Programming Books and such (was Re: Becoming a "Super User")

[sheldon@atlcom.net (Sheldon Simms)]

In article <Pine.PMDF.3.91.961203203931.871576C-100000@OBERLIN.EDU>, Toby
Reiter <str4552@OBERLIN.EDU> wrote:

> Did I say I wasn't willing to invest anything?  My difficulty arises in 
> the fact that I have picked up Apple II Technical Manuals, attempted to 
> read them, and was completely overwhelmed with their complexity.
> (snip) ...
> In addition, I know a little about programming (I 
> am taking a class on C++ [essentially C] in college), but have no 
> understanding of assembly language or the IIgs toolbox.

This is just a matter of experience. The Toolbox references generally seem
to assume that you'll be programming in assembly language, although they
do have C declarations for toolbox calls and data structures. Also they
assume that you actually know something about the event-driven programming
model of the Apple IIgs. This may be one of the biggest hurdles to clear
for a novice programmer. I'll admit that I learned it from the Mac. There
were, and still are, a lot more books for the Mac that teach you what the
OS wants you to do in order to write a toolbox program. I've never seen
the Byteworks book you mention, "Toolbox Programming in C", but it may be
just what you need to bridge the gap between your C++ course and the Apple
IIgs toolbox references. Of course you may have another problem since your
course is in C++, rather than straight C. If you have learned to rely
heavily on C++ features not found in C, you may find C programming
frustrating until you re-orient your mind towards a non object-oriented
style.

As for assembly, I personally don't think it's all that important *in
general*. However, for Apple II computers it is pretty important.
Understanding assembly language is the key to knowing how the machine
actually works and figuring out just how did those FTA programmers do all
that stuff?!

I have 3 copies of the book "Elementary Assembly Language for the Apple IIgs
and the 65816" by William B. Sanders that I picked up at a used bookstore
a while back. They're just gathering dust on my shelf so if you (or anyone
else) wants a copy for the price of shipping I'll mail it off. After
glancing at the book, my opinion is that it's not that great, but it's
better than nothing. My gripe is that it seems to dwell for far too long
on incredibly simple stuff, but maybe I just don't know what a beginner
would like anymore - it might be useful to you. It's based around Merlin
but it shouldn't be too hard to figure out how to use it with ORCA/M.
 
All this makes me think of two things I think it would be nice to have
for the IIgs, but I'm not holding my breath on either of them:
1) A C++ compiler.
2) A more accessible rewrite of the Toolbox References along the lines of
   New Inside Macintosh.

-Sheldon

-- 
W. Sheldon Simms III - sheldon@atlcom.net