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25 of 25 persons found the following review helpful.
Kind to beginners but also utile generally
By Robin Pain
Faludi is kind to the reader by using simple language in the old school of: tell-them-what-you’re-going-to-say, tell-them and then tell-them-what-you-said.
I purchased the book because altho I am not a beginner to electronics, I am to ZigBee, and I am lazy and want a quick start out to what to get and why and which “start-bugs” to avoid. Faludi does a good occupation here and tries to please every one by including non-Windows based (Mac and Linux) examples where he may (this market is without doubt or question biased towards Windows).
Evidently you could plainly download the free ZigBee spec’ and read it – it is not too boring and took me in regards to four days to scan through it, but for the cheap price, I would commend that even a professional would recover the cost in time saved from this book but plainly he will not be fascinated in the simplistic treatment of how to connect A to B, just the tips and hints and as a quick wide outline for both the spec and the constituents range.
For the beginner this book is magnificent with both diagrams and photographs of how to wire up the half dozen-or-so connections amid one module and another plus very full descriptions + screen shots of how to drive the (mainly Windows based) software.
The firmware example-code is systematically of the simplest-only-to-do-the-principle (there is no cheating by padding with big amounts of code) and gradually the reader is taken into more and more detail with regards to protocols and networking in a painless manner.
A huge amount of work has gone into this book to make it look simple. It is also up to date (late 2010). I highly commend it to anyone.
19 of 21 people found the following review helpful.
Wireless networks made easy
By SFTA
This book is a *must* for any individual working with xBee series 2 radios. After wasting innumerable hours scouring the internet for info on how to update firmware, and configure/interface with the series 2, I found this book to be a godsend. It is simple to follow and distinctly written. The book is broken down into little projects so you may speedily get a network up and running, and then move on to building more spectacular and more sophisticated networks. Without Faludi’s guidance, my xBees would surely be gathering dust on a shelf. I highly commend this book for any person mesmerized in building wireless projects!
9 of 9 persons found the following review helpful.
Great step by step guide…
By Keith & Sunnie
NYU Professor Robert Faludi, has supplied a very easy to follow book tackling the construction of a XBee wireless network, which is not as simple as it may appear. He provides both a step by step guide and a basic understanding/education of the technology involved.
This book starts with describing primary selections around hardware and software to construct a XBee wireless network, Professor Faludi likewise does a quick tutorial on radio transmissions theory and wireless networking. Once you have the bits and pieces set out, Professor Faludi walks through a number of projects helping to build up the readers overall knowledge:
1. A Wireless doorbell
2. Romantic Lighting Sensor
3. Simple Sensor Network
4. Simple Sensor with Sleep Project
He then discusses a XBee Internet Gateway (XIG) project ( see his blog), this opens up the borders by permitting the XBee radios to proxy through the ConnectPort X2 and consequently be accessable by way of the Web.
Next project, a project to Tweat to a XBee. Professor Faludi concludes the book with a review of the ZigBee stack, a list of plans for the ZigBee platform. Finally there is a resource guide for Arduino, Python, ZigBee, Digi, etc.
This book in truth offers a end to end introduction to XBee radio networks and is well worth the time for anybody who is hacking or looking at industrial apps in sensor networks.
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