ISP Survival Guide: Strategies for Running a Competitive ISP (ISBN 0471314994)

Amazon.com Review:
Running a successful Internet Service Provider (ISP) requires excellence in many areas. Good ISPs must keep on top of all the technical issues involved in high-traffic Internet connectivity. They must deal with the public, including its most technically incompetent segments. On top of all that, they have to make a profit in a competitive business environment. ISP Survival Guide does a good job of explaining all sides of the industry. Rather than tie his book to the specifics of particular hardware and software products, Geoff Huston explains ISP technologies without implementation details. He writes at great length about the various interior and exterior routing protocols without mentioning specific products. He also covers the pros and cons of various data-transmission technologies, including ATM, ISDN, Frame Relay, and other systems, in addition to analog modems. Huston pays attention to quality of service issues--a subject that is not well covered elsewhere. ISP Survival Guide also provides insight into the business aspects of running an ISP. Huston provides specific dollar figures that you can use to estimate capital equipment purchase costs and per-account annual maintenance costs. The book also contains advice on doing business with other providers that you're connecting to. --David Wall

misleading title:
This book misses the point, written by techie who worked for a University network that was sold to telco which vowed to crush every ISP in the country, the title is somewhat ironical. This dude has never managed a real commercial ISP in the business sense. Other then a few technical tid bits you should already know it offers little in the way of "survival strategies". Maybe that's the point if you expect to survive in the business world focusing on router protocols and authentication servers your days are numbered. If you are thinking of setting up an ISP this book covers some of the basics your technical people should already know inside out. If you are looking for advise on survival in the current market place forget it. I would recommend browsing through the cisco online documentation its free and more up to date for technical details and freshmeat its related sites and debian.org for linux info. This book is dating quickly as you would expect an internet book to do, emerging trends in adsl, 3rd gen gsm etc didn't really exist when written.

A call to reason:
Readers who found this book lucid and helpful must be part of the editorial staff or the publisher's company. After reading other's negative comments and passing them off as cursory and badly evaluated, I bought the book anyway. To my surprise, the negative comments were understated. The book was poorly written, has enormous gaps in the telecommunications area as related to the practical buildout of an ISP at both the hardware and business level. I returned the book after 10 days of thorough and painful reading. I cannot recommend someone spend money on this book. My apologies to the author but this is an honest response. The author could also use a few more years of grammar and composition before he publishes another book. I'm sure he knows his field but he simply cannot communicate it.

Good outline, but a mediocre execution.:
This book succeeds as a handbook--it is truly comprehensive. Unfortunately, it lacks depth in virtually every topic, and the writing is unacceptable--where was the editor? Anyone in a management position within an ISP--or consulting for one--will be most effective in their job if they are familiar with the material in this book. Starting with the history of the Internet, it zips through a quick introduction of TCP/IP and immediately becomes bogged down in an interminably long and obtuse discussion of routing (Perlman is both easier to read and more detailed). A tortuous 45 page discussion of VPNs concludes with a terse and useful 8-word definition. In spite of its flaws, it manages to at least touch on telecom technology, QoS, security, the role of the Internet authorities, and relationships between ISPs. The majority of ISP product offerings are discussed, and it includes a lengthy discussion of ISP business models. Everything is here but marketing, which is covered in a different Wiley text. The book tries to be all things to all people, but specialists in any of the areas discussed, from technology to business, could find a better, more specific source, and it could easily be half this length without losing any information. A usable handbook would be twice this size, and half as prolix. Until such a text exists, I reluctantly recommend this one. Skim it if you have to, but if you work in the business you should be familiar with everything in this book.

Gran recurso de investigación para redes ISP:
El libro muestra paso a paso las diferentes necesidades y actividades necesarias para diseñar una infraestructura ISP. Comenzando desde los aspectos teóricos de arquitectura, infraestrucutra, ruteo, administración de red, seguridad, etc; hasta los aspectos legales u organizacionales del ambiente Internet-ISP. A mi criterio, temas que faltaron fueron: Primero modelos matemáticos y/o prácticos para el dimensionamiento de las troncales telefónicas (acceso dial up) y ancho de banda WAN . Segundo diferentes posibilidades y escenarios de interconexión internacional. Este último aspecto basado en ISPs fuera de los Estados Unidos. Como conclusión es un libro ideal para estudiantes de ingeniería con bases intermedias de internetworking.

General book for non specialist:
I am non american, so that I can't evaluate the style of the author or his business capacity... Nevertheless, I think that this is one of the few books on this topic who presents a general view on ISP architecture and business. If someone knows an other book on this topic, I am interested in!! It's not a book for specialist, you must not expect to configure cisco routers with it. But if you already know the basic of networks, it's a good introduction to ISP