Windows machines are becoming more Mac-like and Macs adopt more Windows features every day, but a considerable gulf remains between the two popular consumer platforms. Macintosh Windows Integration: Integrating Your MacIntosh With Windows 95/98 and Windows NT Environments explains how to get work done in an environment that includes both kinds of computers.

As an aid to those with experience in only one kind of computer's networking conventions, there's coverage on networking Macs and a separate chapter on networking Windows machines. After laying that groundwork, the book dives into cross- platform networking with TCP/IP and other protocols.

You'll find explicit procedures accompanied by lots of screen shots that show how to fit a Mac into a nest of Windows boxes and vice versa. There's a very helpful section on hooking one Mac to a single Windows computer via a null modem cable or crossover Ethernet cable, as well as some documentation of Virtual PC, SoftWindows and hardware-based solutions for running PC software on the Mac. There's a lot of information here about Unix machines, too. --David Wall

Topics covered: Exchanging files on floppy disks, converting files with special software, reconciling differences in filename conventions and setting up multiple partitions on storage devices.