Title: Cloud Computing Concepts, Technology & Architecture
Number of pages: 528
ISBN: 9780133387520
Released: May 2013
My opinion:
The book is well written, is vendor neutral, covers both business and IT aspects and contains many great diagrams. It also has a lot of useful references to external resources.
What I disliked, is that because of the vendor neutral approach some aspects are relatable enough (especially for people that don’t have a lot of working experience). I feel the book would have benefitted by providing more real-life examples of products or services.
The book is a good start for experienced people and will especially come in handy as a reference when getting involved in cloud computing projects. It will help understand vendor specific products and services better.
I would recommend people that are new to cloud computing (or that have very limited working experience) to first read a cloud essentials book like the one from Sybex before reading this book though.
To take a look at the book and its content, you can visit the book’s companion website: http://servicetechbooks.com/cloud
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Tags: Architecture, Book, Cloud, cloud computing, Concepts, ICT, Learning, review, study, Technologies, Thomas Erl
Introduction
For those who haven’t read my previous blog posts, here’s a short summary. About 1,5 – 2 years ago I decided that I wanted to know more about cloud computing and get certified as well. I used freely available resources to attain these certifications:
In short, my conclusion was that the quality of the freely available resources were not sufficient. ITpreneurs were kind enough to provide me with access to their e-learning course and Train Signal (now Pluralsight) provided me with their video training. Reviews for both can be found here:
Even though both resources are good, I personally prefer a book over eLearning and video training. As such I picked up a copy of “Cloud Essentials : CompTIA Authorized Courseware for Exam CLO-001”
Review
Number of pages: 268
ISBN: 978-1-118-40873-5
Released: June 2013
My opinion:
The book is well written and knows to provide a very good basis of cloud computing both technical and non-technical. Even though the number of pages is limited, the most important aspects are covered in my opinion, which should be enough to provide insight and to pass the Exin and Comptia cloud exams.
What I disliked are some of the questions at the end of the book, because they are sometimes a bit strange. But as far as I can remember, this was also the case in the official exams … so better get used to it if you are going to get certified.
All in all, this is a very good book to get started with cloud computing.
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Tags: Book, certification, certify, CLO-001, Cloud, cloud computing, Cloud Computing foundation, Cloud Essentials, CLOUDF, CompTIA, CompTIA Cloud Essentials, Exin, Exin Cloud Computing Foundation, foundation, ICT, Learning, PluralSight, review, study, sybex, train signal, trainsignal
Last week I completed PowerShell Deep Dives which got me excited again to read more about PowerShell. As such, I continued reading the next book on my reading list: Windows PowerShell Best Practices by Microsoft Scripting Guy Ed Wilson.
The book was released late January 2014 and is the most recent book about PowerShell that has been released to my knowledge. This means it includes PowerShell 4.0, Desired State Configuration DSC and references to Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2.
In my opinion the book was very well written and contains a good mix of theory, sample scripts and “notes from the field” from many PowerShell specialists. The sample scripts are available for download at Technet Script Center.
The best practices that are described in the book are very recognizable and I had already adopted many of them based on the many great blog posts by the community. In the book they are all bundled and well explained including examples. Where the book really shines though in my opinion is that it describes how PowerShell is used in real-life, how it relates to many other processes within a company and what you need to consider.
I think this book is a must-have for anyone working with PowerShell. For those starting with PowerShell, I recommend first reading the books “Learn Windows PowerShell In A Month Of Lunches” and “Learn PowerShell Toolmaking In A Month Of Lunches” and then read this book.
Notes:
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Tags: best practices, Book, Powershell, powershell best practices, review, windows powershell best practices
I’ve had the book PowerShell Deep Dives laying around since August 2013. I had read some parts of it because I follow many of the great PowerShell community members that contributed to it. But I hadn’t gotten to reading it completely yet until now.
The title of the book includes “deep dives” implies very deep technical content and I can assure you, this type of content is present in the book. some of the stuff I still need to wrap my head around to understand properly. On the other hand, other parts of the book are more simplistic which you might not expect from a deep dives book.
The book covers a very broad number of topics and technologies. What I liked is that the articles were written by professionals and community members that are specialized in or are very knowledgeable about this specific topic/technology.
