Customer Reviews

Systems Engineering and Analysis (4th Edition)

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

 

 

Very much the 30,000 foot view of systems engineering. I picked this book up because I saw it referred to all over the place, and assumed that it was reasonably definitive. Sadly, it is not. What the book does do is give the reader a reasonably good high-level overview of systems engineering in general, and of some of the techniques involved in estimating the "ilities" of a given system design. However, the level of detail on any one subject area is very light, and the bias of the book is very much toward DoD-style systems engineering. A good book for systems engineering managers. System designers should also seek out Wymore's "Model-Based Systems Engineering" for a thorough understanding of requirements and design.

Blanchard and Fabrycky start with an excellent discussion of systems engineering (SE) history and proceed to cover program/project SE in a logical and orderly fashion. The material is well written, lacking the usual jargon and catch-words. The book could benefit from additional technical implementation details of effectiveness analysis, design concept development, and integration technique coverage. Among the alternates available, this is the preferred broad coverage of SE and well worth reading carefully.

One of the early original works to attempt to define Systems Engineering, it still represents one of the best overall introductions to the multiple faceted discipline of Systems Engineering and Analysis. It successfully covers the broad range of topics associated with this field. It is also a good introduction as it shows how Systems Engineering evolves over the various phases of system development from concept definition to final testing.

I took a course in school that used this book and I really enjoyed the book and what it taught me about systems engineering. The authors do a great job of walking the student through the systems engineering process, and ginving a general overview of the steps. The later chapters expand upon this overview to give the detail needed to actually carry out the process. The last part of the book expands upon the "-ilities" of systems engineering which are the authors partiucalr areas of interest. I think anyone interested in systems engineering should get this book, its a great resource. A few things I didn't like was the constant referencing of graphs and figures from previous chapters, it really inhibits my learing when I have to keep flipping back and forth to follow a train of thought. There are also a few chunks of the book that are very, very hard to follow the logical train of thought and require meticulious attention to the detail, and often require rereading. I'm hoping the authors with put out an updated and expanded edition soon, that compensates for these shortfalls.

we used this book for undergrad se classes i taught.
unfortunately there are not a lot of alternatives.
(we *also* used buede for another class and mandel for project management etc).

the authors know their stuff, unfortunately some of it got lost in translation. perhaps because a lot of the material got translated from govt publications.

this is more like a handbook than a textbook. for the handbook user just get sage's tome. for a textbook -- well this is least worst for an intro to SE. for supporting areas other books are better.

what is good is excellent. but what is bad is frustrating.
they tried to cover way too much in one book and got confused with SE and OR and management techniques and quality and a whole bunch of other stuff that is really tangential to SE.

and the material gets covered at uneven levels of detail so it is not a good handbook nor a good textbook just a good pile of notes on a lot of se related stuff.

previous editions had many errors and did not come with any answers to the problems, many of which were confusing as stated.

the first part of the book really introduces SE. The rest of the book is for review by someone who has specialised in the areas they cover.

The book would be much better if they concentrated on SE and left the other stuff to other books. i have not checked with the publisher for current availability, but previously there was no instructors guide and no answers to the questions. that is a big drawback for classroom use.

this would be best for an experienced person who wanted to review SE or get an introduction to a specialised topic relating to SE.

the dsmc/dau se handbook is (was?) free on the internet from various govt sites and does a great job of introducing SE. you should look at that resource before buying this book. indeed, unless you are using it in a class you might just want to borrow this from a library instead of buying it.

The book does a great job of giving the reader an overall sense of what goes into systems engineering. Although not detailed to the nth degree, it has enough info so that the concept is understood and when possible, linked with examples. A little wordy at times, but otherwise exceptional.

Great text, packed with information- very thorough coverage of the topic. I find skimming through it to be difficult because every sentence contains important information; I have to read most chapters twice to get everything out of them. A bit expensive though, you may want to consider getting an international version of the text- it's less than 1/3 the price and contains the very same information.

I hate when the author/publisher is so cheap that they recycle material and don't have decency to edit it.
In this book you will find sentences that don't make sense, cryptic questions referring to deleted material, and obvious mistakes in figures and illustrations. I bet that the size of this book will double if it was reviewed by a decent technical writer.
I have to lecture out of this book as an assignment. So, I'm doing a very rigorous reading/summarizing to create my presentations. At the moment I'm doing chapter 15 and so far it has been a mixed ride. Sometimes, I have to read the paragraph to make sure I'm getting the point. Most of the time it works but sometimes I'm left puzzled. Sometimes I felt like that some topics needed more depth and some had mundane details and repetitions.

Bottom line: this book needs to be edited properly. As it stands, it is not worth its price. I would say it is worth...uhmmm... 10-15 max.

Added to library for work to keep on top of SE work. Getting old and forgetful as I move into management.

I'm currently teaching graduate students and used this as a text book last semester. I suppose students have enjoyed this book very much. I appreciate the author and ...'s excellent work as well.