Tuesday, 23 December 2014

The $5 eBook Bonanza is here!

Following the success of last year’s festive offer, Packt Publishing will be celebrating the holiday season with an even bigger $5 offer.

From Thursday 18th December, every eBook and video will be available on the publisher’s website for just $5. Customers are invited to purchase as many as they like before the offer ends on Tuesday January 6th, making it the perfect opportunity to try something new or to take your skills to the next level as 2015 begins.

With all $5 products available in a range of formats and DRM-free, customers will find great value content delivered exactly how they want it across Packt’s website this Xmas and New Year.

http://bit.ly/1r5fCms

Thursday, 20 November 2014

Book review: Developing Responsive Web Applications with AJAX and jQuery

Developing Responsive Web Applications with AJAX and jQuery
Packt Publishing  
Writer: Sandeep Kumar Patel
Paperback:248
Link to the book page:   
https://www.packtpub.com/web-development/developing-responsive-web-applications-ajax-and-jquery

My rating: 4/5

This book is intended for Java developers wanting to create rich and responsive applications using AJAX.  

This a cool book to start to develop a responsive web application. Reading chapter to chapter you will learn to setup your environment step by step. 

A little bit knowlegge on this technology stack "HTML5, CSS, Javascript" will be a plus to follow this book on a easy way. Together, they are a powerful combinations.

Also, you will find more interesting tips to work with Twitter, Facebook, Youtube and Google + integration.

Final chapters cover more advanced tricks to get the best when you are debugging and testing your web application. By the end of this book, you will be able to develop responsive web applications by combining AJAX development techniques with the jQuery JavaScript library.

Tuesday, 1 July 2014

Packt’s celebrates 10 years with a special $10 offer

(Press release)
This month marks 10 years since Packt Publishing embarked on its mission to deliver effective learning and information services to IT professionals. In that time it’s published over 2000 titles and helped projects become household names, awarding over $400,000 through its Open Source Project Royalty Scheme.
To celebrate this huge milestone, from June 26th Packt is offering all of its eBooks and Videos at just $10 each for 10 days – this promotion covers every title and customers can stock up on as many copies as they like until July 5th.
Dave Maclean, Managing Director explains ‘From our very first book published back in 2004, we’ve always focused on giving IT professionals the actionable knowledge they need to get the job done. As we look forward to the next 10 years, everything we do here at Packt will focus on helping those IT professionals, and the wider world, put software to work in innovative new ways.
We’re very excited to take our customers on this new journey with us, and we would like to thank them for coming this far with this special 10-day celebration, when we’ll be opening up our comprehensive range of titles for $10 each.
If you’ve already tried a Packt title in the past, you’ll know this is a great opportunity to explore what’s new and maintain your personal and professional development. If you’re new to Packt, then now is the time to try our extensive range – we’re confident that in our 2000+ titles you’ll find the knowledge you really need , whether that’s specific learning on an emerging technology or the key skills to keep you ahead of the competition in more established tech.’ More information is available at http://www.packtpub.com/10years 
www.packtpub.com/10years

Tuesday, 17 June 2014

Book review: The Manager's Guide to Employee Feedback

The Manager's Guide to Employee Feedback  
Impackt Publishing  
Writer: Glen Devey
Paperback: 70
http://www.packtpub.com/managers-guide-to-employee-feedback/book

My rating: 4/5
This book is aimed primarily at new Managers who want to improve their skills to delivering a feedback. Six chapters, six lessons ahead.

* Chapter 1: Feedback Fundamentals 
"Taking a portion of the output and comparing it with the input to decide
whether you are getting what you want out of a system."


Seven key principles: Evidence- based, Activity- focused, Results- orientated, Specific, Honesty, Only positive languaje and Timed well.

* Chapter 2: Delivering Balanced Feedback
WIN model of feedback: What went well, Insteresting aspects of perfomance, Next time...

It's a structure for emphasizing the positive aspects
of someone's performance and also for suggesting areas of improvement
.