As a result of having the broad number of topics and technologies, not all parts of the book might be relevant to you (especially as a deep dive). I found myself skimming over some parts later in the book since it is very unlikely it is or will become useful for me. This will differ from person to person though, so take a good look at the topics being covered in the table at the end of the article.
All in all it was a good read and I think I’ll use the book mainly as a reference for those times that I need the deep dive insights. The book can be ordered from by example Manning.com and all royalties go to charity: Save the Children
| Part 1 PowerShell administration |
| 1 Diagnosing and troubleshooting PowerShell remoting (Don Jones) |
| 2 CIM sessions (Richard Siddaway) |
| 3 Collecting and analyzing performance counter data (Arnaud Petitjean) |
| 4 TCP port communications with PowerShell (Boe Prox) |
| 5 Managing systems through a keyhole (Bartosz Bielawski) |
| 6 Using PowerShell to audit user logon events (Mike F. Robbins) |
| 7 Managing and administering a certification authority database with PowerShell (Cadims Podans) |
| 8 Using PowerShell to reduce Active Directory token bloat (Ashley McGlone) |
| Part 2 PowerShell scripting |
| 9 The 10 PowerShell scripting commandments (James O’Neill) |
| 10 Avoiding the pipeline (Jeff Wouters) |
| 11 A template for handling and reporting errors (Will Steele) |
| 12 Tips and tricks for creating complex or advanced HTML reports with PowerShell (Jonathan Medd) |
| 13 Using and “abusing” dynamic parameters (Bartosz Bielawski) |
| 14 PowerShell type formatting (Adam Driscoll) |
| 15 Scalable scripting for large data sets: pipeline and database techniques (Matthew Reynolds) |
| 16 Building your own WMI-based cmdlets (Richard Siddaway) |
| 17 Turning command-line tools into PowerShell tools (Jefferey Hicks) |
| Part 3 PowerShell for developers |
| 18 Using Source Control Software with PowerShell (Trevor Sullivan) |
| 19 Inline .NET code (Richard Siddaway) |
| 20 PowerShell and XML: better together (Josh Gavant) |
| 21 Adding automatic remoting to advanced functions and cmdlets (Karl Prosser) |
| 22 Taming software builds (and other complicated processes) with psake (Jim Cristopher) |
| Part 4 PowerShell platforms |
| 23 PowerShell and the SQL Server provider (Ben Miller) |
| 24 Creating flexible subscriptions in SSRS (Donabel Santos) |
| 25 Inventory database table statistics using PowerShell and SQL Server Management Objects (Robert C. Cain) |
| 26 WSUS and PowerShell (Boe Prox) |
| 27 Provisioning IIS web servers and sites with PowerShell (Jason Helmick) |
| 28 Active Directory Group Management application (Chris Bellee) |
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Tags: Book, Deep Dives, Powershell, PowerShell Deep Dives, review
Like many other people I’m continuously looking to improve. For me this includes, but is not limited to:
- My technical skills as an ICT professional.
- The balance between work and personal life.
- Health and happiness.
- Soft skills.
The last three categories are purposely very broad. Because of this, there are many books available that can help you improve. The books I’ve read or plan to read can be found on my website http://bjornhouben-web.sharepoint.com/Lists/Books. I hope it might inspire you to read some of them.
PS: Besides the books, there are also great online resources you might want to look into. I personally really like Seth Godin’s blog.
Should you know of any other great resources, please leave a comment.
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Tags: balance, Book, books, e-book, e-books, happiness, happy, ICT, life, personal development, personal life, professional, self improvement, skills, technical skills, work
The recorded HPO webinar ’Hoe bouw je een High Performance Organisatie’ is in Dutch and takes about 30 minutes. It will explain the definition of a High Performance Organization (HPO) that is being used and which factors are relevant for being/becoming an HPO. You can find the recording of the webinar here.
If you want to know more about High Performance Organizations, take a look at my previous blog posts regarding HPO. These are written in English and also contain links to other useful resources.
