[Swlug] C Programming Book Recommendations

[Alan Gray]

Hello Huw

Nicely said. I started on 6809 then 6502. Like you, it helped understanding pointers.

Wasn't Erlang developed for use in telephone exchanges?

Computer languages are tools. As always it is best to select the right tool for the job. Without knowing the job it's all speculation.

As a first serious language I am reminded that years ago in college I was taught 'C' and Pascal. They had quite different characteristics and were considered complementary. Probably Python would replace Pascal, but I am not so sure about 'C'. Maybe Rust, but there are others that could be considered.

Regards
Alan Gray 


On 23 October 2024 18:52:53 BST, "Huw Ford (ConceptPC) via Swlug" <swlug at mailman.lug.org.uk> wrote:
>Hi,
>
>I agree that C might not be the ideal 'first' serious programming
>language, but after 40 years of programming, I’m still not entirely sure
>which one would be.
>
>I started with assembler on the 6502 CPU, then moved on to the 68000.
>From there, I learned K&R C (Kernighan and Ritchie). My background in
>assembler, especially with memory addressing, helped me make sense of
>C’s pointers. Later, I transitioned to ANSI C.
>
>After that came C++. Once I got my head around object-oriented
>programming (OOP), I really fell in love with it.
>
>Eventually, I got into PHP and JavaScript, both of which are
>syntactically similar to C in many ways.
>
>But the language that really expanded my thinking was Erlang. It was so
>different from anything else I’d ever used. That said, I wouldn’t
>recommend Erlang unless you had a specific use case for it.
>
>I’ve worked with people who recommend Java as a good first language—it’s
>quite similar to C but without the headaches of manual memory
>management. However, I haven’t had any first-hand experience with it myself.
>
>Hope this helps.
>
>Huw
>
>
>On 23/10/2024 10:16, Neil Greenwood via Swlug wrote:
>> On Wed, 23 Oct 2024, 10:04 Morgan Green via Swlug,
>> <swlug at mailman.lug.org.uk> wrote:
>> 
>>     Hi,
>> 
>>     I am very new to programming, but I want to start out on C to
>>     grasp the fundamentals of all programming languages. Can anyone
>>     recommend me any paperbooks on C programming that is suitable for
>>     complete beginners?
>> 
>>     Kind regards,
>>     Morgan Green
>> 
>> 
>> Hi Morgan,
>> 
>> I'm not sure C is the best language for a beginner. You have a lot of
>> extra work to do managing memory - my first C program (after I had 8
>> years experience with 2-3 other languages) just segfaulted, and I
>> never fixed it!
>> 
>> If you are just starting out, my recommendation is to look at Python -
>> apart from the strict indentation requirement, it's much more
>> friendly. This will give you a good understanding of the fundamentals
>> that are present in most languages.
>> 
>> If you want dead-tree books, Pragmatic Press make a good series of
>> introductory titles for both C and Python, as well as a wife range of
>> other languages.
>> 
>> Hope this helps,
>> Neil
>> 
>> 
>>     Sent from Outlook for Android <https://aka.ms/AAb9ysg>
>>     --
>>     Swlug mailing list
>>     Swlug at mailman.lug.org.uk
>>     https://mailman.lug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/swlug
>> 
>> 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.lug.org.uk/pipermail/swlug/attachments/20241023/9a4974a0/attachment.htm>