How Computer Programming Works (Technology in Action Series)

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Imagine, for a moment, a guy. This guy, about 40 years old, has worked all of his life in a job that doesn't require much knowledge of computers, certainly not of how to write software. Now, imagine that our guy decides to change career paths and learn computer programming. He goes and buys a book about a programming language, perhaps one that promotes itself as elementary. The book presents our hapless guy with recipes that he can follow, it's true, but mostly it confuses him with talk of APIs, linked lists, hashes, and a mess of other stuff that he doesn't understand, really. "I can make it all work by following directions," our guy implores into the Void. "But I don't understand what I'm doing." This guy needs How Computer Programming Works.

In this book, Daniel Appleman sets out to explain computer programming at a conceptual level, and succeeds admirably. Appleman ignores the peculiar characteristics of specific programming languages (leaving them for specialized books), and instead uses fantastic color illustrations and lucid text to explain what goes unsaid among professional programmers. He also uses pseudocode--a sort of standardized, generic programming language--and examples in BASIC to back up his points. Although Appleman approaches programming mainly from a procedural angle (the book would be better with more coverage of object-oriented programming techniques, which fundamentally are different, in many cases), the contents of this book will suit any beginning student of programming and computer science--our guy included. --David Wall

Topics covered:

Aspects of computer programming that you must understand in order to write code, but that generally are not explained conceptually in language-specific programming books
Variables
Loops
Pointers
Arrays
Code blocks
Stacks
Trees
Other fundamental building blocks
Critical algorithms, like the bubble sort
Getting from specification to finished product
Network programming

Book Description

Just as children must learn the alphabet before they can read, future programmers must understand certain concepts before they can write their first program. This unique book uses full-color illustrations to help you truly understand the underlying computer science on which all programming is based.

Veteran programmer Dan Appleman provides a comprehensive, easy-to-understand explanation of computer programming, starting from a basic description of what a computer language is to coverage of how Internet programming works. The book shows you how to turn ideas into code and how to use algorithms to accomplish common tasks, and describes the basic function of compilers and interpreters.

Curious readers of any age will find an accessible yet comprehensive explanation of a field that has revolutionized the way we live and work.

Download Description

A useful book for future programmers or anyone interested in explaining important computer programming concepts.
Full color illustrations help to visually explain important topics!
New expanded section on computer programming for the Internet.

Just as a child must learn the alphabet before they can read, future programmers must understand certain concepts before they can write their first program. This unique book uses full color illustrations to help the reader to truly understand the underlying computer science on which all programming is based.

Customer Reviews:

Not in the same league against average computer books!.......2007-03-29

I bought this book and felt disappointed.

I think it's a wrong decision of me not carefully looking into the index portion to check my expectation. It is also a result from Amazon side, only a portion of chapter one, not revealing enough examples for readers to judge.

It's a general introduction of some basic "ideas" about programming. It focuses on one idea per chapter. The illustrations are indeed very good to demonstrate those ideas. The whole book is like a delighted lemon juice, with very thin content.

But, I feel the whole book best serves the teens as an introduction book about programming. If an amateur has a clear intention to head into the world of computer software, this is not a good entry book. He'd better consider other books and don't waste time on this one. This is just suitable for those whose time is free and ease.

By the way, I feel not worthy to return this book because of the shipping fee. So, I decided to keep it for my son to minimize the waste.

Not bad, but not really written for kids.......2006-12-21

I bought this book based on the reviews. It was for my 11-year old son who is a whiz working with computers and wants to learn more so he can eventually start programming. I have been writing software for 20 years and find it difficult to make my knowledge and understanding relevant to someone so young. I don't want to dash his enthusiasm with too much technical jargon, yet he should learn enough to get curious and start tinkering with confidence.

This book was not relevant for him. He's a pretty smart kid for 11, but the references in this book are for adults. It will bore a kid under 18.

On the other hand, this book will probably be pretty good for an adult wanting to learn how computers work.

I don't want to blame the writer since he never said this book was written for kids, but it's tough to rate it higher since the book now sits on the shelf.

By the way, if you've gotten this far in this review, then you might know or have a youngster (isn't that an old-foggey word?) who wants to know more about computers. When kids have fun learning, they stay interested. With this in mind, a fun book to learn about computers is, surprisingly, "Head First HTML" by Elizabeth and Eric Freeman. By taking a fun approach to learning how to make web pages kids are introduced to programming.

