Cisco Networking Simplified 85
| Cisco Networking Simplified | |
| author | Paul Della Maggiora, Jim Doherty |
| pages | 268 |
| publisher | Cisco Press |
| rating | 6 |
| reviewer | Michael Bennett Cohn |
| ISBN | 1587200740 |
| summary | Networking terminology and concepts for novices. |
This book is clearly written for two types of people: executives from a non-technical background who get flustered when speaking to network engineers, and networking novices looking for a friendly introduction to the subject before they begin serious study for, say, the CCNA.
When I first opened Cisco Networking Simplified, I was a bit put off by the intensity with which I felt the authors and illustrator were trying to convince me just how down-to-earth they are. The organization of the book is such that it's so easy to flip through, the pithy explanations so easy to digest, that one might grow quickly suspicious that here is a book designed more to make the reader feel at ease than to actually teach her anything.
But one would be wrong. CNS is a good basic reference book. It's short because it sticks to the essentials. It's weirdly-inked illustrations do make the concepts clearer. And the friendly tone never gets smarmy. On the contrary, Maggiora and Doherty anticipate a newcomer's reaction to the material well enough to know when to be terse, and when to insert whimsical asides. The unofficial eighth (political) and ninth (technical religion) layers of the OSI model and the use of ISDN to mean It Still Does Nothing are fun tidbits, well-placed, and perhaps even useful as mnemonic devices. The paragraph explaining that "routers switch and switches route," is appropriately illustrated with two people scratching their heads. That the authors make room for "Algorhyme," Radia Perlman's poem describing the Spanning Tree Algorithm (which she also wrote), shows that they know the difference between cute and distracting, and cute and relevant.
There are some problems, though. For example, the discussion of classful addresses is outdated. The class A, B, and C system is presented as the solution to a problem caused by unanticipated Internet growth. That may have once been true, but now the time when the class system was itself perceived as the next wave of that problem has already come and gone (gone, because outside isolated or masqueraded networks, class addressing has been replaced with CIDR). An executive who reads this book and then asks his engineers whether the company has been assigned a class A, B, or C address isn't going to get a lot of respect. A more serious problem is the confusing definition of the term DCE. On page 209, it's "data circuit-terminating device." On page 210, it's "data communications equipment." The first definition is more popular according to a google search, but makes less sense (where does the "E" come from?). Perhaps both definitions are somehow valid, but in a book like this, it shouldn't be the reader's job to figure out which one. And ISDN gets two detailed pages with illustrations, while the more popular (in the U.S.) DSL gets little more than a paragraph.
Also, to call this book Cisco Networking Simplified is not really accurate. A better title might have been: Cisco Presents: Networking Simplified. Cisco has no special claim to, say, IP addressing, which is discussed in some detail. Of course, to write a basic networking book without discussing IP would be silly, and Cisco makes a lot of products that deal with IP addressing. But so do a lot of other companies.
In short, I recommend this book (three of five stars), but with caveats. Technically-minded people who already have some experience in the networking field will probably be put off by the coloring book look-and-feel (but then, it wasn't written for them). Novices who are reading this book as the first step on their way to certification may find that, ironically, it provides much more information on certain subjects (voice over IP, for example) than may be sought. It's hard to imagine anyone reading this book straight through of their own volition: it's a beginner's reference. If you're confused by a topic as it's dealt with in another networking book, you can be fairly sure that if CNS covers that topic, then it contains the simplest explanation of that topic that you're likely to find.
You can purchase Cisco Networking Simplified from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
Might be worth a read (Score:1)
back a few years ago when I was a complete noob, I read "Networking for Dummies". Pretty good read, and taught me all I needed to get me started. Maybe this is one I can recomend to my noob friends.
Re:Might be worth a read (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Might be worth a read (Score:2, Insightful)
Agreed. Fo rmyself, all I usually need is a push in the right direction. Once I get some understanding, google and man pages can usually get me where I want to go.
Sad, really (Score:1)
I almost never touch routers in the real world and I still passed the CCNA pretty easily.
Are you the kid who screwed the network up at ______ machine and tool last weekend?
If so, thanks. I made $600 in 2 hours straightening that all out!
Re:Might be worth a read (Score:2, Funny)
He immediately freaked out, thinking that he was missing out on some new dot-com buzzword language/app/whatever. Kind of funny.
Re:Might be worth a read (Score:1)
More titles (Score:5, Funny)
If you liked our "Cisco Networking Simplified" book, be sure to look for these other titles:
"Learn Brain Surgery in 21 Days"
"Quantum Mechanics in a Nutshell"
"String Theory for Dummies"
Re:keep patting yourself on the back (Score:3, Informative)
For those that characterize network management as the ability to type a few commands into a router, please find a more suitable calling. The industry is currently polluted with people that know just enough to be dangerous, and certifications like the CCNA have been tremendously devalued as a result.
