Mumps Books

I am a programmer in the MUMPS language. I used this book for my on the job training. The book is set up for any level of skill, easy to read and understand. Every chapter is arranged in teaching modules to assist the learner in mastery. There are lots of examples and exercises with answers for self pace learning. Well worth getting.

I am a big fan of this book...it is one of my best childhood memories, reading this book at the library over and over again and then realizing that i could check it out too and read it at home. a lovely little story for kids to read on halloween or any time if they love witches and cats. the illustrations are adorable as well.

Most of us are used to reading a book or article, and then wondering what it said. We read 5 or 10 or 200 pages - and then don't have any new ideas or information. This book is the opposite. Crammed into its pages are dozens of specific methods for evaluating and improving your M routines. From file design to CPU processing to user interactions. The ideas are real, the methods given are clear and very applicable. In a word, they work ! Highly recommended.

I have an admission to make: I'm a secret golf geek. Yeah, I golf. I'm not very good at it, but I love it. And I watch golf, a lot of golf. I can tell you if you have a wicked reverse pivot or are swinging outside-in.

And I absolutely loved this book. I laughed my grass off. If you liked the Eddie Caminetti books or the Caddyshack or Tin Cup movies, you must read this book.

Sentell has whipped up a golf farce that resonates like a clubhead's *ping* after a lovely ball strike. It's obvious from that Sentell is both an insider and a devotee of golf. Anyone who watches a little bit of golf, like bits of the final round of the Masters on alternate years, will snort at the golf snarks in this book. If you watch the Golf Channel with any frequency, you'll loooooove this book.

I gave this book to my dad for Father's Day last year, and he loved it. If your dad even occasionally golfs, then this book is a great Daddy-Day gift.

TK Kenyon

Even die-hard worshipers at the shrine of Augusta National will never watch the Master's the same way again once they've read Toonamint of Champions, a hilarious send-up of the hallowed event written by Georgia golf writer Todd Sentell.

Sentell puts a cast of outrageous characters both inside and outside the sacred grounds where golf's elite meet each spring to celebrate the game. Playing a round at Augusta is every golfer's fondest dream--and one that will never, ever come true for 99.99999% of us. But Sentell's Waymon Poodle, a daydreamer from Mullet Luv, Georgia, manages the feat in a way that defies description in a family book review.

Toonamint of Champions is the perfect read for Master's weekend. I suggest you don't try to multi-task and read it while you're waiting for Zach Johnson to line up his putts on TV, though. You just might end up laughing so hard you'll miss the winning stroke.

The Augusta National golf club deserves a pie in the face, a big foamy white sloppy cream pie.

I have never swung a golf club in my life, and at my age, not likely ever to do so. However, I am an avid watcher of golf and enjoy the Master's Tournament at Augusta National Golf Club for the high level of play of the entrants. However, for me at least, the members of the organization itself equally fascinate me.

Based on the snobbery scale, only those at level seven and above need apply. Hootie Johnson, from his Augusta National throne, issued edicts to the rest of the world. Fortunately, they apply only to Augusta National or we would by now be fighting world war three with nine irons and pitching wedges.

The members must be of the hoity-toity, the elite, or royalty and must be male (I chose "male" instead of "men" because there may be doubt about orientations). Hootie Johnson, then Augusta National Emperor descended the throne to say that Augusta National will not have commercials interrupting the Masters Tournament. Magnanimously, it would please the viewers - the little people - he implied as the reason rather than the organizations sexist attitudes.

With Toonamint of Champions, Todd Sentell has delivered the pie in the face that Augusta National has so long deserved. It is an out of the box comedic romp through all of the mores so treasured by the snobby club. Even the names of the unforgettable characters Sentell conjures up for this novel thumbs a nose at them, Waymon Poodle, Mullet Georgia, LaJuanita Mumps and the clincher, Emiglio Rafsoolicicki.

Don't try to read this book to drop off to sleep with. Chances are you'll stay awake until you've finished it and even then the comedic images Sentell has created will float across your mind and you'll wake up laughing again.

Five stars for Toonamint of Champions, six if there is such a level.

Red Evans author On IceOn Ice

Sentell's book is charming and witty and not just for those who follow golf. Treat yourself to a humorous respite from all the bad news on TV and curl up with TOONAMINT OF CHAMPIONS. You'll find yourself laughing out loud at the absurdity.

I always wondered what went on within the bastion of the golfing world...and now I know! Apparently it's full of some of the most outrageous and truly original characters, all brought to life by Todd in a blaze of comic color. The humor is terrific fun, slapstick and side splitting and whether you have feelings for the institution of golf or not, you will love what Todd has bravely done to it!

The book is a good reference of MUMPS as far as it goes, but lets face it MUMPS is a disease that should be vaccinated against. It is a programming language/database/operating system that has worse syntax than BASIC and encourages nothing more than unmaintainable code. Go out and buy yourself a good Java book instead and be part of the future instead of the dusty ancient past.

How true it is that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing! The reader from Tucson is obviously mistaking the MUMPS he 'knows' from the seventies with the completely different language it is today. Sure, it's early incarnations didn't enforce the tidiest code, but only an ignorant person would advise you against a new BMW because he didn't like the Ford Model T! Since Intersystems have taken MUMPS over the language has seriously matured into what is today - now known as CACHÉ. It can fully integrate with Java (which is NOT a database language by the way), and one can develop extremely powerful web-enabled, object-oriented database applications with very little code at all! Moreover, it is easier to maintain than many other languages I know. I suggest he should, like you dear reader, take a look at CACHÉ (the 'Best New Database of 1998' according to Deloitte and Touche) and discover how you can speed up your existing SQL database applications by a factor of 20 without having to change any code at all! Ancient and dusty? Mature, reliable, innovative and still the fastest is more like it.

Speaking from the standpoint of a professional MUMPS programmer, I would like to point out that I originally learned MUMPS using only this book and the source code of the MUMPS-based operating system used at my place of work. I come from a background of C/C++ and ASM programming and found this book to be more concise, more readable, and far easier to understand than almost any other programming guide that I've ever owned or read.

That said, I'll move on to the poorer points of the publication: firstly, this book is not altogether complete in its presentation of aspects of the language. While most of the basic functions and commands are covered in decent detail, the book does not see fit to include some of the more advanced (and useful) ways of utilizing them, although some of these methods are covered in partial detail in the second portion of the book -- which brings me to my second bone of contention.

The book is divided into two logical sections: the definitions of the commands, functions, operators, and base functionalities of the language (extending into about 25%-30% of the pages), and the "everything else" section of the material. This type of structure is fine -- if the second section is logically organized and planned, that is. Instead, the reader finds themselves immersed in descriptions of topics and snippets of source code that seem to fit the heading of the chapter, but only if the reader thinks very hard about it first -- definitely not the sign of a good guide.

The author partly makes up for this with an excellent set of appendices and index, but the final, two-page treatment of "programming style" is exactly the sort of monstrosity that makes people think that MUMPS is an old, disorganized language.

In short, buy this book if you want to learn MUMPS or if you need a decent quick reference guide. But stay away from the back half of the book!

Although it is not the best written book in the world, it does accomplish its task of introducing the reader to the MUMPS language. In addition it is one of the few book available for MUMPS. Despite the previous review, MUMPS is still widely used today (especially in medical and insurance fields). Speaking from personal experience it can also be on of the cleanest and fastest ways to program a large database.