Whether you've just finished working through Katherine Ulrich's Flash 5 for Windows and Macintosh, or have taken another route to Flash 5 competence, this book is aimed at you. Author Russell Chun is speaking to anyone who has "mastered the basics of tweening and [is] ready to move on to more complex tasks involving video, masking, dynamic sound control, or movie-clip collision detection."

Flash 5 Advanced for Windows and Macintosh is organized into five sections covering advanced animation, ActionScript, navigation and timelines, transforming graphics and sound, and information handling. Each chapter builds on what's gone before as the book deals with progressively more complex techniques, though that needn't stop you from dipping in further back if, for example, you're itching to know how to do clever stuff with sound.

The book pulls you in right from the start with strategies for building complex animations from simpler parts. The logical structure of the chapters encourages you to fast-forward if you feel you're ahead of the rest of the class. The numbered tasks (rarely comprising more than six steps), together with frequent tips, make it a simple matter to locate a technique, try it, then apply it to whatever you're working on.

Flash 5 Advanced for Windows and Macintosh isn't full of stunning animation. If you want to be impressed by the possibilities of Flash, you'd be better off with New Masters of Flash. But for a thorough and comprehensive tutorial that doubles as an accessible reference, it hits the right level for those ready to hone their Flash authoring skills. —Ken McMahon, Amazon.co.uk

In just 21 days readers will learn how to use the key features of the C# programming language—not only the commands, but how to create entire programs using them within a few simple chapters. This book is designed to teach C# from the ground up—each lesson is built to supplement the chapter before to provide a fully rounded understanding of the C# language. Sams Teach Yourself the C# Language in 21 Days is the only book on the market that takes C# out of the Microsoft Visual Studio and teaches it as a platform-independent language—letting readers program for Windows, FreeBSD, and Mac OS X. Additional coverage added from the first edition: more and better Windows Forms information, database access, XML, types, runs, appendix for Visual C++ .NET users, plus much more. This book also includes a CD-ROM full of third-party editor software and sample code, making it an easy-to-use, all-in-one package.

For some artists, learning to use a 3-D application is like a vertical climb up the face of an ice cliff: painful, difficult, and slow. 3ds max 4 is like that ice cliff, but Peachpit Press's 3ds max 4 Visual QuickStart Guide is like the climbing guide that everyone hopes to hire. Concise, experienced, and never overwhelming, this handbook is designed to lead an artist new to 3ds max 4 up the face of the cliff and help him or her plant a flag on the summit.

Fifteen chapters build a solid foundation for almost every aspect of 3ds max, starting with installation, interface navigation, and the basics of creating, selecting, and moving objects. Subsequent chapters include advanced modeling of objects, animation, working with lights and cameras, and using materials and maps. The final chapter, "Rendering," covers final output and how to add effects that are only visible in the final rendered frame, such as depth of field, motion blur, lens flares, glows, and so on.

The most remarkable thing about the book is how thorough each section is, even though such a wide range of deep topics are covered in under 500 pages. It is impossible to find a favorite chapter—they are all important, and all equally well written and illustrated. Some topics are simply not covered, which is a fine approach; there is more than enough material here to keep the new Max artist busy for some time.

This book is for beginners. There is virtually no information on the deeper tools like MAXScript or bones, or using inverse or forward kinematics, although a short section discusses using morph targets. However, it is ideal for someone brand-new to the program who needs to learn the basics as quickly as possible. Getting a handle on the basics of any application is often the most important step to learning to use it well, and this book—like others in the Visual QuickStart series—focuses on the basics. There is no companion CD-ROM, but a section containing color images offers inspiration.

3ds max 4 is a rich and mature application relied on by professionals all over the world, but understanding how it works and learning to use it can be daunting. 3ds max 4 Visual QuickStart Guide is designed to help any user new to Max climb the curve and conquer the application. —Mike Caputo

Written by Mike Meyers, the industry leader in A+ certification training, this authoritative reference offers complete coverage of all material on the A+ Core Hardware and Operating System Technologies exams. You'll find exam objectives at the beginning of each chapter, helpful exam tips, end-of-chapter practice questions, and photographs and illustrations. The bonus CD-ROM contains a testing engine with questions found only on the CD. This comprehensive guide not only helps you pass this challenging exam, but will also serve as an invaluable on-the-job reference.

The best A+ Certification guide in the field just got better.

Because, let's face it; in terms of walking you through the computer from the ground up, there wasn't anything better out there. Other A+ guides will fling random tables of processors and numbers at you as if you were a dartboard, hoping that maybe a couple of facts will stick; Michael Meyers's All-In-One A+ Certification Exam Guide starts by showing you the same sets of problems that faced the original designers of the PC. You have just designed a chip that can handle thousands of calculations per second. Now how do you talk to it? How do you get other components to communicate with it? How do you know when it's listening?

By the time you finished the previous editions, you knew all of the answers—and better than that, you understood why the hundreds of processor types were so hinky. You had been faced with the same hurdles that the designers had to face, and you'd had the solutions explained to you—all in a delightful, easy-to-digest format. And furthermore, you'd had that same treatment given to every part of the PC, from the monitor all the way down to the motherboard. If you got confused, a wealth of pictures would show you the difference between an RJ-45 and an RJ-11 jack.

The only problem was that it was a little out of date, but you could forgive it for that. Everything else was so amazingly strong, and the A+ exam itself tends to be a little behind the technology curve anyway—so it was a forgivable sin.

Sin no more, my friends, and read on—the latest edition of this book isn't quite cutting edge, but it deals with Windows 2000, 3-D video cards, surround sound speakers, and burnable CDs. You might not find all of these listed on the A+ exam, but there they are nonetheless.