When was it valued? (Score:1)
Re:When was it valued? (Score:2)
It actually was at first. But the availability of braindumps, and a lack of QA on Cisco's part made it easy to get one.
The CCNA actually entails a good deal of background knowledge. While I admit that it's only the ground floor, I'm curious to know how much of what people learn from their CCNA studies, is actually retained - or, if the only objective is to remember what might be on the test, and then forget most of it a week later.
Re:When was it valued? (Score:1)
Re:More titles (Score:1)
Quantum mechanics for beginners... (Score:1)
i asked a friend of mine who is actually doing his doctors thesis on QM, and he didn't think so highly of it; not cause it was a 'for beginners' book, but cause it overly complicated issues, and brought up subjects which were only confusing.
i took some comfort in that.
f64 : making rich excuses for being poor
Re:More titles (Score:2)
Chapter 10: Flax or Cotton-Poly Blend?
Does it deal with CISCO gear? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Does it deal with CISCO gear? (Score:1)
Nice cross-post... (Score:5, Interesting)
Glad you don't work for me (Score:3, Funny)
I see reuse and avoiding the common all-too-common hubris of wanting to reinvent the wheel.
I'd hire him over you.
Re:Glad you don't work for me (Score:1, Funny)
Cisco networking simplified, the Cisco way!! (Score:1, Funny)
Sample chapter from book (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Sample chapter from book (Score:1)
It looks like it was illustrated by The Cheat [homestarrunner.com].
Why not get Cisco training for free (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Why not get Cisco training for free (Score:1)
Re:Why not get Cisco training for free (Score:1)
Christmas present for my GradeSchoolers (Score:1)
DCE (Score:2, Informative)
Re:DCE (Score:2, Insightful)
Cisco had been doing this for years (Score:4, Informative)
"Understanding Data Communications (7th Edition) by Gilbert Held.
It's good at explaining a lot of things, right down to decoding packet headers for various things. If you don't need that kind of detail, it's still a great book for the uninitiated. fitting it into the real world. I've got a dog-eared second edition that I've loaned to a number of people through the years.
Cisco has been good at training materials for quite some time. I sat through every Cisco class offered they had in 1995. The training materials were very good.
Years of Male Oppression, of course! (Score:1)
Re:Female? (Score:2)
It's just a modern convention of writing. For hundreds of years if you were referring to a generic human you referred to this person as a "he". This started changing somewhere in the 90s when writers of just about every genre, and whether the author was male or female, began defaulting to "she" instead of "he" to mean "generic person".
Sort of like the Barbie doll of the 80s who exclaimed "I don't like math!" when you pulled her string, the predominating view in mode
Re:Female? (Score:2)
When you start writing books that use "she" as the generic, and you start putting out more books for kids featuring women as astronauts or scientists or mathematicians we will have the enourmous benefit of a society that does not value women primarily as mere Vicoria's Secret fashion victims.
That's right. What we really want is victoria's secret models that can configure our cisco routers and cook hot grits! Then you'd be cooking!
Re:Female? (Score:2)
Mandarin - "Tha"
Malay - Dia
Japanese - ka re till about 100 years ago when it got corrupted by English or some other language
Re:Female? (Score:1)
It is rather annoying, isn't it? Seeing 'she' in the context of O'Reilly guides and engineering texts always trips me up a bit; I begin to cringingly imagine the writer congratulating herself (and now I've done it too!) for the great blow she's struck for gender equity, or whatever.
But picking 'he' or 'she', and alternating in the name of political correctness, is infinitely better than the disgusting 'he or she'. Unfortunately, I'm not a big fan of your singular 'they' either, as it tends to cause confus
Re:Female? (Score:2)
Goes well with Hokkien too - where "ee" means about the same thing.
I've found this to be much more informative (Score:5, Funny)
Experts such as Charles Manson [routergod.com] explaining static routes. Don King [routergod.com] explaining IP access lists and Denise Richards [routergod.com] on the PIX Firewall. Those celebs really know their stuff.
Missed an opportunity (Score:1)
Wouldn't have mattered (Score:2)
heh
Re:Wouldn't have mattered (Score:2)
They seem to only have 9 copies to give away. I jumped on the same offer and 3 months later, got a postcard saying "Sorry, we ran out!"
So you're saying the offer was slashdotted?
Still Waiting. (Score:1)
$2 more at amazon + more reviews (Score:1)
For more reviews of this book and other information, check out my new site: VeryGeekyBooks.com [verygeekybooks.com].
Algorhyme (karma whoring) (Score:3, Informative)
If you need... (Score:3, Insightful)