Repetitive Strain Injury: A Computer User's Guide by Emil Pascarelli and Deborah Quilter An excellent overview of RSI issues for computer users.

Questioning the Millennium: A Rationalist's Guide to a Precisely Arbitrary Countdown by Stephen Jay Gould An extension of an earlier essay of his (a version of which consitutes the second chapter of the book), Questioning the Millennium is a very entertaining forray into millennial issues. The debate of January 1st, 2000 versus January 1st, 2001, is only a part of the story.

Feynman's Lost Lecture : The Motion of Planets Around the Sun by David Goodstein, Judith Goodstein, and Richard Feynman A wonderful book (includes audio CD), which presents Feynman's geometric proof of why the planets move in ellipses, and not necessarily in perfect circles. The challenge for the authors was that only an audio version of the 1964 lecture existed, with a few notes, from which to reconstruct his proof. The challenge for the reader is that the proof is performed using mathematical devices available to Newton, mostly geometry. The proof is, as Feynman puts it, elementary - which does not mean simple. Newton's original proof was a tremendous achievement. For millenia, aesthetic sensitivities had ordained simple geometrical patterns for the motion of celestial bodies. Unfortunately, as astronomy became more accurate, it became increasingly obvious that the motion of the planets was more complicated. The classical linneage of Copernicus, Brahe, and Keppler led to a detailed description of the motion. Newton's proposed laws not only linked earthly fenomena with celestial motion, but could be used to geometrically derive the force of gravity and demonstrate the necessity of the ellipse. One detail bothered me: the cover is somewhat misleading, as it claims that the book demonstrates why the planets move in ellipses and not circles, which is incorrect: Feynman's proof is that the planets must move in ellipses, of which circles are a special case. Why the probability of the special case is very low is beyond the scope of the book.

The Demon-Haunted World : Science As a Candle in the Dark by Carl Sagan Truly a book that I wish the public would read! Sagan presents, in an emminently clear and convincing manner, the case of science versus mythology, parapsychology, alien abductions, religion, etc. Possibly the greatest single contribution of Sagan was the writing of this book. Perfect present for gullible friends...

Mismeasure of Man by Stephen Jay Gould Gould is the best counterweight I've found to the Bell Curve believers of the world. Since it's Gould, it's a brilliant book - not just for the task of in one volume summarizing a century of criticism of craniology, IQ testing, and race-based immigration quotas. It's also an excellent source of wisdom for would-be scientists, debunking as it does a long history of flawed research. It is not without its own flaws: as often with Gould's material, there is a tendency to be repetitive. The book would have benefited from further editing. Also, Gould's zest to attack (and rightfully so) the proponents of flawed research on human intelligence ducks several issues. For example, that intelligence is strongly hereditary appears to be clear from studies of twins separated at birth, a research result which is controversial to popular culture but which Gould carefully avoids dealing with. He correctly asserts that a hereditary intelligence within a group is no basis for claiming hereditary differences between groups (it's difficult for identical twins to be of different races, after all). However, the manner with which mass media counters the latter is by refuting the former. Ducking this issue is fine within the context of the first version of this book, published in 1981, which had a very specific thesis: that there is no serious evidence for a single number representing innate and essentially immutable intelligence. The current edition specifically offers to counter the broader claims of the Bell Curve, for which such a specific (almost tautological) thesis does not quite live up to. Overall, however, an excellent book.

Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson The first biography of Gates, published in 1992, this book makes a serious attempt to cover the details of the origin of Microsoft. The authors, at the time reporters for The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, have interviewed a large number of friends, colleagues, and rivals. The book makes eminently clear that the source of success for Microsoft was no fluke, an opinion that was more prevalent in media at the time than it is today (1997).

Overdrive: Bill Gates and the Race to Control Cyberspace by James Wallace In many ways a continuation of Hard Drive, Wallace describes the inside perspective on the legal struggles with the federal government, the launch of Windows'95, the turnaround to deal with the Internet, etc. Not up to the level of Hard Drive, it is nevertheless a worthwhile read.

Startup: A Silicon Valley Adventure Story by Jerry Kaplan Kaplan describes his adventures in forming GO Computing, the first serious venture project to create Pen-oriented computers. The book is highly readable for the screwups that the author generously shares. Dr Kaplan must have a high natural sense of self esteem to be so honest. The project makes a series of strategic and tactical errors which lead to inevitable doom. Unfortunately, very little about the technology is covered, this is strictly a business book. It is also a valuable primer in what happens when you get on the wrong side of Gates. GO becomes blacklisted by Microsoft, and this gives them no end of problems, many of which serious. Anyone interested in an insight into the frustration of entrepeneurs who get in harms way of Microsoft should read this book.

Being Digital by Nicholas Negroponte An MIT professor and Wired columnist, Negroponte obviously has interesting things to say, but the book falls short of being remarkable. It is essentially a collection of slightly revised columns, so there is a great deal of repetition and a recurring sense of having read this before - which is probably true since Negroponte's ideas are highly visible. The promise on the cover - "The Road Map for Survival on the Information Superhighway" - is completely irrelevant to the contents, and simply a reflection of trendy phrases from 1995. The conversion to a book did not inspire the author to include a single diagram or picture. Considering the overall claim of discussing the future, Negroponte avoids the responsibility of a serious discussion of the risks and caveats of the digital revolution. Despite my reservations, this is a highly enjoyable book with many entertaining anecdotes and observations.

Programming Pearls by Jon Louis Bentley Selections from Bentley's "Programming Pearls" column in Communications of the ACM (CACM). An excellent books for programmers interested in exploring the subtle depths of their profession.

Expert C Programming: Deep C Secrets by Peter van der Linden "Expert" depends on your mileage, but for intermediate programmers (less than 500 hours experience, say) this is highly useful reading. Very Sun platform oriented (SunOS, Solaris). Mr van der Linden appears to have a very high opinion of himself, which is no doubt warranted, but is somewhat distracting. I was familiar with perhaps 80% of the material, and the fact that I, despite this, find value in reading this book is good testimony.

Writing Efficient Programs by Jon Louis Bentley Unfortunately, this title is out of print. It's a thin book, but excellent value. Essentially, in "Programming Pearls" Bentley describes a sequence of anecdotes of programming problems. In Writing Efficient Programs, he attempts a synthesis, presenting a structured approach to writing fast software. The book resulted from a series of seminars. The fact that this book is out of print is testimony to the ignorance of educators. This should be mandatory litterature for any computer scientist.

Writing Efficient Programs