I found this book to be a good value, especially when one considers it comes with on-line training at no extra cost! I have just completed both the book and the course, and I believe the combination of the two should simply be considered an extremely useful training package, not just a book.The book:The book itself simply does what it purports to do, i.e., prepare you for the ITIL® v3 Foundation exam as it actually teaches you the fundamentals of the ITIL®. I’ve not taken the exam, yet; however, I have no doubt I’m well prepared for it. I did get frustrated over several typographical errors. These are distracting at most and do not take away from the book’s usefulness. I did find one question, too, that I’m sure has the wrong answer attributed to it. I could have cleared that up with The Art of Service, but I considered it of little consequence, anyway.The On-Line Course:I chose to take the on-line course, which is really a series of narrated slide presentations, after studying the book. In that way, the course served as a review of the material, and I did find it easy to follow along, with some exceptions as discussed below. I also liked the fact that I could stop the presentation at any time and take notes, review the book, etc. I did find a few useful diagrams and even a complete chapter presented in the on-line course that do not exist in the book. An example: The final on-line chapter is “Supporting Tools and Technology”, which is not in the book. I have no idea if this is even relevant to the exam; however, it really just means you should definitely take advantage of the on-line course.So why not five stars? The typos, missing information, and also I was a bit annoyed that the on-line presentation of material within some chapters was often presented in a completely different order than it was in the book. It made following along rather confusing at times. The quality of some of the diagrams in the book and the way they attempted to present the information were rather amateurish at best, downright confusing at worst and difficult to interpret. For me, they sometimes slowed me down as I sat there trying to figure out what they were trying to show. It also appeared they were made for color presenations but reproduced in black and white. Shaded coding of the material just didn’t work very well, but color certainly would have! Maybe I’m just slow, but good graphics should be more self-explanatory than that! Still four stars because the whole package works and works well.Bottom Line:Based on my experiences, thus far, and other reviews, I would have to say this was a good choice for me, and I have no doubt that I am prepared to take the exam and proceed further down the road to other ITIL® certifications.
Read more about The Book and the CourseGreat Value!, August 11, By Paul S. Wolf
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