It's also an enjoyable book for adults.

Simplistic.......2005-05-17

The other reviewers here that reference their 13 year olds enjoying this book are absolutely right. This book is for 13 year olds. As a 25 year old trying to wrap his mind around programming, it leaves much to be desired.

If all you want is a gloss-over for someone who has no intention to continue in the field of programming, but just wants a non-programmers understanding of programming, this book is for you. If you want something you can take with you on a journey into real programming, you will have to really dig deep to distill the few morsels of theory offered here. In fact I had to reread most paragraphs dozens of times in order to find the underlying concept he was trying to teach; to find something that would still be useful to me after finishing the book.

Bottomline: A waste of time if you are out of high school and attempting to truly learn something about programming. Take a few minutes to skim thru the pictures at your local bookstore, then go buy a real programming book.

"An illustration is worth a thousand words".......2005-03-09

Not when the illustrations are as poorly drawn and pointless as these. eg people staring at computers, sweeping arrows with colored blends, or pointing hands (proving, yes they are hard to draw!). I can however follow the reasoning.

This is yet another programmer who has trouble explaining the jargon but has noticed books that do a good job of being user friendly, have pictures. I found this book to be just like those inane PowerPoint presentations that middle executives think expresses the right side of their brain. A right side that seems to be made of cheap PC clip art.

It doesn't help every time the book gets to a core idea, that it glosses over it as if it is obvious, without explaining the detail. Nor that on top of the meaningless graphics, the book is full of DTP blunders that obviously nobody has checked. Such as text set in fonts with mismatching encodings, resulting in strange accented characters being substituted for whatever the author intended.

Why do programmers have such difficulty producing clear, sequential, logical and carefully crafted expression, that has been checked for errors?

I thought that was their job.

fundamental concepts on a silver tray.......2001-04-01

A good book does not need to be complex. This one does a great job. You could read this book during one hour and learn more than in one semester of COS111. It is so simple. Comcepts are the most important thing to learn. They give meaning to programing. Without concepts, programing becomes meaningless.

Average customer rating:

Excellent learning tool for Java based servers and servlet writers
Great for Industrial Server Engineers
A solid pedagogical way to the implementation of Tomcat 4
powerful interfaces in Tomcat
I'm afraid I wasn't that impressed

How Tomcat Works
Budi Kurniawan , and Paul Deck
Manufacturer: BrainySoftware.com
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 097521280X

Book Description

How Tomcat Works is the only book that explains the internal workings of Tomcat, the open source project used by millions of Java developers. Unlike other Tomcat titles, it is unique because it does not simply covers the configuration or servlet development with Tomcat. Rather, this book is meant for advanced readers interested in writing their own Tomcat modules or in understanding more beyond servlet/JSP programming.
The authors of this book have cracked open Tomcat 4 and 5 and revealed the internal workings of each component. Upon understanding the contents of this book, you will be able to develop your own Tomcat components or extend the existing ones.

In particular, this book explains:
- How to develop Java web servers
- Whether or not more Tomcat creates more than one instance for each servlet
- How Tomcat runs a servlet that implements the SingleThreadModel interface
- Why you cannot change the value of request parameters.
- The two main modules of a servlet container: connector and container
- How to build your own connector or extend the existing ones
- The four types of containers: engine, host, context, wrapper
- How Tomcat manages sessions and how to extend the session manager in a distributed environment.
- The class loader and how to create custom loaders
- How Tomcat implements security and basic/form-based/digest authentication
- How realms and login configuration work.
- How Tomcat processes the configuration file (server.xml) and converts the XML elements to Java objects using Digester
- Tomcat's shutdown hook
- JMX, Apache's Commons Modeler, and Tomcat JMX manageable resources

Customer Reviews:

Excellent learning tool for Java based servers and servlet writers.......2007-06-20

Excellent technical code-oriented book, great learning tool for people interested not only in Tomcat but in writing either Java server code or servlets. Also a great book to better understand how to manage Tomcat. The author reviews in details the code and gives the whys of it. He goes step by step and gives you code that you can run to build progressively a web server. Even if Tomcat 5 is not fully covered (when is the next edition?), it is still a great insight on Tomcat and what's going behind the scene when you write a servlet.

Thanks so much for this hard work, I am waiting for the next edition.

