What do you think?
How Networks Work
The first edition of this lavishly illustrated book sold more than 100,000 copies. The new edition adds chapters on the Internet and the Web, e-mail, information about on-line services, and more. Full-color illustrations explain everything from peer-to-peer LANS and switched digital services.
208 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 1993
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
July 30, 2012
The first part of this book is very good, where it gives some historical information about early telephone and telegraph systems. Unfortunately, it goes downhill a bit after that. In particular, it doesn't even mention the 7-layer OSI model, which seems like quite a glaring omission!
I think this book suffers from the series format: there are some chapters where the diagrams don't really add anything to the description, so it would be better just to have text.
There are some technical errors, e.g. the book doesn't distinguish between RJ45 and 8P8C. Also, some chapters are so light that they're pointless. For instance, chapter 30 covers the World Wide Web, but it just offers an inadequate explanation of what websites are; if you've used the web then you know this already and if you haven't then you won't be able to visualise it just from this description. There's no deeper detail, e.g. a sample of HTML code, to tell you how it actually works, which is supposed to be the whole point of this book!
I think this book suffers from the series format: there are some chapters where the diagrams don't really add anything to the description, so it would be better just to have text.
There are some technical errors, e.g. the book doesn't distinguish between RJ45 and 8P8C. Also, some chapters are so light that they're pointless. For instance, chapter 30 covers the World Wide Web, but it just offers an inadequate explanation of what websites are; if you've used the web then you know this already and if you haven't then you won't be able to visualise it just from this description. There's no deeper detail, e.g. a sample of HTML code, to tell you how it actually works, which is supposed to be the whole point of this book!
December 8, 2014
This was laying around at the office, so I took it home and read it. I'm not strong on networking and I figured this would provide a decent overview.
It did, even though it's seven years old as of this writing, which is ancient in tech years. In fact, it was actually too broad. I wanted more depth and actual technical details than I got. But I do have a better idea now of how things generally work.
The format is each chapter leads off with some text, followed by diagrams to illustrate the concepts discussed. This works well for simpler ideas, but it breaks down a bit for more complex topics and leads to oversimplification.
All in all, not a waste of time, but I probably could have sought out something better.
It did, even though it's seven years old as of this writing, which is ancient in tech years. In fact, it was actually too broad. I wanted more depth and actual technical details than I got. But I do have a better idea now of how things generally work.
The format is each chapter leads off with some text, followed by diagrams to illustrate the concepts discussed. This works well for simpler ideas, but it breaks down a bit for more complex topics and leads to oversimplification.
All in all, not a waste of time, but I probably could have sought out something better.
October 16, 2011
Its good, but not in deeps, and I have to admit, its illustrated photos are very good.
June 22, 2014
Pretty good for the historical overview parts. Fairly short and shallow coverage of most topics. Real problem that it's 10 years out of date.
willing-to-remember-about
January 26, 20112005 version is at the library, I saw.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews