Write Great Code, Volume 1, 2nd Edition: Understanding the Machine by Randall Hy

Description: Write Great Code, Volume 1, 2nd Edition by Randall Hyde The first volume in a landmark series explaining the underlying mechanics of how a computer works. FORMAT Paperback LANGUAGE English CONDITION Brand New Publisher Description Understanding the Machine, the first volume in the landmark Write Great Code Series by Randall Hyde, explains the underlying mechanics of how a computer works.Like the highly regarded first edition, this second edition of Understanding the Machine covers machine organization and computer science topics like the CPU, machine architecture, memory and cache organization, I/O and peripheral devices, and how the decoding and execution of machine instructions affects software performance. This edition has been updated to cover 64-bit machines, newer peripheral devices, larger memory systems, large-scale SSDs, and newer CPUs like those used in personal computers and tablets. Author Biography Randall Hyde is the creator of the Lisa assembler for Apple II and developer of the High Level Assembly Language (HSA). He is the author of The Art of Assembly Language, one of the most highly recommended resources on assembly since 1996, and the Write Great Code series. He has written for Dr. Dobbs Journal, Byte, and the Association for Computing Machinerys Ubiquity magazine. Table of Contents Chapter 1: What You Need to Know to Write Great CodeChapter 2: Numeric RepresentationChapter 3: Binary Arithmetic and Bit OperationsChapter 4: Floating-Point RepresentationChapter 5: Character RepresentationChapter 6: Memory Organization and AccessChapter 7: Composite Data Types and Memory ObjectsChapter 8: Boolean Logic and Digital DesignChapter 9: CPU ArchitectureChapter 10: Instruction Set ArchitectureChapter 11: Memory Architecture and OrganizationChapter 12: Input and OutputChapter 13: Computer Peripheral BusesChapter 14: Mass Storage Devices and FilesystemsChapter 15: Miscellaneous Input and Output DevicesAfterword: Thinking Low-Level, Writing High-LevelAppendix A: ASCII Character SetGlossary Review "Sooner or later it makes sense to get a grip on what happens underneath the interpreter and compiler, even below the abstraction layer that the operating system provides. . . . This book leads you a part of the way to this knowledge. In a clear and understandable writing that makes it a joy to read."—Thomas Manthey, Amazon ReviewerPraise for the first edition of Write Great Code, Volume 1:"Todays programmers can hardly keep up with the race against inhumane deadlines and new technologies; therefore, they rarely have a chance to learn the basics of computer architectures and the inner-working of their programming languages. This book fills in the gaps. I strongly recommend it." —InformIT.com Write Great Code "isnt your typical teach yourself to program book. . . Its relevant to all languages, and all levels of programming experience. . . Run, dont walk, to buy and read this book." —Bay Area Large Installation System Administrators (BayLISA)5/5 stars: "[Write Great Code] fills in the blanks nicely and really could be part of a Computer Science degree required reading set... Once this book is read, you will have a greater understanding and appreciation for code that is written efficiently - and you may just know enough to do that yourself. At least you will have a great start at the art of crafting efficient software." —MacCompanion "Great fun to read." —VSJ Magazine "Write Great Code: Understanding the Machine should be on the required reading list for anyone who wants to develop terrific code in any language without having to learn assembly language." —WebServerTalk Promotional Understanding the Machine, the first volume in the landmark Write Great Code Series by Randall Hyde, explains the underlying mechanics of how a computer works. Review Quote Praise for the first edition of Write Great Code, Volume 1 : "Todays programmers can hardly keep up with the race against inhumane deadlines and new technologies; therefore, they rarely have a chance to learn the basics of computer architectures and the inner-working of their programming languages. This book fills in the gaps. I strongly recommend it." -- InformIT.com Write Great Code "isnt your typical teach yourself to program book. . . Its relevant to all languages, and all levels of programming experience. . . Run, dont walk, to buy and read this book." -- Bay Area Large Installation System Administrators (BayLISA) 5/5 stars: "[ Write Great Code ] fills in the blanks nicely and really could be part of a Computer Science degree required reading set... Once this book is read, you will have a greater understanding and appreciation for code that is written efficiently - and you may just know enough to do that yourself. At least you will have a great start at the art of crafting efficient software." -- MacCompanion "Great fun to read." -- VSJ Magazine " Write Great Code: Understanding the Machine should be on the required reading list for anyone who wants to develop terrific code in any language without having to learn assembly language." -- WebServerTalk Promotional "Headline" Understanding the Machine, the first volume in the landmark Write Great Code Series by Randall Hyde, explains the underlying mechanics of how a computer works. Excerpt from Book WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW TO WRITE GREAT CODE The Write Great Code (WGC) series will teach you how to write code you can be proud of; code that will impress other programmers, satisfy customers, and prove popular with users; and code that people (customers, your boss, and so on) wont mind paying top dollar to obtain. In general, the books in the WGC series will discuss how to write software that achieves legendary status, eliciting the awe and admiration of other programmers. 