Great for Industrial Server Engineers.......2007-01-04

I have been working in the past 4 years as an architect for several high-profile industrial strength web sites (i.e. 1,500-27,000 tps) and they all use tomcat for their back end. The common thing I have found is that out-of-the-box tomcat won't support this kind of transaction rate and some tweaking is needed. For example the threading model doesn't fly, and obviously stickiness isn't an option. I got this book to understand the code base better and to see where and how the modifications could best be made. This book is definitely for contianer/server engineers. I doubt' much bnenefit would come if you are just a servlet or jsp type. But if you are having performance problems, want to develop your own container, or are an architect for highly-scalable sites that use ro want to use tomcat then I recommend this book.

A solid pedagogical way to the implementation of Tomcat 4.......2005-11-29

This is one of the rare books that pave you a way through the implementation of a major software product. The last one I read was Tannenbaums classic "Operating Systems". The Tomcat book is a lot easier to access: Tomcat is written in Java not C and the author takes a lot of trouble of making code iterations especially for pedagogical reasons. I do very much appreciate this. Both authors have a very clear style. They do not enervate and distract you with any vanity. You have ample time during the read for your own thoughts of how you can do better. Usually I found that my ideas were worse and I learned something more. Sure there are rather small questions of style. The code smells a little like C. There are very many if statements. Some routines are quite long... Still it is a pleasure to read the code.

In this book you learn a lot about the implementation of a major software project and a lot about production quality code. You do not learn how to install, administer and use Tomcat. Most is about Tomcat 4. Some ideas are given of the changes due to Tomcat 5. This is a Tomcat 5 aware book but not a book about that version. I am sure this book helps you to actually do extensions of the engine itself, though this certainly is not its main impetus. Be prepared for some very solid reading. Do not worry about the comments with regards to bad editing. The editing is more than adequate.

Much welcome improvements:
(1) Provide an overview of the major interfaces and classes. And provide the central sequence diagram. Put both at a prominent place in the book (maybe inside the book flaps). This should be straightforward and easy for the authors.
(2) Update the book to the newest version of Tomcat. I know this is really asking too much. It takes at least a full time week to read the book, to rewrite takes considerably longer. But it is clear that Tomcat 5 would require even more: an entirely new adapted pedagogically design of the book.

powerful interfaces in Tomcat.......2005-09-23

Tomcat is the most common container for Java servlets. Yet using all its power can be formidably intricate. To help you, the authors spend much space going over the interfaces it offers. Using these is an easy way for your servlets to avail themselves of Tomcat's functions.

Like writing your own logger, specific to your output needs. All it has to do is implement the Catalina Logger interface, and the container can run it. Or, you can use sundry default loggers that come with Tomcat.

The text shows, amongst other things, how Java's interface capability is a profoundly useful enabler of modular code. It lets you integrate easily with Tomcat, using a minimum of coding.

I'm afraid I wasn't that impressed.......2005-08-11

Having recently finished TCP/IP illustrated, volume 2, which is a line-by-line treatment of the BSD networking code, I was hoping that "How Tomcat Works" would be as thoughtful and as comprehensive a treatment of Tomcat's code. It wasn't, and it fell far short of my expectations. For the most part, the value of the book comes from the author's organization of the source code - first look at the connectors, then look at containers, then look at wrappers, engines, hosts, etc. This organization is valuable if you're just sitting down to dissect the source, since it gives you a place to start. Otherwise, though, the book didn't provide much information that the source code itself (freely available) doesn't. The authors just present the source code and say, "there you go. That's it". They don't delve into the why or the how - they don't show how the sources tie together or discuss areas where Tomcat might be improved (or why it can't be improved in an otherwise obvious way). All in all, if you're the sort of person who'd be interested in reading this book, you probably already know everything it has to teach you.

Average customer rating:

A Grammar of Game Play: How Games Work
Raph Koster
Manufacturer: Paraglyph Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1933097159

Book Description

Raph Koster's "A Theory of Fun" book was hailed by critics and reviewers as "An instant classic," "The best game design book I have ever read," and "One of the best books for our industry." Following on the success of this classic book on game design, Koster now introduces readers to a new way at looking at game design in A Grammar of Gameplay. This highly creative and stimulating book uses the author's unique illustrations and commentary to help the reader develop a working "grammar" to understand how games are designed, how they communicate, how they model reality, and how they stimulate and challenge players. Anyone from game designers to game players will want to read this book for a greater understanding of how games work, while those interested in the theory and concepts will once again find extensive end notes designed to help them do deeper research.

