Book details of 'Internetworking with TCP/IP : Design, Implementation, and Internals'

Title	Internetworking with TCP/IP : Design, Implementation, and Internals
Author(s)	Douglas E. Comer, David L. Stevens
ISBN	0139738436
Language	English
Published	June 1998
Publisher	Prentice Hall

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The Virtual Bookcase Reviews of 'Internetworking with TCP/IP : Design, Implementation, and Internals':

Reviewer Rob Slade wrote:
If only my calculus text had been this good. "Internetworking with TCP/IP" is intended as a text for a course in the problem of communication between networks with dissimilar protocols, with reference to the use of the TCP/IP protocol suite as a means to overcome the problem. This should not prevent those interested in using TCP/IP from looking at it: the material is quite complete and detailed. As both text and reference, it succeeds admirably. After the first two chapters introduce general "inter"networking concepts and communications technology, three sections of chapters deal successively with basic connection services, routing and gateways, and then move into applications issues. The chapters are many (twenty-seven) and usually short. The same structure is followed for most: the presentation of a particular problem of interconnection, the presentation of the "internet" answer, a detailed look at this answer, and an examination of its strengths and weaknesses. The author states that the reader should have a familiarity with programming and basic data structures. This is quite reasonable, given the topic. For much of the book, however, the descriptions are clear enough that the intelligent novice should be able to make sense of it. It is also suggested that this work could be used as a text for a more general communications course and, again, I agree wholeheartedly. While TCP/IP, and the related suite of protocols (generally one per chapter) are used as the specific examples, it is the concepts that are stressed. The book is refreshingly free of bias or "side", and when a particular aspect of TCP/IP is weak, it definitely says so. Comer is an excellent writer. The book's layout and structure is well organized and logical. In addition, the writing itself is not only clear, but an "easy read" for so technical a subject. The text is broken by boldfaced topical section headings, and supported by one sentence conceptual summations. By the end of the first three chapters you are well aware that when italics show up, you'd better read carefully. Volume II of the set is not so much a "follow on" as supporting material for Volume I. Much of the same material is covered, but in terms of the programming and implementation of various TCP/IP related protocols. While Volume I could be used with a fairly naive audience, Volume II definitely requires a programming background, preferably in C. The second volume does not cover all of the protocols dealt with in the first. Discussion of implementation requires considerably more detail: six chapters are devoted to aspects of TCP alone. Nevertheless, the examples given should address most of the concepts needed to implement other protocols in the suite. There are not one but two "volume III"s. These cover client-server programming and applications from an AT&T TLI and BSD socket perspective respectively.
Reviewer Koos van den Hout wrote:
The next book in the series. The book you want on this subject.
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