I was asked by PACKT Publishing to review a new Lync 2013 book authored by Fabrizio Volpe called Getting Started with Microsoft Lync Server 2013. I have never done a book review before and figured it was a good start doing a review on a getting started book :)

About the book

The book was written by Fabrizio Volpe and was published July 2013. Going to the official landing site you will find that it is available both in print and as an e-book and sports 122 pages. You will also find the following overview

• Understand and deliver the top required features such as Enterprise Voice, Persistent Chat, and mobility with step-by-step guides
• Deploy a working environment applying load balancing and fault tolerant solutions
• Create a collaborative space around the user’s needs, containing all the information and document history using the Persistent Chat Server

The book is aimed at system administrators, IT pros, unified communication technicians, and decision makers in companies or in the consultancy business.

My thoughts on the book

I found the book very accessible. It tells you how to implement Lync and at the same time goes through

• Best Practice configuration
• core technology without going to deep
  • will refer you to TechNet or good blog posts on the subject if you are interested in learning more
• the steps for installing Lync in the correct order without too much jumping back and forth

It is fast paced, straight to the point in installing the core features and it is easy to follow throughout. I reads like a well written blog post series, and I like it since I tend to find to the point blog posts more accessible than the more thorough and sometimes vague TechNet type articles.

My recommendation

I would recommend this book to an IT-administrator or someone tasked with getting to know Lync and who wants to implement it in a lab and do it correct the first time. It is as it says in the title, a good starting point in to the world of Lync 2013 core technology. I would say it is not so much for Lync professionals or decision makers since it will not go deep enough in to the technology or discuss Lync as a state of the art Unified Communications experience in detail.

I did not make any money doing this review, I only got access to the e-book for a read-through in order to write the review.