Just as with A Theory of Fun, this book's unique approach of providing a highly visual storyboard combined with a narrative on the art and practice of designing successful games is sure to be a hit with game and interactive designers. Some of the important concepts presented in the book include using game design patterns, understanding games as models, creating a language to dissect and communicate design ideas, maximizing the use of art styles, color, storytelling, and music to create dynamic interactive environments, and much more. This unique visual guide will stimulate anyone who is interested in game design to look at game design in an entirely new way.

How Debuggers Work: Algorithms, Data Structures, and Architecture

Average customer rating:

Very superficial and fragmented
Quite useful short book
Superficial, Short: Skip it!
i liked this book very much
A Good introductory book

How Debuggers Work: Algorithms, Data Structures, and Architecture
Jonathan B. Rosenberg
Manufacturer: Wiley
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0471149667

Book Description

A total guide to debuggers: what they do, how they work, and how to use them to produce better programs

"Debuggers are the magnifying glass, the microscope, the logic analyzer, the profiler, and the browser with which a program can be examined."-Jonathan B. Rosenberg

Debuggers are an indispensable tool in the development process. In fact, during the course of the average software project, more hours are spent debugging software than in compiling code. Yet, not many programmers really know how to constructively interpret the results they get back from debuggers. And even fewer know what makes these complex suites of algorithms and data structures tick. Now in this extremely accessible guide, Jonathan B. Rosenberg demystifies debuggers for programmers and shows them how to make better use of debuggers in their next projects.

Taking a hands-on, problem-solving approach to a complex subject, Rosenberg explains how debuggers work and why programmers use them. Most importantly, he provides practical discussions of debugger algorithms and procedures for their use, accompanied by many practical examples. The author also discusses a wide variety of systems applications, from Microsoft's Win32 debug API to a large parallel architecture.

Visit our Web site at: http://www.wiley.com/compbooks/

Customer Reviews:

Very superficial and fragmented.......2003-01-05

If there were any alternative books on the topic, I'd give this one 1 star, rather than 3. But for some reason there aren't any, so one has to be extra charitable. The book is EXTREMELY superficial, badly structured, fragmentary, it truly looks like a few unrelated white papers written by a younger colleague/research assistant bound together and published under the head honcho's name, a hasty, half-hearted affair.

Since this is the only thing in print covering the topic, you can't go wrong reading it, but don't expect to gain much. Perhaps working through the gdb's source code is better. Well, there's no question, of course, it's better because it's a real thing, but you might want to read this book as well, it does contain randomly located bits and pieces of relevant information.

It would be really great if this book were reworked: cleaned up, meaningfully structured, and given more depth (as well as source code.) Not sure why that's not done--such a book would definitely be commercially successful.

Quite useful short book.......2001-03-13

I think this book deserves reading, espesially if you are a beginner in corresponding field. It covers main aproaches to debugging, describes difficulties of debugging, briefly describes functionality, provided by Unix and Windows and it mentions future trends in this field. I think, taking into account nearly total absence of any structured information about this field of computer science, this book deserves reading.

Superficial, Short: Skip it!.......2001-01-21

I recall the time, as I worked on a large parallel Unix debugger, and only slowly collected facts and scraps of necessary knowledge to progress. I always wondered, why not a single book was written, which would be solely devoted to the architecture, design and implementation of symbolic debuggers?

As I saw this book announced, my expectations were high. Could this be a help in organizing my knowledge about debuggers, collected so far from semi confidential industry reports or white papers, 3-4 dissertations, several implementations, plus some 10-15 conference papers with vague descriptions of implementations, claims of spectacular achievements or with mere theoretical ideas?

No, unfortunately this is not so. This book, or rather "a booklet" is very incomplete. It literally did not told me any single detail which I would not have known already. For example, missing is the description of the very standard Unix interface to control and hold a process. Since this is not a scientific book providing more generic foundations about process tracing (such as tracking of very long time running programs, replay techniques, generating snapshots etc. etc.) than I would at least expect a solid practice orientation. This should include a complete discussion of several assemblers and typical architectures, because they provide sometimes completely different means of implementing breakpoints, watchpoints or of support for threads. In many cases a debugger must be, or can be supported by a cooperating compiler. Several interesting ideas have been implemented in the back ends, which may greatly help supporting breakpoints, finding function prologues, dealing with exceptions and asynchronous signals. I also miss the specifications and a good comparison of the two most common formats holding symbolic information, Stabs and DWARF! Etc. etc., this list of missing facts and issues could go on and on.

