From: danny@cs.su.oz.au (Danny Yee) Date: Tue, 20 Jun 1995 22:36:12 +1000 Subject: Book Review - Internetworking with TCP/IP, Volume 1 title: Internetworking with TCP/IP, Volume 1 : Principals, Protocols, and Architecture by: Douglas E. Comer publisher: Prentice Hall 1995 subjects: computing, networking other: 613 pages, 3rd edition, exercises, bibliography, index title: TCP/IP Illustrated, Volume 2 : The Implementation by: Gary R. Wright + W. Richard Stevens publisher: Addison-Wesley 1995 subjects: computing, networking other: 1174 pages, exercises, solutions, bibliography, index A new edition of Comer's classic introduction to TCP/IP is most welcome. The third edition is -- I am glad to see -- basically the same as the second, with some additional material and minor updating. The new material includes discussion of supernetting and CIDR, DHCP, MIME and SNMPv2, as well as entirely new chapters on TCP/IP over ATM, firewalls and security, and IPng/IPv6. Given the continuity, it's probably not worth updating from the second edition unless you are particularly interested in these topics. For many years Comer's book was *the* introduction to TCP/IP. Now there some choice, with the appearance of Stevens' _TCP/IP Illustrated, Volume 1_. While my personal preference is for the updated Comer book, with its slightly more abstract approach, the choice between the two is really a matter of taste, and many will prefer the more concrete Stevens. -- When it comes to TCP/IP implementations, however, I think the second volume of _TCP/IP Illustrated_ has a definite edge on the second volume of _Internetworking with TCP/IP_. For one thing, it describes a real implementation -- the 4.4BSD-Lite (Net 3) code -- rather than a "toy" one, and it covers it in far greater detail. While Comer and Stevens included chapters on SNMP clients and servers, and on implementation of the RIP and OSPF routing algorithms, Wright and Stevens restrict themselves to TCP/IP "proper", providing separate chapters on topics such as SLIP and ethernet drivers, IGMP, and packet filtering. With almost twice as many pages, the extra depth is hardly surprising, but since most people will use it as a reference rather than reading it cover to cover (I have read only four of the thirty two chapters in full), I don't think the length has any disadvantages. The promise of the "illustrated" in the title is fulfilled with diagrams showing the relationships between different functions, lists of global variables, diagrams of the data structures used, and a complete code listing. It's still not easy reading, but it's a darn site more fun than looking at the raw code! Exercises are provided at the end of each chapter, with some solutions in an appendix. -- Disclaimer: I requested and received review copies of _Internetworking with TCP/IP, Volume 1_ and _TCP/IP Illustrated, Volume 2_ from Prentice Hall and Addison-Wesley, but I have no stake, financial or otherwise, in their success. -- %T Internetworking with TCP/IP, Volume 1 (3rd edition) %S Principals, Protocols, and Architecture %A Douglas E. Comer %I Prentice Hall %C Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey %D 1995 %O hardcover, 3rd edition, exercises, bibliography, index %G ISBN 0-13-216987-8 %P xxv,613pp %K computing, networking %T TCP/IP Illustrated, Volume 2 %S The Implementation %A Gary R. Wright %A W. Richard Stevens %I Addison-Wesley %C Reading, Massachusetts %D 1995 %O hardcover, exercises, solutions, bibliography, index %G ISBN 0-201-63354-X %P xxii,1174pp %K computing, networking Danny Yee (danny@cs.su.oz.au) 20 June 1995 ------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright (C) Danny Yee 1995 : Comments and criticism welcome ------------------------------------------------------------- URL http://www.anatomy.su.oz.au/danny/book-reviews/index.html -------------------------------------------------------------