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Three Books On The iPod
The first impression you get of O'Reillys iPod Fan Book is of the packaging. A small volume (about the same height as the iPod and twice the width) it comes with a half-height wrap that has the title and author on the front and the bar code, price and a short contents on the back. Take this off and you have a full-size cover with all the simple elegance of the white iPod itself. The front features the wheel of a 4G iPod and the back has just the Apple logo and "iPod" in Apple's distinctive typeface below it. Remove this second cover and you have a book with a simple design of grey with a white border, the back is blank and the front has the title and the subtitle "Go everywhere with iPod" in small type.
This concentration on design flows through the rest of the book. It is visually stunning; at the same time, effort has been made to make the design useful. The pages are visually tabbed to make it easy to navigate the seven chapters. Each chapter is tabbed in a different color reflected through use of that color within the chapter. Full color pictures and screen dumps add to the legibility and usability of the book.
This book is also full of useful information for the newcomer to the iPod. A small amount is covered in the documentation you get with the iPod, but a great deal is not. Apart from a useful chapter on accessories, the book focuses on methods of getting the best from an iPod and how to organise your music.
To sum up this book: it is a little more style than substance and falls short of being the ideal book for all newcomers to the iPod (and even less for experienced users). On the other hand, the style makes the information that is provided readily accessible for all. I'd say this is the perfect companion to an iPod for a teen-age girl and if my 12-year-old daughter was getting the mini she has been hinting for, a copy of this would be included. (I expect that anyone who spent more than ten minutes deciding on the colour of their mini would probably love the elegance and style of this thin volume.) The price of $14.95 retail makes it a great impulse buy or stocking stuffer.
Hacking iPod + iTunes and iPod & iTunes HacksThe other two volumes I looked at might seem like two peas in a pod. Scott Knaster's Hacking iPod + iTunes and Hadley Stern's iPod & iTunes Hacks certainly have a similarity in their titles and have almost identical cover prices of a fraction less than $25. The content of about half of each of these volumes covers the same territory, too. There are, however, differences in both the style and content between them. So, how to decide?
Hacking iPod + iTunes author Scott Knaster pages 259 publisher Wiley Publishing rating 8 ISBN 0764569845For one thing, it seems that Knaster concentrates more on iTunes than the iPod, while Stern seems a closer balance between the two but once again this is only a slight difference.
Both volumes are clearly, and both cover a range of information for users all the way from a relative newcomer (someone who has read the supplied documentation and played around with their iPod and iTunes for a few days) to users who want to push the envelope by installing Linux, hacking iTunes with AppleScript, or finding cheap ways to stream music, to name just a few of the more adventurous topics covered.
The first real difference between the two volumes I found was that Stern has a few more hardware hacks, including some of the surreal sort of hack that often makes these books so much fun -- who would have thought of making your own iPod case out of cardboard, for example? Stern's book is also much more a Macintosh user's book: fully twenty of the one hundred hacks, for example, are devoted to AppleScript. (Not that Knaster ignores AppleScript - he has a chapter almost entirely devoted to it.) Knaster goes into more detail about such "hacks" as podcasting, RSS feeds, email and the iTunes Music Store.
iPod & iTunes Hacks author Hadley Stern pages 417 publisher O'Reilly Media rating 8 ISBN 0596007787The books also differ in their layout and style. Stern, like all of O'Reilly's "Hacks" book authors, has a slightly dry, informative style with a large number of references to other hacks in the book in the instructions. Knaster's style is a little more tongue-in-cheek, with far fewer references to other parts of the book. Somehow Knaster's style appealed to me a little more, though he seems at times to take a little longer to give you all the information you needed.
Stern's examples are also a little more self-contained, while Knaster tends to give you a start, point you in the right direction and tell you where to go to get all that you needed. The two different ways they approach running Linux on the iPod is typical: Stern uses the uClinux kernel and gives you detailed instructions on how to get that into your iPod using dd, while Knaster uses the Linux on iPod project and gives less detailed instructions. Stern also tells you about Podzilla and a small pointer on developing applications for the iPod while Knaster just leaves you with Linux installed.
Deciding between these two volumes comes down to personal taste, and happily both authors provide samples for you online. For Knaster's book you can go to the Wiley site for Hacking iPod + iTunes , where you can get a table of contents, the index and the first chapter. You can also visit Knaster's site for Hacking iPod + iTunes , where he has a blog on the iPod and pointers to more hacks from the book and some other cool and useful stuff.
For Stern's book you can go to O'Reilly's page for iPod & iTunes Hacks for the usual table of contents and index. It also has a link to a page with ten example hacks, there is also an article on O'Reilly's "Digital Media" website with a further five example hacks.
I'm not going to attempt to decide between these two volumes for you. If you think either might be useful, then have a look at the examples and decide which style suits you best.
You can purchase iPod Fan Book , iPod & iTunes Hacks and Hacking iPod + iTunes from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews. To see your own review here, carefully read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
if you need a book to operate it.
seems like a simple enough device to me, but apparently I was mistaken.
