A review of the O'Reilly hacks books from The Financial Express: It's time to hone your hacking skills, legally

As much as I'd like to, I'm not buying the O'Reilly hacks books.

I recently looked through two of the hack titles: Mapping Hacks and Google Maps Hacks (I'm interested in learning more about mapping technology so that I can write a GPS app for my Windows Mobile device).

To be in a neutral territory, most of the hack titles that involve code have decided to work mostly with Linux-based software, some of which might work for Windows (e.g., some perl scripts might just run).

Or sometimes they use Java.

And of course, this is completely within O'Reilly's right to decide on what technology to use as the foundation of their titles. I first used O'Reilly titles when I was an X11 Windows System widget-based GUI guy. Loved them books.

But now the cash in my pocket stays where it is more often then not when I'm flipping through the latest O'Reilly book. I can't use it and life is getting so incredibly complex that I no longer engage in the joy of porting code from one platform to work on another. I think that O'Reilly is missing out.

And as soon as another publisher brings out quality work that I can use in my world of Windows and IE, the cash is going to spring right out of my pocket and into their pocket.