Customer Reviews

Internet Book

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Comer's book presents a highly technical topic in a readable and easily understood format--almost like prose! I started to read the book in small parts in order to understand only particular chapters, but it is so readable that I read it from the first chapter to the last. In fact, I read over 100 pages in one sitting--something that normally I can do with someone like John Gresham or Tom Clancy, not an author of computer networking. This is a great book for anyone who wants to understand data networking and the Internet. It covered the entire subject without using words like ethernet, token ring or frame-relay

Douglas Comer has an amazing ability to cut through the heavy fog that surrounds Internet technology. Many well trained and accomplished academics are terrible writers. I have wasted much money buying from these authors. I have read Douglas Comer's many books from detailed implentation of TCP/IP to overview of computer networks and internet. I am not surprised by the excellent quality of this book. I will buy any book anytime that Dr. Comer writes. I think this all the result of his pioneering reseach and great desire to teach.

Well, not a bad book. But it deals with pretty elementary concepts and spends too much time in history (though some people may like it, I was annoyed). Mostly, there are too many words than information.If you are completely new to internet and wan to make some background for a serious start [or if you like reading for the sake of reading:-)] this may suit you.

Based on the glowing praise of previous editions of this book and reviews of this book I purchased. I am very new to networking and was very excited to purchase based on all the outstanding reviews.

Unfortunately I am disappointed overall. While the author does have a very good way of presenting the information and provides tremendous analogies to illustrate concepts, there really is no "meat" to the book. I found myself excited to grasp the basic idea of each chapter only to be disappointed that the author does not take it further. It really does not teach you how things work. It is too much of an overview. I would also agree with other reviews that there is a lot of useless historical info that is very interesting but is really just filler.

At $50+, this book really does not deliver on the expectation. The authors writing style and examples are excellent but the ultimate information content is lacking. At the end I found myself with far more questions than I had before reading it. Unless you are extraordinarily new to computers I think readers will find this to be a disappointment.

Although initially frightened by all the acronyms surrounding the Internet and its language, I was put as ease while reading Comer's book. I found that it was written for a person like myself. I have some amount of knowledge of how the Internet and other systems work, but I am a typical user of computer applications and am happy when my machine gives me the information I ask of it. Required reading in a college class is often the only reading I've done for the past seven years. I used to be a reader who read for many reasons. Some days I wanted to be transported away into a science fiction novel. Other days I wanted to live the life of another while reading a fascinating piece of fiction. Sometimes, due to necessity, I read a non-fiction work in order to educate myself just in case I need to know something. Upon picking up Comer's book, I felt that I didn't really need to know much about the Internet. However, after reading, I find that my curiosity was aroused. In fact, Comer dedicates the book to "Everyone Who Is Curious." I became one of these people. Comer's writing was a highlight of the book. The complex became simple in regards to understanding the inner-workings of different systems. I found this book to be a perfect companion for the class as it helped me understand a number of concepts in theories that I simply could not understand no matter how many people explained it in the weekly postings. While reading reviews about the book from an Internet book supply company, many critics are not bashful in their feeling that Comer spent too much time relating the history of the Internet to the reader. I wholeheartedly disagree with these critics and found that the history of the Internet had to be explained in order to fully understand why certain features of the Internet and its accompanying systems are in existence today. The book seemed to be quite simply a recap of all that has led up to today's modern systems. LANs, WANs, and other acronyms had to be explained for the Internet novice. Comer did an excellent job of introducing these areas and their relation to where we are today in regards to technology. Others may have wanted him to be somewhat controversial in his interpretations of where the Internet will lead us. For those people, I would suggest another text. For a person like myself, this text was near perfection. There is only major problem that I did have with Comer's book. With my limited knowledge does come some understanding of today's Internet markets. I believe that if Comer would have mentioned a few prominent companies while explaining certain aspects of the Internet, the book may have been easier to read. I found myself writing questions on the margins such as, "Is this what Netscape is?" His only mentioning of some real world company was of Purdue University. It is only as I write my response to this question that I read that he is a professor at that University. I'm not sure why companies would refuse to give permission for Comer to name them while explaining certain areas. One would think that free publicity is always welcome. I'm not sure if Comer is well known throughout the Internet world. Perhaps he is some type of radical that companies fear. Either way, it would have been easier to understand some concepts if the reader could relate them to aspects in the real world.

This book was required reading for an MBA class. The simplicity of the technical explanations, as well as the simple diagrams make it an easy book to understand. There are a few places where I wish the author would delve a bit deeper, on the topic of security as one example. Overall though, a good book for those who need a basic understanding of internet technology.

The author is one of the "founding fathers" of the internet, he does explain basic concepts clearly. Unfortunately, he doesn't have any sense of humor. The book reminded me a conversation between an old-fashioned professor and his grandkids. Also, some material is outdated in 2005, (e.g. there is a lot of pages devoted to the bulletin board system, and no mention of instant messaging.)

I needed this book for school, and wow, this book is just useless! So basic knowledge! However, I needed the book regardless, and the book was exactly as described. Saved me hundreds from buying the book new from the school!

If you're like me, one of those 'dummie' PC users that has never been able to speak the language of the MIS people, this author does a great job of putting stuff in a language you can understand. Mysterious and intimidating acronyms like LAN and ASKII suddenly seem so simple. Why is this kind of person, who can translate between the language of MIS people and the rest of us, so hard to come by? I hope this author writes a whole lot more stuff for "the rest of us" who'd really like to "get it", but can't find anyone "bi-lingual". I picked up this book in hopes of gleaning understanding of the internet, but ended up getting much more out of it. By going back to the basics, and assuming no computer literacy, this author filled in a lot of holes in my understanding. Granted there are a lot more holes to fill, but it's refreshing to know that at least one person has figured out how to bridge the language gap

This is a great book that provides answers to how the internet works. It gives excellent metaphors to help even the most inexperienced reader understand the concepts in the book. I purchased this book to keep in my library. Good material.