1.1 The Write Great Code Series Write Great Code, Volume 1: Understanding the Machine ( WGC1 hereafter) is the first of six books in the WGC series. Writing great code requires a combination of knowledge, experience, and skill that programmers usually obtain only after years of mistakes and discoveries. The purpose of this series is to share with both new and experienced programmers a few decades worth of observations and experience. I hope that these books will help reduce the time and frustration it takes to learn things "the hard way." This book, WGC1 , fills in the low-level details that are often skimmed over in a typical computer science or engineering curriculum. These details are the foundation for the solutions to many problems, and you cant write efficient code without this information. Though Im attempting to keep each book independent, WGC1 might be considered a prerequisite for the subsequent volumes in the series. Write Great Code, Volume 2: Thinking Low-Level, Writing High-Level ( WGC2 ) immediately applies the knowledge from this book. WGC2 will teach you how to analyze code written in a high-level language to determine the quality of the machine code that a compiler would generate for it. Optimizing compilers dont always generate the best machine code possible--the statements and data structures you choose in your source files can have a big impact on the efficiency of the compilers output. WGC2 will teach you how to write efficient code without resorting to assembly language. There are many attributes of great code besides efficiency, and the third book in this series, Write Great Code, Volume 3: Engineering Software ( WGC3 ), will cover some of those. WGC3 will discuss software development metaphors, development methologies, types of developers, system documentation, and the Unified Modeling Language (UML). WGC3 provides the basis for personal software engineering. Great code begins with a great design. Write Great Code, Volume 4: Designing Great Code ( WGC4 ), will describe the process of analysis and design (both structured and object-oriented). WGC4 will teach you how to translate an initial concept into a working design for your software systems. Write Great Code, Volume 5: Great Coding ( WGC5 ) will teach you how to create source code that others can easily read and maintain, as well as how to improve your productivity without the burden of the "busy work" that many software engineering books discuss. Great code works . Therefore, Id be remiss not to include a book on testing, debugging, and quality assurance. Few programmers properly test their code. This generally isnt because they find testing boring or beneath them, but because they dont know how to test their programs, eradicate defects, and ensure the quality of their code. To help overcome this problem, Write Great Code, Volume 6: Testing, Debugging, and Quality Assurance ( WGC6) will describe how to efficiently test your applications without all the drudgery engineers normally associate with this task. 1.2 What This Book Covers In order to write great code, you need to know how to write efficient code, and to write efficient code, you must understand how computer systems execute programs and how abstractions in programming languages map to the low-level hardware capabilities of the machine. In the past, learning great coding techniques has required learning assembly language. While this isnt a bad approach, its overkill. Learning assembly language involves learning two related subjects: machine organization, and programming in assembly language. The real benefits of learning assembly language come from the machine organization component. Thus, this book focuses solely on machine organization so you can learn to write great code without the overhead of also learning assembly language. Machine organization is a subset of computer architecture that covers low-level data types, internal CPU organization, memory organization and access, low-level machine operations, mass storage organization, peripherals, and how computers communicate with the rest of the world. This book concentrates on those parts of computer architecture and machine organization that are visible to the programmer or are helpful for understanding why system architects chose a particular system design. The goal of learning machine organization, and of this book, is not to enable you to design your own CPU or computer system, but to equip you to make the most efficient use of existing computer designs. Lets do a quick run-through of the specific topics well cover. Chapters 2, 4, and 5 deal with basic computer data representation-- how computers represent signed and unsigned integer values, characters, strings, character sets, real values, fractional