One Review and One Prereview

Amazon.com just published my five star review of Security Data Visualization by Greg Conti. From the review:

Security Data Visualization (SDV) is a great book. It's perfect for readers familiar with security who are looking to add new weapons to their defensive arsenals. Even offensive players will find something to like in SDV. The book is essentially an introduction to the field, but it is well-written, organized, and clear. I recommend all security analysts read SDV.

I give five star reviews to books that meet certain criteria. First, the book should change the way I look at a problem, or properly introduce me to thinking about a problem for which I have little or no frame of reference. Although I have been a security analyst for ten years, I have little visualization experience. Author Greg Conti spent just the right amount of time explaining the field, describing key terms (preattentive processing, occlusion, brushing) and displays (star plots, small multiples, TreeMaps). I loved the author's mention of Ben Shneiderman's visualization mantra: "overview first, zoom and filter, details on demand" (p 14).

I'd like to mention another great No Starch book called Linux Firewalls by my friend Mike Rash. Mike was kind enough to ask me to write the foreword. If you look at my quote on the front cover (click on the image) you might think "Wow, Bejtlich is creative." Here's the context for that quote, from the foreword:

I'd like to conclude these thoughts by speaking as a book reviewer and author. Between 2000 and mid-2007 I've read and reviewed nearly 250 technical books. I've also written several books, so I believe I can recognize a great book when I see it. "Linux Firewalls" is a great book. As a FreeBSD user, "Linux Firewalls" is good enough to make me consider using Linux in certain circumstances!

No Starch has several more great books on the way, including Absolute FreeBSD, 2nd Ed (on FreeBSD 7.x) and several others.