UML and the Unified Process: Practical Object-Oriented Analysis and Design

Rating:
Summary: Good UML/UP Book
Review: Actually I wanted to give 4.5 stars for this book.

One of the best UML books i have read so far, very clear and sets lot of things straight in the somewhat vague (if we don't know the concepts behind the diagrams) UML world..! Has a slight Java bias, which is understandable.

One complain i always have against UML (not this book) itself is.. most software professionals should be very familiar with UML and the methodologies first before developing something or be a part of the project - but it has always been the other way so far. You do 2 or 3 projects, know all the mistakes, then realize the importance of something like UML and try to learn it. In fact UML itself borrows so liberally from C++ and other Object Oriented languages than leading the software engineering. And then the companies coming out with their own methodologies (rather than improving UML itself) to grab the market.. it can be quite difficult.

This book treats most of the technologies it refers quite fairly - with even some C# and Java comparisons side-by-side. Another notable thing is the wonderful style adopted that makes it an easy read, stressing important points again and again, clear summary at the end of each chapter without missing anything etc.,

Rating:
Summary: Excellent book for UML and UP
Review: I purchased this book for the IBM's Object Oriented Analysis and Design with UML certification (Test 486).

I have not taken the test yet, however, after reading it, I am more confident for the test.

Comparing to the "Applying UML and Patterns" by Craig Larman, the author uses common English describes what UML and UP are. It is more concise, and easier to understand.

Craig's book was okay, but it put me to boredom while I was reading it. (Z Z z z z)

Thanks,

David Zuo.

Rating:
Summary: A real treasure!
Review: I stumbled on this book at Borders while browsing through a dozen or so
books on the OOA&D, RUP, and the UML. I am not a novice: I have studied the
field and worked in OOA&D for over a decade. I immediately felt that
this book is a treasure: it is the best overview of the OOA&D, RUP, and XML
that I have ever read.

While many practitioners have their reasons to favor one approach over
another (RUP, Agile, XP, etc.), this book does not project any bias and
contains the most clear and simple explanation of RUP, its phases, work
flows, and the UML. Its language is enjoyable, the examples are just right
to illustrate the points of discussions. It is not an in depth volume, but
it is thorough enough to teach you about the most important flows and
artifacts, and how to interpret and use them.

If you are tired of reading books filled with vague, useless, and boring
definitions -- try this one. You will not be disappointed.

Rating:
Summary: Concise, Excellent OOAD Guide
Review: I was pleasantly surprised by this book. I have read "UML Distilled" by Martin Fowler,"UML User Guide" by Graddy Brooch, etl, etc but this book cut to the chase by presenting the essentials of UML and RUP very succintly. The authors do not use any bombastic, academic or philosophical tone but down to earth explantions that any one can understand. I like the section of use case which explains what an <> vs <> stereoptypes are for use cases. The authors also include an example Web OOAD at www.umlandtheunifiedprocess.com

I recommend this book to anyone who is lost in the woods of UML and/RUP and needs to get some work done.
Kudos to Dr. Jim Arlow and Ila Neustadt. I look forward to their next book: Literate UML

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Book on UP with UML
Review: It has great advices on UP and UML. It shows you not only how but why and when to used UP and UML. I learned an interesting way of using UP and UML together on my next project.

Rating:
Summary: Just what I was looking for ...
Review: This book is exactly what I was looking for. Having had some exposure to OO programming but none to diagramming or modelling OO systems, I was looking for an introduction to a diagramming system that would help me document an existing system. UML seemed the correct way to go but just diving into Visio without understanding it was going to be an exercise in frustration.
I now have a much better understanding of the why and how of UML and feel much more confident in beginning this project.

Rating:
Summary: Just what I was looking for ...
Review: This book is exactly what I was looking for. Having had some exposure to OO programming but none to diagramming or modelling OO systems, I was looking for an introduction to a diagramming system that would help me document an existing system. UML seemed the correct way to go but just diving into Visio without understanding it was going to be an exercise in frustration.
I now have a much better understanding of the why and how of UML and feel much more confident in beginning this project.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent book on UML and UP
Review: This book meets a need that many other books have not really fulfilled. There has been a need for a comprehensive guide that bridges the theoretical world of modelling and the practical aspects of delivering a solution.

Whilst explaining how the process of analysis and design for object-oriented projects can be carried out in the Unified Process lifecycle, the authors focus on real world deliverables. The book introduces the Unified Modelling Language (UML) and the Unified Process (UP) and typically follow the phases from requirements to deployment explaining all the models and activities necessary in each key step.

The authors and publishers have produced a book that is highly readable and extremely well organised. Arlow and Neustadt tell us that there are four ways to access the information in the book:

Fast Track
Reference
Revision
Dipping

Certainly, each of these four ways lives up to the promise. Each chapter has a 'What we have learned' summary at the end. Here you get a distilled reminder of the contents of the chapter, excellent for looking at weeks later.

There are plenty of diagrams and examples and each chapter is broken into smaller digestable chunks. The main sections of the book are :

Introducing UML and UP
Requirements
Analysis
Design
Implementation

The sections actually cover the lifecycle you would follow of your software project and every chapter has a graphical roadmap at the start, depicted as an activity diagram. The Analysis and Design sections are the largest, as you would expect and are full of practical techniques that you can use.

Having personally wrestled with the RUP and tried to take the essential points, we would recommend this book for anyone beginning to get to grips with this subject. This may be the only book you need to understand UML and UP from a practical point of view. The book covers all the essential details in a concise way without being shallow. Jim Arlow and Ila Neustadt should be commended for authoring one of the most readable and usable texts on this complex subject. Buy this book!

Rating:
Summary: very well layed out
Review: This is the first book I have read on this subject. I read various articles I found on the internet that explained the syntax of UML but none of those resources explained how to use it. This is exactly what this book does.

I think what I like most about this book is the way it is set out. The way they have used their numbering system makes it easy to reference back to previous sections of the book. Each chapter ends with a 'what we have learnt' section that is also numbered the same way. Before each chapter starts they provide a uml activity diagram to map out the chapter which I thought was pretty cool.

The book starts out by explaining what UML is and what the UP is, I found the explanations very clear. After that it goes through the steps in UP and explains how to apply UML while going through the unified process.

It covers a lot of information, and the examples are very valuable (they are examples that explain concepts well rather than hard to understand useless examples).

I can't really find any faults in this book I read it from start to finish and enjoyed it. I would like to have seen some more real life examples at the end. There is a sample eCommerce UML model at the end which is good but some more of that would have been good (I find I learn a lot that way).

I won't be needing another book on this subject.