[olug] C book recs

[Mike Peterson]

The Deitel books are a great starting point.

Brian Kernighan also helped create AWK in addition to C and UNIX.
The K in AWK stands for him.


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Christopher Cashell" <topher at zyp.org>
To: <olug at olug.org>
Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2004 7:47 AM
Subject: Re: [olug] C book recs


> At Wed, 17 Nov 04, Unidentified Flying Banana Eric Pierce, said:
> > I'm looking to dig deep into C, and I want everyone's recommendations
for
> > texts.
>
> An excellent choice.  C can be a very rewarding and useful programming
> language to know.  Before I can recommend any books, I need to know a
> little more about where you stand.
>
> Do you currently have any experience with C, or with programming in
> general?  What programming/scripting languages have you used in the
> past?
>
> > Now do I need to focus on books after ANSI C was standardized on?
Wasn't that
> > around 1998 or so?
>
> There are basically three major versions of the C language.  The
> original is the Pre-ANSI C, commonly referred to as K&R C (which was
> never officially standardized, and is documented primarily in their
> book, "The C Programming Language" (First Edition)).  In 1989, the C
> language became an ANSI standard.  There were a number of significant
> changes from K&R C, particularly with function declarations.  The last
> major update to the C language came in 1999, when the C99 specification
> was finalized.
>
> The first thing I want to mention is that C99 is generally backwards
> compatible with ANSI C.  Also, most of the changes that went into C99
> are either minor changes, or additions/clarifications (a lot of it is
> just officially recognizing common extensions to C, such as inline
> functions).  They are of concern to an advanced programmer, but
> meaningless to someone learning the language.
>
> Another thing to remember is that there are very few, if any, compilers
> which have fully implemented the C99 standard at this time.  Most
> compilers still target ANSI C for primary support, since that is what
> the vast majority of C code is written for.
>
> Finally, despite the changes that C has undergone, C is still C.  K&R C
> will still be quite recognizable, if slightly odd, to someone learning C
> today.
>
> > My wife has Deitel/Deitel's 'How to Program C' but the edition came out
in
> > 1994. I've also looked at O'Reilly's 'Practical C' 3rd edition, but it's
from
> > 1997.  So are these books not useful anymore?
>
> Almost any book for sale today will cover ANSI C, or maybe C99
> (remember, they are similar enough that if you compared two 20 chapter
> books, one on ANSI C, one on C99, the first 16-18 chapters would likely
> be identical) and will work just fine for you.
>
> Without knowing more about your previous experience, I will note that by
> far the best single C book I know of is "The C Programming Language",
> Second Edition, by Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie (Mr. Ritchie is
> the creator of the C language, and Mr. Kernighan was a co-worker of his
> at AT&T Bell Labs who worked with him).  However, it's a somewhat terse
> book, and while it covers the C language very well, it is not an
> "introduction to programming" book.  If you have a solid background in
> programming already, there is no better book, though.  In fact, it is
> not only the best C book I know, it's one of the best programming books,
> period.
>
> > Thanks for any input,
> > Eric Pierce
>
> -- 
> | Christopher
> +------------------------------------------------+
> | Here I stand.  I can do no other.              |
> +------------------------------------------------+
>
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