publications

itSMF has gone to RFP for a publisher for itSMF's own publications. The relationship with Van Haren has ended (Along with finally prying the brand from itSMFUK's grasp, dissociating from VHP is another of the old itSMF roots falling away. Watch with interest for VHP's next moves - they are likely to be canny ones). I doubt itSMFI are rushing into TSO's arms.

How many revisions of the ITIL V3 Foundation syllabus have we had since Passing Your ITIL Foundation Exam was published? It must be pretty badly out of date by now. [Update: TSO's ITIL Foundation Handbook was revised in June 2009 to fully comply with the May updates. But Passing Your ITIL Foundation Exam is still dated November 2007.
Update update: A new version of the book is reportedly in review]

[Updated 18th September 2009, wrong ISO20000 book] With seemingly everyone gouging the ITIL user these days, is there an alternative for those of us who can't just (or just can't) get the boss to pay the exorbitant prices? You bet.

[A couple of years ago the IT Skeptic wrote of my first impressions of the ITIL V3 five core books. That article is no longer available online, so I have revised it and reprinted it here]

As discussed in my review of the Service Strategy book, it will take considerable time to really digest these books and their implications, and to test the chisel of theory against the cold hard rock of reality (none more so than that Service Strategy book).

But first impressions can be drawn now and they are good ones.

Putting aside the IT Skeptic's role in itSMFI and Aiden Lawes recent barracking after many years as an itSMFI stalwart, Kiwis have always contributed more than our 2% of the world economy or under-half-a-percent of the world population. Continuing this tradition, itSMFI has appointed Kirstie Magowan as Chief Editor.

I don't normally "plug" products but this one is interesting because it puts a cat amongst the pigeons: Van Haren's Best Practice Online, the five ITIL V3 books online in full for fifty Euros per year.

Just how good are the indexes on the ITIL V3 core books? Well if one random test is anything to go by, not very...

There have been a whole list of amendments to the five core ITIL Version 3 books. The IT Skeptic has gone through these for you, cross referenced them to the BOKKED database, and listed here the ones that are worth knowing about.