Publisher's Synopsis
1. 1 TwoFundamentalQuestions There are two fundamental questions that should be answered before buying, and even more before reading, a book: Why should one read the book? What is the book about? This is the reason why this section, the ?rst of the whole text, proposes some motivations for potential readers (Section 1. 1. 1) and an overall description of the content (Section 1. 1. 2). If the answers are convincing, further information can be found in the rest of this chapter: Section 1. 2 shows in detail the str- ture of the book, Section 1. 3 presents some features that can help the reader to better move through the text, and Section 1. 4 provides some reading tracks targeting speci?c topics. 1. 1. 1 Why Should One Read The Book? One of the most interesting technological phenomena in recent years is the di?usion of consumer electronic products with constantly increasing acqui- tion, storage and processing power. As an example, consider the evolution of digital cameras: the ?rst models available in the market in the early nineties produced images composed of 1. 6 million pixels (this is the meaning of the expression 1. 6 megapixels), carried an onboard memory of 16 megabytes, and had an average cost higher than 10,000 U. S. dollars. At the time this book is being written, the best models are close to or even above 8 megapixels, have internal memories of one gigabyte and they cost around 1,000 U. S. dollars.