values, and other numeric and non-numeric quantities. Without a solid grasp of how computers represent these various data types internally, itll be difficult for you to understand why some operations that use these data types are so inefficient. Chapter 3 discusses binary arithmetic and bit operations used by most modern computer systems. It also offers several insights into how you can write better code by using arithmetic and logical operations in ways not normally taught in beginning programming courses. Learning these kinds of standard "tricks" is part of how you become a great programmer. Chapter 6 introduces memory, discussing how the computer accesses its memory and describing characteristics of memory performance. This chapter also covers various machine code addressing modes , which CPUs use to access different types of data structures in memory. In modern applications, poor performance often occurs because the programmer, unaware of the ramifications of memory access in their programs, creates bottlenecks. Chapter 6 addresses many of these ramifications. Chapter 7 returns to data types and representation by covering composite data types and memory objects: pointers, arrays, records, structures, and unions. All too often, programmers use large composite data structures without even considering the memory and performance impact of doing so. The low-level description of these high-level composite data types will make clear their inherent costs, so you can use them sparingly and wisely. Chapter 8 discusses Boolean logic and digital design. This chapter provides the mathematical and logical background youll need to under- stand the design of CPUs and other computer system components. In particular, this chapter discusses how to optimize Boolean expressions, such as those found in common high-level programming language statements like if and while. Continuing the hardware discussion from Chapter 8, Chapter 9 discusses CPU architecture. A basic understanding of CPU design and operation is essential if you want to write great code. By writing your code in a manner consistent with how a CPU will execute it, youll get much better performance using fewer system resources. Chapter 10 discusses CPU instruction set architecture. Machine instructions are the primitive units of execution on any CPU, and the duration of program execution is directly determined by the number and type of machine instructions the CPU must process. Learning how computer architects design machine instructions can provide valuable insight into why certain operations take longer to execute than others. Once you understand the limitations of machine instructions and how the CPU interprets them, you can use this information to turn mediocre code sequences into great ones. Chapter 11 returns to the subject of memory, covering memory architecture and organization. This chapter is especially important for anyone wanting to write fast code. It describes the memory hierarchy and how to maximize the use of the cache and other fast memory components. Youll learn about thrashing and how to avoid low-performance memory access in your applications. Chapters 12 through 15 describe how computer systems communicate with the outside world. Many peripheral (input/output) devices operate at much lower speeds than the CPU and memory. You could write the fastest-executing sequence of instructions possible, and your application would still run slowly because you didnt understand the limitations of the I/O devices in your system. These four chapters discuss generic I/O ports, system buses, buffering, handshaking, polling, and interrupts. They also explain how to efficiently use many popular PC peripheral devices, including keyboards, parallel (printer) ports, serial ports, disk drives, tape drives, flash storage, SCSI, IDE/ATA, USB, and sound cards. 1.3 Assumptions This Book Makes This book was written with certain assumptions about your prior knowledge. Youll reap the greatest benefit from this material if your skill set matches the following: * You should be reasonably compete Description for Sales People Meets the needs of many students and prospective students studying computer science. Fills knowledge gaps as well that are prevalent among working programmers who lack formal training in computer science. There is a huge and growing demand for computer science and programming titles. Updated to cover topics such as 64-bit systems, newer peripheral devices, large-scale SSDs, newer CPUs, and more. Details ISBN171850036X Author Randall Hyde Publisher No Starch Press,US Year 2020 ISBN-10 171850036X ISBN-13 9781718500365 Format Paperback Imprint No Starch Press,US Subtitle Understanding the Machine Place of Publication San Francisco Country of Publication United States DEWEY 005.1 Short Title Write Great Code, Volume 1, 2nd Edition Language English UK Release Date 2020-07-31 Publication Date 2020-07-31 AU Release Date 2020-07-31 NZ Release Date 2020-07-31 US Release Date 2020-07-31 Audience General Pages 472 We've got this At The Nile, if you're looking for it, we've got it. With fast shipping, low prices, friendly service and well over a million items - you're bound to find what you want, at a price you'll love! TheNile_Item_ID:141763953;

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