In "The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs," Carmine Gallo provides a framework for you to deliver a keynote like Steve does. The book provides both an Al Michaels and John Madden perspective of Jobs's keynotes: a play-by-play account of events married with analytical insight.

While rich in detailing the stylistics of Jobs's presentations and the empirical evidence supporting it -- for example, limiting bullet points on slides, using simple language, and using the rule of threes to enhance a narrative -- the most captivating portion of the book is how it details Steve Jobs's preparation for his keynotes. Yes, even Steve Jobs, like the rest of us, must prepare for his preparations presentations.

And prepare he does, which is evident in the stories of Paul Vais. An executive at Jobs's former company NeXT (that Apple later acquired, which brought Jobs back into the Apple fold), Vais recalled that "every slide was written like a piece of poetry...[and that] Steve would labor over the presentation. We'd try to orchestrate and choreograph everything and make it more alive than it really is." However, Gallo says that "making your presentation 'more alive' takes practice. Once you accept this simple principle, your presentations will stand out in a sea of mediocrity."

Gallo's book follows many of the "Jobsian" presentation mantras he preaches. Like a Steve Jobs keynote, the book is simple to read and provides an easy-to-follow roadmap for a reference-minded reader. The one thing that most readers will walk away with is that Steve Jobs's on-stage presence evinces a style similar to that of Apple's products when they're on the stage of the showroom floor or marketed on Apple's website. As a result, as much as it serves as a Steve Jobs presentation guidebook, "The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs" in many ways is a Steve Jobs biography.

"The Presentation Secrets of Steve Jobs" is available at many booksellers, including Borders, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble.

With the introduction of iWeb '09, Apple pumped up the volume on its entry-level website authoring tool, making it more functional and flexible for novice users while adding enough power -- multi-site publishing options, FTP upload to unlock users from MobileMe, more capable RSS/podcasting tools and widgets, and links to social media sites like Facebook -- to merit a second look alongside midrange/prosumer apps like Sandvox, RapidWeaver, Flux & Freeway. Since the app is included in iLife '09 and bundled with every new Mac, it's likely to be the authoring app of first resort for many Mac users.

If you want to get the most out of your iWeb '09 site, we're proud to say there's one guy who has your back: our own Steve Sande, who has revised his Take Control of iWeb ebook for the latest iLife version. The $10US digital title (also sold in printed form for $23.99) reviews all the new features, covers advanced tricks and techniques, and walks the reader through the creation of a sample site (online here). Steve did a great interview about the book on Chuck Joiner's MacVoices podcast last week.

In the interest of sharing the iWeb love (and thanks to Tonya & Adam Engst at TidBITS Publishing), we've got an exclusive discount on Steve's ebook just for TUAW readers. Follow this referral link to place your order (be sure to click the big orange "Buy eBook" button) and you'll get a 30% discount off the ebook; it's normally $10US, but for you? $7. 143 pages + an appendix worth of iWeb goodness -- enjoy!

If you just can't get enough of books from current and former TUAW team members, you can check out Steve's guide to making the most of your classic iPod, Scott McNulty's WordPress book, or multiple titles on iPhone development and maximizing your iPhone/iPod touch from Erica Sadun.

Many TUAW readers have probably bought an iPhone app and had the thought "I could do better than this!" go through their minds. Sometimes you're wondering when someone else is going to write an app to do just the thing you want to do with your iPhone or iPod touch.

Carla Kay White was one of these people. She had an idea for a "Gratitude Journal", where you keep track of the everyday things you're grateful for. It's a great concept, and it can keep your spirits up when a prescription antidepressant fails you. Carla was writing her gratitude into a paper journal when she realized that her iPhone was just the platform for this tool. One problem, though – Carla didn't have any iPhone programming skills.

What she did have was a good idea, a background in project management, and some minor funding to bring her concept to light on the iPhone. Inside Secrets to an iPhone App is a short (88 page) tome that not only tells the story of how she brought Gratitude Journal (click opens iTunes) to market, but how anyone with an idea for an iPhone app can do the same.


Apple was kind enough to include a veritable encyclopedia of information with my Apple ][. Inside the big, red manual, you'll find complete step-by-step instructions for setting up the machine, adjusting a tape recorder for optimal use, plenty of programs to get you started, and a handy reference for the hardware inside.

I found the manual easy to read, although given the constraints of typing programs by hand using a typewriter, some code was printed using a dot matrix printer. Mr. Wozniak includes excellent code to help you build your own programs, however, and code for interfacing with the likes of a teletype, should you need printed output. There are critical routines for floating point calculations, which I'm sure some will appreciate.

Apple introduces a little design philosophy in the manual, which is a welcome break from the volumes used to learn the 5100, for example. Rumors on our sister site Engadget say Tandy is working on a consumer machine with BASIC and a human-readable manual as well, but I'll believe that when I see it. Anyway, the Apple ][ manual has some sample code for making actual audio tones using the built-in speaker (a novel idea, by the way). Why use audio in a program? Here's the design philosophy I found interesting:

"Computers can perform marvelous feats of mathematical computation at well beyond the speed capable of most human minds. They are fast, cold and accurate; man on the other hand is slower, has emotion, and makes errors. These differences create problems when the two interact with one another. So to reduce this problem humanizing of the computer is needed. Humanizing means incorporating within the computer procedures that aid in a computer's usage. One such technique is the addition of a tone subroutine."

It's like they want to make the computer more *personal*, somehow.

Once you've seen how to make graphics, sounds and even interaction and I/O in code, the manual wraps up with a thorough examination of the included hardware. This is a hobbyists' machine, after all. The schematics and diagrams will have you fully understanding how the computer addresses memory and controls video, plus many other miracles I can't believe they crammed into such a small package.

This valuable red book of data comes free with your Apple ][, but I wouldn't part with it! You'll find yourself referring to it time and again. Check out the photostat gallery below for a few sample pages.

Gallery: Apple II Manual

I've never found book reviews to be terribly helpful -- technical book reviews even less so, as how one learns differs from person to person. Some iPhone devs out there learned simply by poring over Apple's copious documentation. Others have been poking at the iPhone's innards since pre-SDK days, learning as they went from forums and good old hacking. But once the NDA lifted, the floodgates of iPhone dev books opened.

Each book and each publisher has a different angle both in content and presentation. Each book may appeal to different people and different learning styles with different backgrounds (not to mention the numerous sites, blogs and video resources out there beyond what Apple provides). Over the course of 2009 we'll be taking a look at some books in a new series called TUAW Bookshelf. We won't just be covering developer resources, either. There's a wide world of Apple-related reading out there, so stay tuned as we pull from our personal libraries and share our thoughts on what's available.

To kick things off I read iPhone in Action by Christopher Allen and Shannon Appelcline, published by Manning. I wound up reading this first because one of the authors threw a few copies at me while at Macworld (sorry, I don't know who you are and I can't seem to find your business card!). We've got a few to give away, but look for that in another post this month.

iPhone in Action is designed to be a soup-to-nuts intro to almost everything you can develop for the iPhone. This includes web apps, which was the book's main focus until the SDK was announced while they were writing. I don't think shifting focus to the SDK is a bad thing, and as near as I can tell it didn't hurt the content. In fact, I thought this book would make an excellent primer to Apple's mobile platform efforts. Having taught technology for six years, I can say this is the book I'd use for a 100-level course in developing for the iPhone. I'm not saying it will make you into an expert overnight, and I'm not saying you can't come to the table with zero dev experience, but as a starting point, it is wonderful. To find out why, keep reading...