Rating: 
Summary: Windows Scripting for Dummies
Review: All I did say is "This book is ideal for those who have no clue on Windows Scripting". It could very well be included in the dummies series.
Rating:
Summary: Good "Step by Step" Guide for Network Admins
Review: As a "recently transplanted" Network Admin - I found this guide to be a very good "step by step" introduction to Windows Scripting. Good, practical examples and enough "repetition" to allow things to "sink in". Good overview of using WMI and ADSI. Coverage of IIS 6.0 and Exchange 2003 was a little light.
Definitely not a "technicians" book but, as if you are ready for a "Starting from Scratch" book on Windows Scripting... I'd say this would be an excellent book to consider.
I would, however, avoid purchasing it from AMAZON.COM. Unless you have LOTS of time to WAIT. Despite the ordering screen clearly stating "Usually ships within 24 hours" - it took them ELEVEN (11) DAYS to get it here. Clearly they are having "issues" with order processing / delivery.
Rating: 
Summary: This book helped me learn VBScript
Review: Do you want to know if you have all the admin tools installed on your computer? This is the first script in this book. What about mismatched computer names? This is the second script in the book. Sure the book does not copy pictures of "object models" from Microsoft, but then I am a network administrator, and pictures of object models are USELESS!!!!
I like the way the author organized the material into common tasks that a network administrator does. I think the author bio says he was a consultant, and it shows. This book was written by someone who knows networks inside and out. I have already modified one of his scripts, and I used it on a regular basis to "monitor" some of my servers. It is the script that dumps out information about all the processes running on my server. This script alone is worth the price of the book.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Learning Guide
Review: First some background information:
I work in a rather large multi-operating system environment and have several sysAdmins working for me. Like most senior level system analysts, I own dozens of books on topics of system administration and programming.
I have purchased and read a number of books on windows scripting and was looking for a learning guide for my staff when I came across this one.
What this books isn't.
1. A definitive resource guide
2. A programmers refererence manual
3. A beginners programming book
I believe the strengths of this book is the way the author breaks down a script and explains each part. The author does a very good job of building on each skill learned as you move from chapter to chapter. The author makes use of typical problems encountered by sysAdmins and demonstrates how scripts can be used to solve those problems.
Having gone through the first 17 of 20 Chapters, I have found this book has provided me with an excellent foundation from which to build on my Window Scripting knowledge.
Each member of my staff will be receiving a copy of this book.
Rating: 
Summary: Another VBScript book that is Lacking
Review: How many VBScript books have you picked up that completely skip explaining the Windows Script Host and VBScript environment? They immediately jump into having you write scripts without even explaining the scripting environment, something that is Crucial to learning VBScript. This is another of those books.
This book has no information on the WSH (Windows Script Host), objects or methods, when and why to use the various WSH objects and methods, and there is only haphazard information on syntax. You can't even find this information in the appendices.
The author takes you through writing VBScripts, almost from page one, and only gives the briefest of explanations of what you are doing. For example, in the second chapter of the book, you are presented with a multiline script that includes the following:
Set objWMIService=SetObject("winmgmts") _
& .ExecQuery _
("SELECT = FROM Win32_Process")
If you never worked with Windows Script Host or VBScript, would you have any idea what this is? Or why you are using it? The author gives a 2 sentence explanation, and then jumps right into something else.
If you are new to VBScript, and are looking for a book to teach you about VBScript and WSH, this book is not for you. If you are an experienced VBScript writer, you might find some tidbit of useful information in this book. This book, sadly, does not teach you VBScript, and would be of no real use to someone who already knows VBscript.
Don't buy it.
Rating:
Summary: I wish I had this book when I was learning windows scripting
Review: I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn windows scripting. Even a proficient scripter may find some gems in this well planned guide.
Rating: 
Summary: Book is good, LABS need work
Review: I went thru the book and thought the lessons were good. The way the book disects every script as you read it is great for beginners. Ed's technical reveiwer(s) did him a disservice by not check every lab on the CD against what he had in print. Of the 40 labs 3 do not work at all. If you cut and paste from the book text you can get 3 more to work. So 6 out of 40 labs have issues. The chapter 15 labs are broke all the way around. You need to adjust most of the labs to get them to work in your environment and there is no discussion of this in the text. For a book on scripting, the debugging was average.
Rating:
Summary: Start scripting here
Review: I wish this book had been out last year. There are a lot of good scripting books out there, but they all start from the beginning, open notepad and start programming. The vast majority of system admins do not learn scripting this way. They learn it by finding scripts on the web and 'making them work'.This book starts out with load this script from the cd. 'This' is a script, these are the elements you have to have, these are 'nice to have' and here is how it works. The first lesson manipulates those elements so you see their importance and the second is what so many people already do, modify the script to make it do something else. The book then begins to provide you with the tools to gather information, monitor and report. From there, it switches over into administration. The tone is friendly and conversational. It clarified things that I had picked up elsewhere but not fully understood until now. It comes with a demo version of Primal Script which I use and enjoy. As a free alternative to notepad that does color context highlighting for VBScript, you can use http://www.crimsoneditor.com
Rating:
Summary: Little Known but Powerful
Review: There are a lot of general administrative tasks that can be scripted so that you don't have to specifically key in each and every little step in the process. The result is a tremendous increase in both speed and accuracy.
Scripting in many forms is included with Windows, but relatively few people realize that this is a programming language/system in its own right.
This book, published by Microsoft Press breaks new ground in making scripts easy to use in a wide variety of application areas. The CD-ROM included with the book contains a hundred useful scrips that handle a lot of tasks and even better are a good place to start modifying to get exactly what you want.
Rating: 
Summary: Frustrating and incomplete.
Review: This book is a double failure.
It fails as a learning guide by neglecting to discuss important basics necesary for all non-trivial scripting, (e.g. how to include a " character in a string) leaving the reader who departs even a little from the labs totally stranded.
It is also useless as a working reference. Nowhere will you find summaries of operators, data types, reserved words, syntax or useful functions. The cutesy chapter names make it hard to even find the long-winded descriptions of what you need a quick refresher on.
Don't get it.
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