Which is, come to think of it, another strength of this book: It goes beyond the normal testable topics and really wants you to know what problems you're likely to face as an actual technician in the real world. Meyers gives lots of hands-on advice, frankly admitting that this topic is still tested but he's not quite sure why, telling you that power supplies can be repaired (and should be) even if the test says otherwise, and generally giving copious examples from his tech experience to show "what can go wrong."

In fact, if a major criticism can be leveled at this book nowadays, it's that it might go a bit too in-depth at times; Meyers's zeal to show you everything he knows about computers makes it possible to get lost in the wealth of information and not focus on critically-tested subjects. But keep in mind that if you truly understand even 60 percent of this book, you'll pass the exam with flying colors—it—it's that good.

The book has ten questions at the end of every chapter that aren't modeled specifically after the A+ exam, but they are fairly tough questions nonetheless. There's also a CD that has the standard array of video clips and test questions, but it also has several tech utilities that Meyers himself recommends—a great value.

In short, this is simply one of the best test-prep books on the market for any exam, and it's also one of the few books that's completely honest: It is, when it comes down to it, an all-in-one guide. Buy this and you will pass. Highly recommended. —William Steinmetz

C# Primer Plus teaches the C# programming language and relevant parts of the .NET platform from the ground up, walking you through the basics of object-oriented programming, important programming techniques and problem solving while providing a thorough coverage of C#&#'s essential elements - such as classes, objects, data types, loops, branching statements, arrays, and namespaces.

In early chapters guided tours take you sightseeing to the main attractions of C# and provide a fast learning-path that enables you to quickly write simple C# programs. Your initial programming skills are then gradually expanded, through the many examples, case studies, illustrations, review questions and programming exercises, to include powerful concepts - like inheritance, polymorphism, interfaces and exception handling, along with C#&#'s most innovative features - such as properties, indexers, delegates and events.

With C# Primer Plus's dual emphasis on C# as well as fundamental programming techniques, this friendly tutorial will soon make you a proficient C# programmer building Windows applications on the .NET platform.

Any programmer creating web applications needs to understand database programming. Mastering C# Database Programming helps you attain this valuable skill with Microsoft's hot new object-oriented programming language, specifically designed for the .NET platform. With coverage of advanced topics not discussed in any other C# database programming titles, this book is your logical next step after Mastering Visual C# .NET or Visual C# .NET Programming. While we provide focused coverage of ADO and how it relates to C#, we also tackle other complex topics including transactions, Windows forms, Web Forms, XML, and Web Services. This book is ideal for veteran C# programmers who want to learn database programming, as well as Visual C++ and VB programmers who are learning C#.

The biggest appeal of this book is its companion software with three separate versions of Linux on CD-ROM—Red Hat Linux 4.1, Slackware Linux 3.1, and Caldera Open Linux Lite 1.1. You'll be able to try out all three versions without going through the trouble of downloading (though these are old versions of each flavor).

The text focuses on Red Hat Linux, though it's similar to the other two versions on the CD-ROM and you can easily transfer lessons to the others. The authors begin by explaining how to install Linux and how to configure it properly for your hardware environment. Then, they talk about key commands—file management and the like—before spilling the beans on how to run programs.

The information on how to get DOS and Windows programs to run under Linux with dosemu and other jury-rigs is notable. There's even a list of programs (popular and less so) that have been made to run under Linux; each entry comes complete with the e-mail address of a person who claims to have done it.

From there, the book moves on to explain X Windows, time-sharing servers, vi, Internet tools, and the mechanics of using Linux as an Internet server (though there are other whole books that cover the subject in more depth). Overall, this book distinguishes itself by showing you how to do unusual things with Linux. Get this book if you want to see your new operating system do some unusual tricks.

PHP is a powerful (and free) scripting language used to create dynamic Web sites and Web applications. With PHP, Web application developers can perform both simple and complex functions with a few lines of additional code in a standard HTML Web page. PHP is frequently being used to replace forms and functions formerly created by CGI scripts. PHP for the World Wide Web: Visual QuickStart Guide is geared for beginning and intermediate Web developers looking for an introductory guide. The task-based format gets users started with basic syntax, testing scripts, working with variables, creating Web applications, and more. Throughout the book, sample scripts and projects show the readers just what they need to know, and a companion Web site offers every script in this book available for downloading.

I am fonder of Macromedia Flash than just about any tool, and I feel much the same way about Peachpit's Visual QuickStart Guides; so, the idea of a Visual QuickStart Guide about Flash 5 makes me weak in the knees.

Well, maybe that's overstating it; but, in truth, Flash 5 for Windows & Macintosh: Visual QuickStart Guide combines a successful book style with a talented and experienced writer to deliver a nearly painless learning experience.

Over the course of 16 chapters, we have started at ground zero—understanding Flash basics, using the Flash editor, getting around the interface—and quickly worked our way up through simple graphics, complex graphics on one layer, complex graphics on multiple layers, using object libraries, and on through using different kinds of animation (motion tweening vs. shape tweening) and the animation of whole scenes.

Both this book and Flash 5 really start to shine in chapters 12 and up, when we begin learning how to use Flash 5 to create interactive actions. Adding sound is a big part of that, and this topic gets its own chapter (chapter 14, "Adding Sound to Movies"). Finally, chapter 16 is all about delivery and covers subjects like optimizing the Flash movie, creating the necessary HTML code, and exporting a Flash movie to other formats.

Flash 5 for Windows & Macintosh: Visual QuickStart Guide is a vital learning tool for anyone who wants to create content using by Flash 5. Honestly, no other title can get you up the learning curve more quickly. —Mike Caputo