On Thu, Jan 03, 2002, Phil Beder wrote: > Thank you!! > > The diversity of point of view and depth of knowledge of the participants > of this group is truly phenomenal. A simple question (in essence "where > should I start") yielded me not only an interesting variety of response to > that question, but a road map, complete with pitfalls and milestones and a > vision of where I should end-up. > > Questions I would have never though to ask were answered, as the ping pong > ball of opinion flew around. Why use a low level language like "C" for GUI > applications -vs.- why not when one language will do the trick. The > benefits of being able to allocate and access memory locations directly. > Old standards -vs.- ANSI 99. Types, Classes, Portablilty!! . . . WOW > > I understand now why "C" was creating such a stir back in 1989 when I first > started into programming. It's abilities both as a low level and high > level language are, I believe, what make it so universally accepted. With > "C" a programmer enjoys the flexibility to write a function many different > ways, which means I don't think I would look forward to maintaining "C" > code written by a bunch of programmers with diverse views (but I guess I > sure would learn a lot). > > Thanks for your help, . . . all of you. I'll be sure to avoid the rest of > Herb Schildts books (I got a small inexpensive programmers reference of "C" > keywords & functions and some common "C++" functions that has comes in > handy for figuring-out usage and syntax). After what you guys said, Ill > bet his ears are ringing. I haven't found the Kernighan and Ritchie book > in my local bookstore. I have been using a "C for Linux" book which seems > to get right to the point and I appreciate the direct application to Linux > and the gcc compiler.
Hi, No comments to add about the language wars, but as far as books go, I find often the easiest method by which to determine what books are worth looking at and what are junk, is by publisher. I don't think it's an anomoly that out of 30+ computer science books I have around, almost all are published by O'Reilly, Addison Wesley, PTR/Prentice Hall, John Wiley, and New Riders. These publishers, IMHO, uniformlly produce much higher quality CS/IT books than most others. I've found generally that Que, Sams, IDG/Hungry Minds, and others (I can't remember right now) are significantly worse, and rarely even consider them. I suggest a similar strategy might prove useful to you as well. I also recommend bookpool.com (standard no affiliation disclaimer) as a great place to shop online, especially for price and customer service. HTH, Daniel > I wish I was a good enough programmer to contribute to this great project. > Maybe one day when I understand more about Linux I could write a more user > friendly help interface with clear syntax, option, and flag usage. > > Thanks again > > > -- > To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] > with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] > -- Daniel A. Freedman Laboratory for Atomic and Solid State Physics Department of Physics Cornell University