Mac OS X: The Missing Manual
David Pogue
Pogue Press/O’Reilly Associates
ISBN 596-00082-0
US $24.95 CA $37.95
565 pages not including index

Computer books are a dime a dozen. As soon as a new version of Microsoft Whatchamacallit or Adobe Thingamajig appears on the shelves of CompUSA or MacRetailer, the instruction books hit the shelves of Borders, or Amazon.com’s virtual bookshelves. Since more and more applications no longer ship with paper manuals, the need for printed manuals grows. Unfortunately, most computer books tend to be massive tomes that are little more than elaborate regurgitation’s of the skinny manuals and Help files shipping with the software itself. The reader learns little more than how to accomplish certain functions in a certain order. This is what I call the cookbook approach to computer manuals.

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