In my C learning crusade, I have traveled at light speeds across many forums, write-ups and e-books (Well, the loading takes a while though considering my internet speed, but the data is still sent at light speed anyways, no matter how small the chunks are). I have lurked in the shadows, reading, scrolling, judging lines and lines of text; I have chuckled, smirked and been relieved many a time.
I have come to the one, inevitable, conclusion: Programmers are dicks!
Not all of them, but many of them. A lot of them take the "If I tell you everything, you'll never learn" thing too far. No, nobody has ever done that to me. As far as I can remember, the only post I made in a public forum regarding programming was at the Code Blocks forums asking about a feature which was promptly resolved in their nightly releases. I only judge what I read...hehe!
Sometimes, even a simple question like "How do I draw a circle?" is responded with "How much are you paying?".
Well, it only strengthens my resolve to be nice. If I ever get to the level of expertise where I am able to help out people, I will go out of my way to be nice & will never be the first one to cast the first crap.
In other news:
I have been trying hard to understand Programming Windows by Charles Petzold. This is supposedly THE book to learn Windows Programming. But it is beyond my comprehension. It was written for people who can speak 'tech' much better than I do.
Not to be undone, I e-mailed Dan Gookin. Gookin is the author of 'C For Dummies' and a host of other books. If I'm not mistaken, it was his book "DOS for Dummies" that birthed the whole "For Dummies" series. Legend.
I asked him if he could do a book on Windows Programming for laymen...well...for 'Dummies', in his unmistakable, humorous and understandable style. It would help someone like me, who wants to learn, but have no good resource or teacher, to get started.
He was very kind and forwarded my e-mail to his publisher to see if they were willing to accommodate a new book.
The publisher's money making instincts did a quick calculation and the returns didn't seem appealing, so they refused. Not their fault, profit is what they are in the business for, they are not a charity. They already did some books on it and those never sold well.
Mr. Gookin told me he is swamped with work at the moment but he will try to introduce a new segment in his blog to introduce us to Windows Programming very soon. Apparently Programming Windows by Charles Petzold is the only book on Windows Programming he has ever bought. And he uses Java to program Windows.
Regardless, I am very eagerly looking forward to his posts on the subject. His C Programming blog is a goldmine. Check this out: A few days back, I dusted off my old book on games programming Game Programming On PC by Diana Gruber. I cannot use the book to program games because the code will not work on Windows 7 (Which is what I use), but I thought maybe I can pick up a few things from scanning the code (FYI, I didn't learn anything, not because the book is hard, but because I'm too dumb). There is a part where she says about a memory location "There is something in there, I don't know what it is, but there is something" (may not be the exact words, but it was the same idea). This was written in the early 90's so she very likely has learnt what is in there since.
I KNEW WHAT WAS THERE....yup I did! I had picked it up from Gookin's blog. :) Knowing is always an ego boost.
If you want to follow his blog here it is: http://www.c-for-dummies.com/cfordummies/
Go there and click on "C Blog" on the left pane.
See you soon.
I have come to the one, inevitable, conclusion: Programmers are dicks!
Not all of them, but many of them. A lot of them take the "If I tell you everything, you'll never learn" thing too far. No, nobody has ever done that to me. As far as I can remember, the only post I made in a public forum regarding programming was at the Code Blocks forums asking about a feature which was promptly resolved in their nightly releases. I only judge what I read...hehe!
Sometimes, even a simple question like "How do I draw a circle?" is responded with "How much are you paying?".
Well, it only strengthens my resolve to be nice. If I ever get to the level of expertise where I am able to help out people, I will go out of my way to be nice & will never be the first one to cast the first crap.
In other news:
I have been trying hard to understand Programming Windows by Charles Petzold. This is supposedly THE book to learn Windows Programming. But it is beyond my comprehension. It was written for people who can speak 'tech' much better than I do.
Not to be undone, I e-mailed Dan Gookin. Gookin is the author of 'C For Dummies' and a host of other books. If I'm not mistaken, it was his book "DOS for Dummies" that birthed the whole "For Dummies" series. Legend.
I asked him if he could do a book on Windows Programming for laymen...well...for 'Dummies', in his unmistakable, humorous and understandable style. It would help someone like me, who wants to learn, but have no good resource or teacher, to get started.
He was very kind and forwarded my e-mail to his publisher to see if they were willing to accommodate a new book.
The publisher's money making instincts did a quick calculation and the returns didn't seem appealing, so they refused. Not their fault, profit is what they are in the business for, they are not a charity. They already did some books on it and those never sold well.
Mr. Gookin told me he is swamped with work at the moment but he will try to introduce a new segment in his blog to introduce us to Windows Programming very soon. Apparently Programming Windows by Charles Petzold is the only book on Windows Programming he has ever bought. And he uses Java to program Windows.
Regardless, I am very eagerly looking forward to his posts on the subject. His C Programming blog is a goldmine. Check this out: A few days back, I dusted off my old book on games programming Game Programming On PC by Diana Gruber. I cannot use the book to program games because the code will not work on Windows 7 (Which is what I use), but I thought maybe I can pick up a few things from scanning the code (FYI, I didn't learn anything, not because the book is hard, but because I'm too dumb). There is a part where she says about a memory location "There is something in there, I don't know what it is, but there is something" (may not be the exact words, but it was the same idea). This was written in the early 90's so she very likely has learnt what is in there since.
I KNEW WHAT WAS THERE....yup I did! I had picked it up from Gookin's blog. :) Knowing is always an ego boost.
If you want to follow his blog here it is: http://www.c-for-dummies.com/cfordummies/
Go there and click on "C Blog" on the left pane.
See you soon.
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