Mac OS X Bible, Panther Edition

Rating:
Summary: The bigger they are, the harder they fall
Review: Don't let the size of this monster fool you. I have so far found it to be useless and am returning it and buying Mac OS X Panter (Visual QuickStart Guide) instead. The way I judge books of this kind is to take a real problem and go to the index. If what I want is there, and leads me to the answer, that's a good sign. If not, it's not. For example, as an experienced Mac owner moving from OS 9.2 to X, I needed to know the significance of rebuilding the desktop in 9; I was having problems launching 9 apps from X and thought rebuilding would solve the problem. The hernia inducing "bible" had nothing to say on the subject. This happened repeatly as I tried to wend my way to becoming comfortable with X.

Then I found Mac OS X Panter (Visual QuickStart Guide) in an Apple store. Smaller, cheaper, and yes, complete with a helpful page on the signficance of rebuilding OS 9 applications when moving to OS X. The bottom line: When it comes to the Mac OS X Bible, size is nothing but a pain. Don't say you weren't warned.

Rating:
Summary: Illuminating!
Review: I picked up this book the other day just to have as a Panther reference and ended up being hooked for a few hours on the living room couch browsing through most of Part IV on "Making the Most of Mac OS X." The best word I can think of to describe the coverage is "illuminating"! Sam Litt and co. obviously have a bead on how Mac users really think and work, and they haven't missed much here. If only all Mac books were this thorough and well written!

Rating:
Summary: Awesome!
Review: This is by far the best book yet on ANY version of OS X, and lives up to the Bible name. Its combination of reader-friendliness and comprehensiveness in unparalleled as far as I can tell. The writing is straightforward, complete, and extremely well organized, with Unix coverage that seems to be useful rather than "geeky" (which makes me actually want to get into that stuff). I've only had this for a couple of days and it's already saved me time and hassle with setting up my home network. Wow! Nice job, guys!