While browsing the site I also came across a nice Dutch article about profiles of Dutch High Performing Employees (HPE). This article describes two profiles that have been defined for High Performing Employees (HPE). One of the profiles is defined from a manager’s point of view and is appropriate for evaluating current employees and recruiting new employees. The other profile is defined from a colleagues point of view and can be used for development and coaching programs. For more information, read the article.
There’s also an English HPO Leadership toolbox app available at the Apple Store and at the Google Play Store. This includes a quick test to determine your current HPO scores.
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Tags: André A. de Waal, André de Waal, boek, Book, book event, Dutch, Event, Grohe, Grohe Netherlands, High Performance Employee, High Performance Organization, Hoe bouw je een High Performance Organisatie, HP, HP Defence, HPE, HPO, HPO Center, Maastricht School of Management, MSM, Nederlands, What Makes A High Performance Organization
Duncan Epping is offering his books vSphere Clustering Deepdive 4.0 and 5.0 for free, but only today and tomorrow.
For more info take a look at his great blog:
http://www.yellow-bricks.com/2013/05/28/free-kindle-copy-of-vsphere-5-0-clustering-deepdive/
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Tags: Book, Clustering, Duncan Epping, e-book, ebook, Free, ICT, virtualisation, virtualization, VMware, vSphere, vSphere Clustering Deepdive, vSphere Clustering Deepdive 4.0, vSphere Clustering Deepdive 5.0
For those who don’t know what a High Performance Organization is, please read my previous blog post because this post will only cover the event organized around the latest book from André A. de Waal called “What Makes A High Performance Organization”
The event was held at the Maastricht School of Management (MSM) and was very well organized. Food and drinks were available and all aspects regarding logistics (including parking) had been properly taken care of as well.
Read the rest of this entry »
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Tags: André A. de Waal, André de Waal, Book, book event, Event, Grohe, Grohe Netherlands, High Performance Organization, HP, HP Defence, HPO, HPO Center, Maastricht School of Management, MSM, What Makes A High Performance Organization
For those unfamiliar with High Performance Organizations (HPO), this is the definition of an HPO:
“A High Performance Organization is an organization that achieves financial and non-financial results that are exceedingly better than those of its peer group over a period of time of five years or more, by focusing in a disciplined way on that what really matters to the organization.”
For more information about the HPO Framework, you can read more on the HPO Center website.
For those who want to know even more about HPO, they can either:
- Order the book “What Makes A High Performance Organization“.
- Attend the book event “What Makes A High Performance Organization” that includes a signed copy of the book from the author André A. de Waal. For more information about the book event, check out this link.
I’ve already read “What Makes A High Performance Organization“. And even though I was already very familiar with the HPO framework (because of previous books from André A. de Waal), I really liked the fact that it was very practical and included many real life examples and experiences from companies all over the world including Microsoft, SABMiller, Svenska Handelsbanken, HP, Unilever, Umpqua Bank, Tata Steel and KLM Royal Dutch Airlines.
I look forward to the book event and hearing more about how other companies went about transforming their organizations to HPO. If you’re attending this book event as well, please leave a comment.
Also if you want to keep track of new developments regarding HPO, you can use the following resources:
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Tags: André A. de Waal, André de Waal, Book, book event, Event, High Performance Organization, HP, HPO, KLM, Microsoft, SABMiller, Svenska Handelsbanken, Tata Steel, Umpqua Bank, Unilever, What Makes A High Performance Organization
Some months ago I heard about the movie The Hunger Games (2012). The concept reminded me of Battle Royale (2000) that I liked very much as well.
When it was available in the movie theatres, many people I know told me they really liked the movie. This made me want to see it even more. I found out however that this movie was based on a book series and that this was only the first part of the trilogy. This was a bit disappointing since I personally do not like having to wait a long time to know the complete story.
So instead of watching the movie, I started reading the books and ended up reading all three books in less than a week. I really loved it because it provided a lot more depth than I initially expected and I was also able to really connect with the characters and feel for them.
Because I really loved the books, I could not help but watch the first movie, even if it meant having to wait a long time for the next one. I liked the movie, but in my opinion it lacked depth/background and should have been a lot darker, threatening/menacing. I hope this will be the case for the remaining movies:
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Tags: Book, Entertainment, Hunger Games, Movie, The Hunger Games
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