Usually I call a book like this one "a blah blah novel." The author claims "I know something, but I will not tell what is it." Yes, there are debuggers, yes we can program them but a lot of code is necessary to do so, yes we can stop a process and advance it instruction by instruction. Yes, yes, I know all that.

I think that will have to keep waiting for a serious book about symbolic debugging! Any takers? If I only could write well...

i liked this book very much.......2000-08-03

This book has been real help to me in "designing implementation of symbolic debugger" as my b.e. final year project. This book has been a source of help in case of any problem i faced during my project.

A Good introductory book.......2000-05-25

Considering there are practically *no* books around that deals with debugger theory, I would label it a pioneering effort from Mr. Rosenberg.

Book Description

The complete guide to making the most of the ISO 9001 standard

You may already know that ISO 9001 certification will help you gain access to important markets and maintain your credibility as a quality software developer. You may not know that, coupled with quality management techniques, meeting ISO 9001 requirements can help you sharpen the focus of your operation, improve relations with your employees, reduce paperwork and bureaucracy, and make your entire organization more responsive to increasingly sophisticated customer demands.

This indispensable guide takes you step-by-step through the ISO 9001 documentation process from the perspective of overall quality management and control. It shows you how each section of the standard should be applied to software development and provides guidance on actual policies and processes that should be used. It also helps you determine how much of the ISO 9001 standard you already satisfy and where you need to focus your efforts. Inside, you'll find:

A detailed, section-by-section examination of the ISO 9001 standard, including the latest revisions and updates for ISO 9001, version: 1994
An emphasis on quality management techniques, their application in software development, and their usefulness in meeting ISO 9001 requirements
In-depth discussions on developing and implementing an ISO 9001 based system, including contents and directions for completing conformance documentation
A conformance checklist that enables you to measure your organization against the standard at any time from now through certification

Customer Reviews:

Out-of-date; useful in areas for non-ISO 9001 shops.......2001-09-24

This book is a good step-by-step description of 1994 version of ISO 9001 as it relates to software.

Book strengths are: (1) Not bogged down with history, the politics of standards or doom and gloom if you do not employ ISO 9001 as a foundation of software quality, (2)you are taken through the key elements of ISO 9001 and shown how to develop a quality manual, project quality plans and process documentation and (3) the conformance checklist, which will greatly aid you in sorting out what needs to be addressed.

Book weaknesses: Out of date (published in 1995 and only addresses ISO 9001 circa 1994).

Customer Reviews:

Best intro to HTML around.......1998-12-23

Can't seem to find it in stores anymore. Get it here. Great intro to give to someone just getting started. Lots of pictures, screen shots, etc.

A beginners dream come true.......1998-08-13

This book is great for people just starting out in HTML. It takes you step-by-step through the basics of creating a great web page. The book provides in depth description along with colorful examples. It also provides extra pointers, along with links to helpful web sites. This book took me from knowing nothing about HTML to becoming a web master of my own site.

A great beginner's book........1996-12-27

This book went step by step from knowing nothing about writing a web page to making a quite complete up-to-date one. And all from scratch, needing only a text editor such as notepad. Links to graphics, various plug-ins, and other helpful downloads are provided. Lots of clear, very helpful pictures are used. I could have had my first page up the next day if I had had a server available

Average customer rating:

Beginner's best choice
Excellent beginner's book
Clear, concise, and easy for a "newbie" to HTML.

How to Use Html3 (How It Works Series)
Scott Arpajian
Manufacturer: Ziff Davis Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Customer Reviews:

Beginner's best choice.......1998-10-14

Resently I got an assignment to build a web page but I had absolutely no experience. Fortunately, I had picked this book up intending some day to read it. Using HTML3 as my only source of reference, I was able to build a multi-paged web site with over 400 links world-wide. If it hadn't been for this book, I'd still be scratching my head and wondering how to start.

Excellent beginner's book.......1997-02-24

This was the fourth book on HTML I've purchased and the only one that was clear and made sense. The explanations are great and pictures helpful. I followed it and created my web page in a short time

Clear, concise, and easy for a "newbie" to HTML........1997-01-10

As a beginner, learning HTML was a daunting prospect. Scott Arpajian's book, HTML3 was a real FIND for me. Since reading this book (more than once) I have constructed a personal homepage, and successfully completed several college computer courses requiring HTML work. THANKS.

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