In this issue

"HTTP Pocket Reference" by Clinton Wong and "Apache Pocket Reference" by Andrew Ford are two new additions to the O'Reilly Pocket Reference series with sixteen other titles to its name.

For those who are unfamiliar with this series, they are small handy quick reference books measuring 4.25 by 7 inches. These two books have only one body; divided into main sections and not chapters. The sections are not numbered and continue on the same page where the previous section ends, giving the impression that both books contain only one long chapter.

On its back cover, O'Reilly markets the "Apache Pocket Reference" as a companion volume to "Writing Apache Modules with Perl and C" and "Apache: The Definitive Guide, 2nd Edition". With only 111 pages and 18 main sections, the content kick off with a clear explanation of the typographical conventions used, followed by a brief outline of the command-line options for starting and stopping Apache. Then it lists all the directories, support utilities and modules that are included in the Apache web server distribution together with short descriptions.

We think this short and compendious book is most suitable for solution providers and professional services personnel who are working with Apache web server and constantly on the move, as it is packed with technical information, highly portable, fits snugly in back pocket or jacket pocket and can be whipped out in a second when one Apache directive keeps eluding the mind. It is truly the constant companion for die-hard Apache users and like it or not, the copy you own will soon have dog-eared pages.

Moving on to our next book, "HTTP Pocket Reference" is aimed at providing a better understanding of HTTP for busy people such as system administrators, web site designers and developers, not to mention software engineers who need to grasp the gist of this subject without spending too much time poring over it. For such a thin book, it manages to cram technical facts, dumps of HTTP transactions, many diagrams and tables within only 80 pages.

This book is the perfect starting point for curious and uninitiated Web surfers who want to deepen their knowledge of how it all works. For the technical professional, this will serve as the quick reference guide to server response codes, HTTP headers, character encoding, and Internet MIME types.

These two books have been such a joy to review we are now anxiously awaiting the imminent publication of the next of these guides, the mod_perl Pocket Reference - which will of course review if they send us a free copy.

[Read our full review of both books]

It's August and our colleagues at O'Reilly have given us four copies of each of their books "Apache Pocket Reference" and "HTTP Pocket Reference" to give away to help us celebrate. For a chance to get your hands on a copy of each of these books, answer this simple question:

Which one of the following is not an Apache-XML project
A) Xerces, B) Xalan, or C) Xena

Send your answer (A, B, or C) to warriorprincess@apacheweek.com to reach us no later than August 15th 2000. Your e-mail address will not be used for anything other than to let you know if you won. Four winners will be drawn at random from all correct entries submitted, one entry per person, no cash alternative, editors' decision is final, so there.

Our feature on the Appaloosa Awards has been updated to include some pictures of the winners. The Appaloosa Awards were announced at the O'Reilly Open Source Conference. The winners included ASF members Ryan Bloom, Lars Eilebrecht, Roy Fielding, Doug McEachern, Dirk-Willem Van Guilik on behalf of Apache XML projects, and Rasmus Lerdorf on behalf of the PHP team.

Apache Site: www.apache.org/httpd
Release: 1.3.12 (Released 25^th February 2000) (local download sites)
Beta: None
Alpha: 2.0a4 (Released 7^th June 2000) (local download sites)

Apache 1.3.12 is the current stable release. Users of Apache 1.3.11 and earlier on Unix and Windows systems should upgrade to this version. Read the Guide to 1.3.12, the Guide to 1.3.11 for information about changes between 1.3.9 and 1.3.11 and the Guide to 1.3.9 for information about changes between 1.3.6 and 1.3.9.

A number of additions and fixes have been made to Apache 1.3.12 with a view to releasing Apache 1.3.13 sometime in August

A series of alpha releases of Apache 2.0 are being made available from the Apache site. The latest alpha is due to be released today and has a number of additions and fixes since the fourth alpha released at the start of June. The Apache alpha series have shown themselves to be quite stable, but should still not be considered even beta-quality code.

In this section we highlight some of the latest articles on the web that are of interest to Apache users. Ryan Bloom's latest article in Apache Today gives a concise guide on how to setup and compile Apache 2.0.

The Developer Shed kick off their series about PHP in "PHP 101 (Part 1) - Secret Agent Man". With a strange James Bond feel the article covers variables, operators and the include() function call.