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Joel reviews "Programming from the Ground Up"
Sathyaish Chakravarthy
Lol, Sath are you seriously pushing assembly language here? Yes, coders should read, and this is a great book to read. I am just wondering what makes this book so great compare to all the other great comp sci books?
Li-fan Chen
Sathyaish Chakravarthy
Book looks good. Assembler is a good cross-training exercise that keeps the programming and thinking skills in shape, and helps when debugging low-level code.
robtwister
That's a good idea for a book. I learned assembly language before anything else, and I think I'm much better off because of it. I'm with Joel, I think knowledge of assembly, even if you don't use it much in your daily work, is essential.
sid6581
I learned assembly in college... for two weeks.
Geert-Jan Thomas
Started with assembly language; even now, when I look at code, I kind of see how it breaks down into individual instructions. It helps you realise how to decompose a command and try to guess the 'cost' of it. Like the guy in a prev thread worrying about the 'MoveTo'. A bit of assembly experience might help guess just how costly that method probably is. Not as accurate as *looking* at the assembly, or *profiling* the app, but a great 'feel' for the issues involved.
i like i
Yes, Geert, you have to learn assembly to realize you don't need it!
Alex
There is a free download at http://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/pgubook/
Alex
Any pointers to where Joel reviewed the book? I only saw a general quote from Joel saying something along the lines of "learning assembly language will make you a proper programmer"...
a2800276
> If you're working on business problems, internet solutions,
_
Just so you guys are aware, most Java/Dotnet virtual machine expose books will cover PCode and Assembly concepts, tying both together. Read one of these and you will kill 2 birds with one stone--besides you probably wouldn't be writing a single line of assembly any time soon if your day job is using any of the commercial programming languages created after 1994.
Li-fan Chen
Unless you're a Systems Programmer working on MVS. Then you nearly always program in assembler.
gwyn
I'm with gwym, fantastic experience to have since it can only benefit you to know how the machine will approach the problem, at least in a likely manner. Everyone should try a significant program in Asm, create a simple database, network, internet, and parser at some time or another. It'd be nice to do them in Asm but C comes close enough for government work. Twiddling just the right bits can really pay off, especially if a bit-twiddler snuck some of that behind the scenes optimization despite the 'high-level' gurus (sets in mySQL come immediately to mind, a bit-twiddlers dream!).
Brian J. Bartlett
I'm with the gwyn guy too and I appreciate this post. It's just the kind of thing I feel I'm missing. Even though I don't like most of the OP's other posts I'm glad he posted this. I'll be getting the book. Wasn't Joel once talking about the leak ... getting down to assembly is pretty close to the Soul of the Machine and I believe and understanding there will help anyone working above that level.
me
I started my career in IT 20 years ago by programming in pure* Z80A assembly. I did learn a lot in doing that, but I have to be careful not to get bogged down with inappropriate "optimizations" these days.
Steve Jones (UK)
I think Li-Fan's comments are an excellent example of some of the dynamics discussed in the young'uns versus old farts threads recently.
Jeff Kotula
Programmers who shun assembly language are like those pop singers who know nothing about music harmony, and architects who don't know how stones and metals work, and digital circuit designers who don't know analog electronics.
rexguo
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