MIT Press "academic." But the writing is exciting, so long as you're not looking for a how-to book. In fact, it's one of the lessons of this book that, so far as information design goes, our understanding of ID is still evolving and an how-to ID book would be premature.

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Matlab for Neuroscientists: An Introduction to Scientific Computing in Matlab Review

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(More customer reviews)I had no previous background in programming or computer science, but based on the reviews I bought this book as an introduction to learning Matlab because it was more specific to the field I'm in. I am REALLY surprised at the reviews that say this book is for beginners. I agree with the previous review that says the book starts off easy to understand, and then it feels like it leaves you on your own to figure out a lot of things.
For example, I was trying to complete the first project on my own and using only the commands covered in the previous chapters. I had to ask for help from friends and despite me telling them "I don't think I'm supposed to use that command because they haven't explained it yet" they still gave me other ways to write certain functions that weren't covered. Since I couldn't figure out how to integrate some of the previous material, I wrote the project program with commands that weren't covered by the book up to that point. It was pretty unsatisfying and discouraging. Not the book's fault that my friends didn't use what was taught, but it does lack some guidance for the projects.
My biggest complaint is that I can't find sample programs for the projects! I've checked the companion website and tried to buy the answer manual online, but you have to prove that you're a professor in order to buy it. Available answers would really help someone like me (who has ZERO intuition for programming) get started on projects and find more efficient ways of writing programs. It's not the advanced math or methods described that make this text hard to get through, which some reviewers are attributing to the bad reviews.
There are lots of comments that accompany the examples, a color insert, and a really helpful appendix that quickly reviews some matrix algebra. This seems like a good book for someone in neuroscience or psychology who already has some background in Matlab. But if you're just starting out, especially without any background in programming, this book will likely discourage you. Also, I could see how this book would be good for a beginning course because you've got a professor to guide you through the text. However, I'd recommend David Rosenbaum's "Matlab for Behavioral Scientists" for a beginning text if you're teaching yourself. After reading that book, I've looked back at this book and can understand everything much better.


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A Vast Machine: Computer Models, Climate Data, and the Politics of Global Warming Review

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(More customer reviews)Understanding how we know about climate, and even what it means to know about climate and climate change, is essential if we are to have an informed debate. This is far and away the best book I have read on the infrastructure behind our knowledge of climate change, how that infrastructure developed, and how the infrastructure shapes our understanding.
The story begins in the 1600s as systematic collection of weather data began (at least in the modern period, other cultures such as the Chinese have older records and it would be interesting to unearth these, although the data normalization issues would be extreme). It picks up speed in the 19th C with global trade and then the telegraph. The more data collected, and the more data is exchanged, the more important it becomes to normalize data for comparison. Normalization requires some form of data model, a theory that makes the data meaningful. Indeed, this is Edwards point, all data about weather and climate only becomes meaningful in the context of a model (this is of course generally true).
Work accelerated during WW2 and then exploded in the 50s and 60s as computers became more available. The role played by John Von Neumann in this is fascinating, as is the nugget that his second wife Klara Von Neumann taught early weather scientists how to program (there is a whole hidden history of the role of woman in developing computer programming that needs to be written - or if you know of one please add it to the comments of this review or tweet it to me @StevenForth).
Edwards also introduces some useful concepts such as Data Friction and Computational Friction. I think my company can apply these in its own work, so for me this has been a very practical text.
Modern models of climate are complex and are growing more so. They have to be to integrate data from multiple sources. One of the main lines of evidence for climate change is that data from many different sources are converging to suggest that climate change is a real and accelerating phenomena. One can meaningfully ask if this convergence is an artifact of the models, although this appears unlikely given the diversity of the data and models. But Edwards shows that it is idiotic to claim that the data and the models can be meaningfully separated. This is true in all science and not just climate science. A theory is a model to normalize and integrate data and to uncover and make meaningful relations between disparate data. That these models are now expressed numerically in computations, rather than as differential equations or sentences in a human language or drawings is one of the major shifts of the information age. It will be interesting to dig deeper into the formal relations between these diffferent modeling languages.

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The science behind global warming, and its history: how scientistslearned to understand the atmosphere, to measure it, to trace its past, and to modelits future.

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Database Systems: Design, Implementation, and Management Review

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(More customer reviews)I'm a technical person but have very little DB experience and purchased the book because I had to for a college class. I feel the book was simply OK. Some points were made well others I had to read several times. Over all the explanations were not as concise as I would like but in all fairness DB concepts are hard to explain. The overall layout was good however I think there should have been more attention during the intro to familiarize the reader with DB's and the related concepts before delving in to the details of each phase of DB creation.
My only real gripe is that a new revision is published every year and the previous version of the $100 + dollar book becomes worthless. To save money I bought the previous version and found all the material I needed. However for the final exam the instructor of the online class gave us page numbers to use as reference so I was forced to buy the latest version which was the same book with a few new references...
If you are buying this book for reference or if you are buying this because you are taking a face to face class I recommend that you buy the previous version required by the instructor at a greatly reduced cost. You may be able to do this w/ an online class if the professor (or classmates) are flexible and willing to help reconcile the different page numbers.


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Database Systems: Design, Implementation, and Management, Eighth Edition, a market-leader for database texts, gives readers a solid foundation in practical database design and implementation. The book provides in-depth coverage of database design, demonstrating that the key to successful database implementation is in proper design of databases to fit within a larger strategic view of the data environment. Updates for the eighth edition include additional Unified Modeling Language coverage, expanded coverage of SQL Server functions, all-new business intelligence coverage, and added coverage of data security. With a strong hands-on component that includes real-world examples and exercises, this book will help students develop database design skills that have valuable and meaningful application in the real world.

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