* Chapter 3: Addressing Specific Performance Issues
BAR model of feedback: Background, Activity, Results.

* Chapter 4: Delivering a Reprimand
In opposite to the WIN model I talked before, here we have the DESC model. 
If you need to have a purely corrective conversation with someone you should use this one.

* Chapter 5: Giving Feedback to Colleagues and Managers
This is the most important chapter on my opinion.
We have to choose our words and techniques depending of people we are talking about.
Some insteresting examples of a softening frame, Mismatch frames and Alternative frames are showed here.

* Chapter 6: Integrating Your New Skills
The four step plan to achieve just about anything:
1. Decide on the outcome you want.
2. Choose a course of action.
3. Pay attention to what happens in the moment.
4. Change course if necessary.


Feedback like in an electronic lesson, as so simple but applied to your company. You should study your environment, people you are going to talk and message you want to communicate. These are the keys, have a good feedback!!

Monday, 9 June 2014

Video Review Building a Data Mart with Pentaho Data Integration

Video Review: Building a Data Mart with Pentaho Data Integration
PACKT Video
Author: Diethard Steiner
Topics and Technologies : Video, e-Learning, Open Source
http://www.packtpub.com/building-a-data-mart-with-pentaho-data-integration/video

My rating: 4/5 
If you are looking for an easy way to learn how to create ETL transformations to populate a star schema these videos are recorded for you.
You only have to follow these videos step-by-step and you will get powerful results.

Today we will started with Chapter 3: "Agile BI – Building OLAP Schema, Analyzing Data, and Implementing Required ETL Improvements" 
There are 3 videos here:
* 3.1: Creating a Pentaho Analysis Model

In this video we may learn two interesting perspectives on PDI: Model and Visualize. The first one we can built metadatas for analysis and reporting on an easy way. We only select our data from the physical tables and drop into the model.
* 3.2: Analyzing Data Using Pentaho Analyzer


Once we have created our model we can explore the data. In this case we will use Pentaho Analyzer. We drop our measures or levels into the sections we want and we will make our report, that's simple!!
* 3.3: Improving Your ETL for Better Data Quality  


There are tools to get a better data quality. DataCleaner is fully integrated within Pentaho Kettle / PDI and you can profile your data directly within Spoon.
You can download this plugin here: http://wiki.pentaho.com/display/EAI/Human+Inference
You will get some interesting statistics about your data (row count, highest value, lowest value, standard deviation, variance, mean...) with this useful tool.
Also, on this chapter, you will learn some PDI steps to clean and you do not load duplicates values.

Short videos, faster knowledge. Totally recommend!!

Saturday, 7 June 2014

Book Review: Practical Change Management for IT Projects & Attracting IT Graduates to Your Business

Practical Change Management for IT Projects & Attracting IT Graduates to Your Business
Impackt Publishing
Writer: Emily Carr / An Coppens
Paperback: 170 / 54
http://www.packtpub.com/practical-change-management-it-projects/book

www.packtpub.com/attracting-it-graduates-to-your-business/book

My rating: 5/5 
Learn to properly manage the changes that occur on an IT project, directly affects project success.
In this book the main roles involved in such projects, which is the best way and when they relate to each, and a set of templates that will be very useful to collect all the process are discussed.
In addition to the 20 templates offered us fill in any project to adequately adapt to changes in IT projects, presents an example that allows us to go through the book very enjoyable and secure.

This book is aimed primarily at IT Project Managers but also can provide guidance to HR staff.

* Chapter 1: What is Change Management?
In this chapter the concept of "Change Management" is introduced and briefly explains the pillars that we should try to have a successful change process. These concepts are discussed in later chapters.


Curiously, according to a study by IBM Global Business Services 2008 called Making Change Work, only 41% of IT projects fully meets its goals.

