The first inspection of the book was disappointing. After further reading I appreciated the detail on subjects on which I wanted to know more, but found it too much on subjects where I only wanted to have an overview.

This thick book (668 large pages) is aimed at students. The title of the book is misleading, because the book deals with computer and network architecture, based on Client/Server systems. The book has 13 chapters, covering client and server hardware and software, middleware and network (LAN and WAN) issues, not forgetting new web technologies, with a good chapter on security. After each chapter there is a set of questions and activities, followed by an article from LAN Times with case study questions.

For a student the book might be hard going because of the too many abbreviations and details. It is hard to filter the real important bits without professional experience. Because of the enormous technical detail on concepts, protocols and product names, some details will be quickly out of date. References to other sources of information would have put the information in a perspective. A larger index would have helped to refer back to unknown terms. I could often not find terms in the index.

You can probably give a good course based on the material presented, but it requires careful selection of the sections to be covered and assignments for the students. It takes a considerable time to read the whole text. I prefer a more concise style.