Pro/ENGINEER Wildfire for Designers Release 2.0

Rating:
Summary: Could not find any error...
Review: B. Tupper made me recheck if I received the correct proe wildfire version 2 book from tickoo or not. Because in my book i did not find the error he has writen in his review. I think he tried to write for another book...

I am liking the tutorials in this book. Thanks to proe company also for making circular array easy in this version.

Rating:
Summary: Could not find errors
Review: Just wanted to state that the errors one of the reviewer mentioned in his review is incorrect. In this textbook, there is nothing like what he mentioned. May be the reviewer forgot to check the name of the book or the release...

Rating:
Summary: Good, but......
Review: Original review, 2 November 2004

Revised 25 January 2005

Turns out my original review was referenced to the wrong edition, and with that I accept the objections which Raks and Nick raised. The problem goes back to Amazon.com, who sent me the wrong book.

That said, much of my original review still holds, though I am raising my evaluation from three to four stars.

This book has much to recommend it--especially for beginners in a classroom situation. However, it has too many errors and omissions to be fully satisfactory for unassisted use by the beginners it targets.

This is a tutorial, not a reference work. That is, going page by page from the beginning to the end, one gets reasonably complete coverage of the main features of Wildfire. However, many features and operations are omitted from discussion or covered only superficially. This would not be a problem in a classroom situation, or if there were an experienced Pro/E user close by to answer questions. But a student working on his own will often be left floundering. It helps if one has recourse to the Pro/E Help Center, though that is unnecessarily difficult to find answers from.

Given the nature of Pro/E and the editorial style of the book, it is not practical to use an edition of the book which is not specific to the particular release of Pro/E. Among other things, PTC Corp is in the process of converting the Menu Manager with its submenus to dialog boxes, so that a student may be misdirected unless matching editions are used.

This edition appears to have fewer errors than the previous one. Still, Mr. Tickoo needs to submit his manuscripts for editing, both of grammar/punctuation and of technical directions, by persons competent in English and in the programs. The language errors are aggravating but do not diminish the technical value of the book. The technical errors and omissions are more serious. The instructions are often incomplete or incorrect to the extent that the indicated operations cannot be completed based on the information given. For example, on page 4-14, Figure 4-24, the student is instructed to select the Edge. That doesn't work. The correct instruction is the corner--the "Vertex." The discussion of the Datum System, perhaps the most difficult and most critical aspect for a working knowledge of Wildfire, is skimpy at best. The examples and instructions given in the text only equip the student to stumble around looking for workable solutions.

The tutorials are for the most part explicit and complete, though sometimes excessively redundant on common features and short on instructions for new or uncommon features. The Exercises, at the end of the chapters after the Tutorials and Review Questions, often rely on operations which are not discussed until a later chapter.

Neverthless, all things considered, I would judge this book as a qualified success--excellent for classroom use or under the tutelage of an experienced user, OK for a resourceful independent beginner willing to poke around for solutions when things don't work as expected.

It should be noted that Mr. Tickoo has provided extensive material on his website supplementing this book. However, those materials work only for the Student/Tryout version of Wildfire, not for the commercial release. A person using the commercial release should obtain a tryout version (free for two months) if he wants take advantage of Mr. Tickoo's supplementary materials.

Rating:
Summary: The students "love" Sham's books...
Review: The students "love" Sham Tickoo's books.. compaired to the other books... these books are FAR-FAR better.... especially when someone is sitting @ a station on their own outside of class time.