Firewall-1 is a complex product which makes the approach taken by Essential Check Point Firewall-1 particularly welcome. Basically, the author presents a series of heavily annotated pictorial mini-tutorials which take you from installation, through configuration, management and on to troubleshooting.

Each tutorial covers a specific feature, shows you how to access it within Firewall-1, what the options mean, which you can ignore under certain conditions and sensible default settings. In practice, the author goes much further, detailing the effects various settings have with and without other software, services and even product licences.

The author's advice on how to develop rule sets is welcome, nearly as much so as the detailed discussions on implementing them, which requires a reasonable understanding of how the rules will affect the user experience along with the network's security. Perhaps the most apposite section, though, covers the many supported authentication methods in Firewall-1. This is as thorough as the section on arranging secure external access to the firewall management software for sysadmins.

All in all, Essential Check Point Firewall-1 is a remarkably accessible book for anyone who has to administer Check Point's bestselling firewall solution. This is highly recommended. --Steve Patient