botterry@ac.dal.ca (12/19/89)
Hi there! I am an M.Sc. student in biology and I'm looking to invest some time in learning how to use "C". I was wondering which "C" would be best to buy, my being a non-programmer. I've heard of Quick C, Microsoft C, Lattice C, Turbo C,and C++. Could anyone out there help me? Terry Grignon Dalhousie University Halifax, Nova Scotia Canada
manis@cs.ubc.ca (Vincent Manis) (12/21/89)
As someone who has taught C for a long time, I think that there are few worse things that an non-programmer can do to him/herself than to learn C. The reasons are not to do with the claimed lack of elegance of the language, but rather with the fact that you need to know a fair bit about the underlying computer to use C effectively. I would strongly recommend a Pascal-like language (e.g., Turbo Pascal or TopSpeed Modula) over C as a first language. -- \ Vincent Manis <manis@cs.ubc.ca> "There is no law that vulgarity and \ Department of Computer Science literary excellence cannot coexist." /\ University of British Columbia -- A. Trevor Hodge / \ Vancouver, BC, Canada V6T 1W5 (604) 228-2394
jvance@ics.uci.edu (Joachim Patrick Vance) (01/01/90)
In article <6038@ubc-cs.UUCP> manis@cs.ubc.ca (Vincent Manis) writes: >As someone who has taught C for a long time... What texts would you then reccomend for a person who wants to learn C on his own and has a fair background in programming in some other high and/or low level language. thanks. Joachim -- Joachim ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ What do my .sig and UCI have in common? | | jvance%bonnie@ics.uci.edu | - - - - - - - - - | ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ They're both Under Construction Indefinately.|
manis@cs.ubc.ca (Vincent Manis) (01/04/90)
In article <259E48A4.1971@paris.ics.uci.edu> Joachim Patrick Vance <jvance@ics.uci.edu> writes: > What texts would you then reccomend for a person who wants to learn >C on his own and has a fair background in programming in some other >high and/or low level language. thanks. Kernighan & Ritchie, \i{The C Programming Language}, 2nd ed, (Prentice-Hall) is the definitive book. It's compact, has lots of good examples, and uses ANSI C. (The first edition is still in print, for those who refuse to give up their brain-damaged pre-ANSI compilers). (I learned C from the precursor to this, Brian Kernighan's old `C Tutorial'.) Kelley & Pohl, \i{A Book on C}, (Benjamin/Cummings) is also good. Unfortunately, it's pre-ANSI. -- \ Vincent Manis <manis@cs.ubc.ca> "There is no law that vulgarity and \ Department of Computer Science literary excellence cannot coexist." /\ University of British Columbia -- A. Trevor Hodge / \ Vancouver, BC, Canada V6T 1W5 (604) 228-2394
gillies@p.cs.uiuc.edu (01/05/90)
I recommend "C: A Reference Manual", by Harbison & Steele
(Prentice-Hall). This ANSII C book is about as definitive as
Kernighan & Ritchie's book. The authors, who have written numerous C
compilers and know the ideosyncracies of the language, contributed to
the ANSII X3J11 standardization effort.
The book is a very well-organized reference (better than K & R, in my
opinion). My experience with K & R (I have the 1st edition) is that
it's a great read, but a painful reference. Material is scattered
throughout the book, and the index is not great.
Harbison & Steele covers the entire language and libraries in less
than 400 pages. Some overly tutorial books blow 700 pages and still
omit large portions of the C language.
Don Gillies, Dept. of Computer Science, University of Illinois
1304 W. Springfield, Urbana, Ill 61801
ARPA: gillies@cs.uiuc.edu UUCP: {uunet,harvard}!uiucdcs!gillies