The main points to cover in each of the pillars of change are:

* Chapter 2: Establishing the Framework for Change
There are several frameworks to manage the changes: “See- Feel- Change” y “Rider, Elephant, Patch”. 
-      The Rider: This is the intellectual side of people and is responsible for maintaining their will power.
-      The Elephant: This is the emotional side of people.
-      The Path: This is the process people have to follow to make the change.

They remind us that although the rider might seem to be in charge and does in fact, hold the reins, the rider is very small and weak compared to the elephant they are trying to control. A person's intellectual side may provide the will power to adopt a change in the short term, but unless they are emotionally driven to make the change as well, they will eventually go back to the old way of doing things.

* Chapter 3: Building Sponsorship for the Change 
In this chapter we will see how to compose our project team. Normally include: Steering committee, executive sponsors, change agents and super-users.

The book explores the role of each in the project, the importance of each and the activities involved.

* Chapter 4: Managing your Stakeholders 
A stakeholder is a user or group that is impacted by the change. There are usually 3 categories: sponsors, end users and project team.
Once the members of these categories are identified, we must establish mechanisms of measurement. Normally, these are join to human feelings.
* Chapter 5: Communicating the Change 
Here the author teaches us to avoid the way we communicate in one direction.
Depending on the status of the project and involved members explains what is the best way and timing to do so.
* Chapter 6: Using Training to Prepare Your Stakeholders 
This chapter is essential because any change requires adaptation on staff and therefore this training.
There are different methods of training available.  We should have a plan to training time, resources and materials.
* Chapter 7: Ready, Set, Change 
This final chapter lists the templates that have completed and summing up the tips for each chapter.

To conclude this review I would like to recommend this great book. In my opinion, the most important is all the templates this book cover. You may find theory in some other books but in the real world you need to know how to deal a real situation on your company. Step by step you have the answers here.
All my greetings to the author, awesome job.

Besides, I propose a good way to mix this book. If we have the best people we will have the triumph. I propose another Impackt book, next one: Attracting IT Graduates to Your Business. This book is aimed at hiring managers and recruiters.

To sum up, the main chapters, are the next:

* Chapter 1: What Do IT Graduates Want?
We have a new group of workers. They have been using mobile phones, laptops, tablet devices, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and LinkedIn since their teens.A person who works as human resources need to know how to deal it and how to adapt the internal practices.


* Chapter 2: Be Clear on What Your Organization Has to Offer

The question is "what makes your organization unique?" You have to know better than nobody how is your company (formal/informal clothes, traditional vs innovative, fun vs serious...)., salary you will pay, benefits if you work here (restaurants, gyms, beauty salons...), training and so on.

* Chapter 3: Creativity Rules in Gaining Graduate Interest

Careers page like this one http://careers.microsoft.com
let us show the people that work in our company and the roles we are looking for. Social media like LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter also are a good place to organize games or competition to attract candidates.

* Chapter 4: Getting to "You're Hired"

Telephone calls, skills testing, interviews..different stages we may manage and we must learn.

Tuesday, 6 May 2014

Packt celebrates International Day Against DRM, May 6th 2014

Packt Publishing firmly believes that you should be able to read and interact with your content when you want, where you want, and how you want – to that end they have been advocates of DRM-free content since their very first eBook was published back in 2004.

To show their continuing support for Day Against DRM, Packt Publishing is offering all its DRM-free content at $10 for 24 hours only on May 6th – that’s all 2000+ eBooks and Videos at www.packtpub.com.

“Our top priority at Packt has always been to meet the evolving needs of developers in the most practical way possible, while at the same time protecting the hard work of our authors. DRM-free content continues to be instrumental in making that happen, providing the flexibility and freedom that is essential for an efficient and enhanced learning experience. That’s why we’ve been DRM-free from the beginning – we’ll never put limits on the innovation of our users.”
– Dave Maclean, Managing Director

Advocates of Day Against DRM are invited to spread the word and celebrate on May 6th by exploring the full range of DRM-free content at www.packtpub.com, where all eBooks and Videos will be $10 for 24 hours.


Click here for more about DRM.

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