I am not sure how to classify this book! Is it a book for a manager? Maybe! Is it a book for a developer new to mobile application development? Not quite! Is it a book for a hardcore technologist (architect, sr developer, product manager, etc)? Definitely not so.
The content of the book is definitely dated (as of 2006). But, I wouldn't blame the author for this. The field of mobile apps is moving very rapidly. There is a lot of confusion, but, a lot of the smoke is also clearing up. Interesting initiatives like OMA are taking center stage in "clearing up the smoke".
The book is way easy to read. But, that's because it has zero technical content. The book touches a lot of interesting technologies, but doesn't provide details on any. It is my belief that the author could have summarized most of the book in maybe 50 pages, or even less!
The book's biggest value is for somebody new to the field. Its a very quick read. There are tons of web links (again dated, but, some very relevant even today) to consortia, forums, companies involved in mobile application development. I was really hoping that the author would put this list online. But, I haven't found anything similar after searching on the author's name in google.
I usually don't read books word-by-word, line-by-line. I try to grasp the big concepts on the first read. This makes me the worst person to find grammatical mistakes in documents/books. But, even I could find grammatical mistakes on the first (and only) read of this book. The editors need to do a better job next time (if there is a next time).
Author(s): Martyn Mallick
Edition: 1
Publisher: Wiley
Year: 2003
Language: English
Pages: 454
City: Indianapolis, IN