Anyone subscribed to Safari Books Online ?

Hi,

so I recently learned about Safari Books Online (in fact I heard about it well before but it's only recently that I looked to see what it had to offer) and I must say it looks great. But being a student with a limited amount of money (and an access to the university library, which is far from awesome especially if you compare to what Safari offers), I'm wondering if it would be a good investment. So even if the final decision is mine, I would like to hear comments from people already subscribed (if they exist) or from those who already tough/think about subscribing. :)

If you don't know about Safari, there's a small promo video here: http://my.safaribooksonline.com/flashdemo

I have access through my ACM membership (it's somewhat limited, since we have a "bookshelf" of 10 books, but this appears to be unlimited (not that I've ever gone over 10 books at a time anyway)), which may be (for you) cheaper as a student.

But I've been pleased; any time I've wanted to find a book on <T>, I could find a book on it.

I confess a certain difficulty in reading books on the screen. I just can't seem to get concentrated enough on the reading material for some reason. I find it incredibly easier on my case to read from a paper book.

This is not the same when I'm reading small articles or website content. It's when the reading demands either my imagination to start flow, or my concentration to kick in (which basically means anything from a novel to a C++ book) that I find paper books much more adequate. I do't think I can explain this in any other way. Just some limitation I have, I guess.

Safari Books is not for me.

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Originally Posted by Mario F.

I confess a certain difficulty in reading books on the screen. I just can't seem to get concentrated enough on the reading material for some reason. I find it incredibly easier on my case to read from a paper book.

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I feel the same... for me it has to do with the scrolling or paging on a computer screen. Scrolling is generally either too constant (I have to do it slowly the whole time or too slow. Paging tends to make me lose track of my position and I have to recompose myself.

I prefer reading a page, turning it, and starting over at the top of the next one. It just feels more natural to me.

I also feel the same as for reading books on a screen. That's probably the biggest disadvantage of this.

The good thing is that, with technology evolving quite fast, it's not rare to have a 5 years old book somehow already obsolete.

Anyway.

At our university all students have full access to Safari Books Online. I have used it at least 3 or 4 times, but every time I have used it I have noticed that my level of knowledge already supersedes what they talk about in the books. The books usually cover all the basics of the topics which they cover, but don't go into much advanced stuff.

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Originally Posted by DavidP

At our university all students have full access to Safari Books Online. I have used it at least 3 or 4 times, but every time I have used it I have noticed that my level of knowledge already supersedes what they talk about in the books. The books usually cover all the basics of the topics which they cover, but don't go into much advanced stuff.

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If you know everything in "Mastering Regular Expressions" you're a better man than me.

We had a free trial period of it at work. I couldn't really get into reading everything on the computer. Guess I'm old school and need a real book in front of me.

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If you know everything in "Mastering Regular Expressions" you're a better man than me.

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Haha. What I mean to say is that of all the books that I have personally consulted, they seem to cover the basics more than the higher up stuff. I haven't consulted every book on there :)