I've written this book as a starting point for programming using the C++ language. You may reread key sections now and then to refresh your memory or even use it as a handy reference, but the primary goal is to bust open your brain and stuff the seeds of C++ into your consciousness.
It may take you a week to read this, if you finish it, or a year. Mastery of the C++ language does not come from any single source, be it book or tutor. It comes from years of experience, experimentation, and mingling with your programming brothers and sisters. Know ye, that I thought to forsake this timeless advice and bound ahead with great strides. But lo! after starting to learn and use C++ in the fall of 1996 I am still discovering things. Do not be discouraged; expect neither too little or too much, but be pleasantly surprised by both.
References in this genre of programming are plentiful and generally complete, but the city of building block books is sporatically filled with useful, useless, and flawed explanations. Author's have sown their work not only with knowledge, but with their self-same biases, prejudices, hyped enthusiasm, or lack thereof, and coding habits for good or ill. The blood and brains of scholars is fired and filled by the quirks of people they have never met in person.
Newbies, I have seen or talked to, wander lost among the maze of boundless and circular information. Prizes of cheese escape them beyond barriers unbroken, unexplained. I write this book to bring YOU to the cheese and send you home happy!
Why Choose C++?
Because that's what this book is about; deal with it!
Do not be easily discouraged. You will see instant results, but the payback in pain and exctasy will grow eternally as you do. A mechanic can have tens of years of experience and still not be able to tell you why your car shakes on the freeway or what that clucking sound is behind the front, passenger-side wheel.
If your adventures are anything like mine they will lead you through more than just language syntax and related; you will track and re-track the same flaws, find a better way of doing something almost constantly, and be constantly wanting to tweak old programs up to your new standard.
This book is meant to be read as a starting point, a leap pad, from no programming or computer experience to a practical knowledge base to draw from and use. You'll acquire a set of biases for and against C++, or perhaps tune them in case you've had previously dealings with programming. Perhaps in the future I will write "Neil's Reference to C++", but I think there might be enough of those out there. What I haven't seen enough of are tutorials and guides to bring the beginner up the totem rank to intermediate.
--> I will not give you more than a tender grasp on a concept before throwing it around like rice at an old fashioned wedding.
Part 1 is an introduction to the world of computers. It requires no computer to read through or do the exercises; it is all concept. The part welcomes to the readers to the technobabble world of buzzwords, heaps of useless and redundant technology, and the diamonds in the rough waiting to be found out. Feel free to skip this if you have previous programming or computer operation experience.
Part 2 is a guide through the basics of the C++ language. This part will school you enough to get by with your programming.
Part 3 dives into advanced concepts for C++, but tries to maintain the thorough explanations. It also brings the reader up to date with newer additions like namespaces and the standard namespace; shining the light on "proper" C++ program structure.
Part 4 delves further into object-oriented and object-based programming with classes, polymorphism, abstraction, namespaces, static and dynamic libraries.
Part 5 is on the C++ Standard Template Library which is a collection of standard classes for common programming tasks.
I'd also like to include stub entries of things to set people on the path to GUI, multimedia, and low-level programming.