You only need a 128 page book to teach you how.
What is this with Apple releasing products with documentation verging on leaflet size (i.e. the original iMac "manual"). Just how much money does Jobs get from all the "missing manual" publications?
For a minute I was thinking "Oh, so they've got eBooks on the iPod now, have they?"
Any sufficiently simple magic can be passed off as mere advanced technology.
What am I babbling about, you ask?
Low and behold, it is REAL
Don't you just plug it in, synch it, and take around with you, so you can listen to music, and carry data around (data/calendar)?
Wouldn't it make more sense to buy some tunes instead of the book?
If you don't know what AltaVista is (was), get off my lawn.
The Sylvania DVD/VHS-combo Kama Sutra
8-Track: The Return of the King
HP 35: Mein RPN Kampf
Hacking desklamps for dummies
Apple has been dying since Steve Jobbs founded it? That must be why they have been in buisness for almost 30 years now. Lasting 30 years in the technology sector is quite a feat.
roche
Bah Humbug!
So is this what I need to cool my 1337 overclocked iPod?
I think mauve has the most RAM
-- PHB
I would think you could fit a lot more than 3 books on iPod.
Most of the "hacks" listed are iTunes hacks, so if anything, these books are just misnamed. Because of the restrictive firmware, there is next to nothing the end user can do to modify their iPod, other than adding songs/contacts/calendars/notes. No, you can't add games (unless you count the Notes-driven choose your own adventure-style games.)
A slashdotter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber.
I can definitely say, you don't need a *book* to learn how to use this thing. You probably won't even need the tiny manual that comes with it.
Even my less-technical friends and family can use it without being told anything more than "this button chooses items, and the rest should be self-explanatory"
I'll create an amusing sig when I have something meaningful to post.
Is there a chance that there is already a place for "Audiobooks" on the iPod? And that you can buy them on iTunes?
English is easier said than done.
Amazon: If you liked this book, we also recommend:
- You and your mouse: Learn all the tricks, and move your mouse in ways you've never imagined
- Hacking your kettle: 101 hacks and mods for your electric kettle
Other than the trendy fashion thing, or the keeping-up-with-the-Joneses thing, I don't understand the big deal behind the Laserpod. A simple colored lightbulb does almost the same thing for a fraction of the price.
Actually, that was an idea I had a few years ago when there were more "Dummies" titles than books sold in an given year.
I was convinced that "Writing 'Dummies' books for Dummies" would be a killer.
myke
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
...please don't allow Santa to bring me worthless junk this year, please, we already got failry cheap toilet paper stocked up
if you do, I will write a book about having received a book about iPods, I swear I will
hey, maybe then I'll get loads of cash 'cause stupid folks are going to buy it
hell, there really are people out there who are so damn bored that they start to write books about their music players
I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I can think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do.
Yes on both counts. Audiobooks on iTMS are the same ones offered through Audible.com and the iTunes/iPod player software is designed to handle bookmarking your audiobooks. I only bought one for $8 (Benjamin Franklin, Citizen)...most of the other good ones are terribly expensive IMO.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
I know you're a troll... because the price difference you allege doesn't exist.
I'm happy to check out a link that shows otherwise, and bad-mouth the moderators for calling you a troll as a result, but... until you do, everyone has the link above, showing clearly that, if anything, the 40GB iPod can be had cheaper than the 40GB iRiver.
There are some other 40GB players that are actually a bit cheaper than the iPod, if you weren't just a troll you might have mentioned one of them, or provided a link to back up your troll. Sadly, you're just a troll...
Just to be clear, I don't own an iPod and could care less which 40GB MP3 player is cheaper ( I'm not buying one, sorry ), I just like to bug people who don't back up their baseless claims with at least links to other baseless claims...
You can also designate any AAC file as an iPod audiobook by changing the file extension to m4b instead of m4a. Useful for if you rip your own audiobook CDs.
I think they're targeting the people buying the iPods: parents and grandparents who don't know much and think the "kids" will appreciate a book on how to use this crazy device.
This and an iPod combined, is a bad idea for presents:
.."
"Awesome, got me a iPod! You know what's great about these, they are idiot proof, you don't even need the manual they're so easy to use, I think only a complete moron would need to read instructions on how to use these things, in fact I'm almost offended it includes a instruction manual. [...] So, what else did you get me? looks like a some kind of book
Let's just hope to $DEITY they don't make an audiobook about the iPod, and then play it on an iPod. The universe would fold in on itself out of sheer redundancy.
You have two hands and one brain, so always code twice as much as you think!
Having read this book in hardcover I can't imagine it being much fun at all in audio format.
1/2 of the jokes are visual.
I use the Monster iCarPlay and it works great - charges the iPod AND broadcasts what's playing on FM. If you go this route make sure you get something that both charges and broadcasts - there is lots of crap out there that only does one or the other.