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| The Chicago Manual of Style, 15th Edition | 
 enlarge | Creator: Staff Of The University Of Chicago Press
Publisher: University Of Chicago Press
Discount Category: Book
Selling Price: $60.00
Buy New: $40.00
Potential Savings: $20.00 (33%)
New (2) from $40.00
Customer Ratings:  7 comments
Platforms: Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows 2000, Windows Xp
Media: CD-ROM
Edition: 15th
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 973
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (pounds): 0.2
Dimensions (inch): 7.6 x 5.4 x 0.6
ISBN: 0226104044
Dewey Decimal Number: 808.0270973
EAN: 9780226104041
Publication Date: September 15, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Comments:
| Showing comments 1-5 of 7 | | NEXT » |
 Buy the Book October 9, 2007
Is a required book for a class in grad school. Really, really, really wish I would've bought the book instead. Yes, the book is big...but e-version is so difficult and frustrating to use, (and I'm fairly technical,) that I end up going to their website instead. A disappointing waste of money.
Save Your Money July 17, 2007
7 out of 7 found this comment useful.
The Chicago Manual of Style is a standard worth having in print. However, the electronic version is the worst electronic implementation of any book that I have ever seen. There is no excuse for that in this day and age. It makes U of C look very childish and unprofessional. In addition to the problems already mentioned, I add these:
(1) The font appears to be a fixed-size bitmap font that is just blown up by making the pixels larger to get the right size. The text on my high resolution monitor is barely legible. Unprofessional doesn't even begin to describe this.
(2) The interface is useless. By default when you start up the program the application is maximized. Most people will not want that as you can only view a section at a time which means that 95% of the screen will be wasted white space. You can double-click on the title bar and resize but the left side of the application is taken up by a table of contents and tabbed dialog with bookmarks and search results. These do not resize themselves when you resize the application, so you are basically stuck with a full screen application and fonts that are the worst I have ever seen in a fairly expensive electronic book. (3) Cosmetically there are lots of problems, like interface parts that don't line up and screen refresh problems that often cause you to have to restart the application. This was clearly thrown together by someone who had zero self respect and no concern for quality of work. Typical these days I guess.But I have never seen something this bad from a respected publisher.
Get the print edition. It is great. But avoid the electronic edition like the plague. It is a waste of good money. If zero stars was an option that is what I would give it. It is sad that a well-known book publisher is willing to put this kind of garbage out and have the nerve to actually charge more for it than the print edition. Shame on you U od C.
 Nice to have the resource portable/offline, but interface needs improvement January 13, 2007
26 out of 26 found this comment useful.
I own the book, but as a freelance editor, I wanted something I could take on the road with me when I travel. I did the trial of the online membership, and it is nice, but not when you're sitting somewhere without internet access. The CD-ROM seemed like the perfect solution.
Unfortunately the implementation leaves much to be desired. When I first installed the software, it worked fine, but the next time I loaded it, the pane with the table of contents and search results had disappeared and I couldn't get it back. I tried reinstalling and it still didn't work, rendering the program essentially useless. I e-mailed CMS customer support and they never wrote back. Eventually about a month later I happened to check their site again and found that they had posted a CD-ROM update file (which wasn't originally up there when I first had the problem). Installing this update did fix the problem, but it would have been nice if they had responded to my e-mail.
Now the CD-ROM does basically fit my needs--I do like having that heavy reference volume in a portable format on my computer. However, the one thing that is really annoying is the searching capability. In the software, if you search for multiple words, it searches for that exact phrase in that order--it does not do an "and" search on the separate words. It gives you an option to do an advanced search on a word, which lets you do an "and," "or," or "not" search, but limits you to just two keywords--the one keyword and the modifier keyword. If you try to search by more than one word in either the search term or modifier box, it pops up an error message that says "Advanced Search does not accept phrases"! How annoying is that, to only be able to search by two single words.
When I'm online, I actually use CMS's web search interface--I like seeing the Q&A results, and I still find the online search easier to use and more comprehensive because it does a normal "and" web search by as many words as you want to enter. This makes it much easier to find what I am looking for. Then, to read an article, I go look it up by article number in the software!
Despite the annoyances, I would still recommend it to anyone who needs portable, offline access to this reference. Just be aware of the shortcomings.
Defective Software January 11, 2007
12 out of 13 found this comment useful.
On my computer, the InstallShield-based installation program crashes halfway through the installation process. I contacted the support staff at the University of Chicago Press. They asked for information about my computer and said they were working on the problem. After weeks of waiting, I was finally informed that the software is simply defective and given an address where I could send the CD for a refund. Very disappointing.
 Tastes great--less filling December 3, 2006
14 out of 15 found this comment useful.
Like the other 2 reviewers, I agree it would be better to see whole pages of the book at a time (I suppose I'd really rate it 4 1/2 stars). But does that flaw make the product a flop? Heck no! Not only can you do searches, but when you click on an item in the index and read the page you're sent to, you can get right back to the same entry in the index. That sure beats flipping around in the (heavy) printed volume. And if you take your laptop to the coffee shop to do your work, like I do, you'll appreciate having your CMS along without the added weight.
I found the interface very intuitive. Three features that will be quite useful are bookmarking, notes, and highlighting. It's nice to be able to "mark up" my CMS without actually writing in a book.
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