Latest Pre-Reviews

I received three new Pearson imprint books yesterday that I've added to my reading list.

First is Windows System Programming, 3rd Ed by Johnson M. Hart, published by Addison-Wesley Professional. This book looks promising because it does not dwell on Windows GUI issues. Instead it focuses on core system services like the file system, memory, processes and threads, synchronization, communication, and security. The 3rd edition is updated to address Windows XP and Windows Server 2003, and it also covers 64 bit issues. I asked for this book to learn more about Windows internals and programming Windows systems. The author is said to take more of a "UNIX-like" approach to Windows programming, which should be a blessing for me.

Next is Cisco Router Firewall Security by Richard Deal, published by Cisco Press. I absolutely cannot wait to read this book, given the attention I've paid to IOS this month. This book is an exhaustive examination of the security features available in IOS 12.3. I am looking forward to trying out the firewall feature set, intrusion detection capabilities, and network-based application recognition, context-based access control, and other IOS goodies. Rather than discuss them at length in my next book, I intend to refer readers to this one.

Last we arrive at Inside Network Perimeter Security, by Stephen Northcutt, et al, published by Sams. I did not read the first edition of this book, but I am happy to see a second edition in an age where everyone says the "perimeter is dead," along with the IDS, and so on. I intend to take a close look at this book and the subjects it covers well, so as to avoid duplicating topics in my next book. Thumbing through the book it seems to be more discussion and less configuration syntax, which may make implementing its recommendations difficult. We'll see -- stay tuned for reviews at Amazon.com once I get to all three books.