July 2015
Intermediate to advanced
380 pages
10h 15m
English
book
Learn C the Hard Way: Practical Exercises on the Computational Subjects You Keep Avoiding (Like C)
by Zed A. Shaw
Overview
You Will Learn C!
Zed Shaw has crafted the perfect course for the beginning C programmer eager to advance their skills in any language. Follow it and you will learn the many skills early and junior programmers need to succeed–just like the hundreds of thousands of programmers Zed has taught to date! You bring discipline, commitment, persistence, and experience with any programming language; the author supplies everything else.
In Learn C the Hard Way, you’ll learn C by working through 52 brilliantly crafted exercises. Watch Zed Shaw’s teaching video and read the exercise. Type his code precisely. (No copying and pasting!) Fix your mistakes. Watch the programs run. As you do, you’ll learn what good, modern C programs look like; how to think more effectively about code; and how to find and fix mistakes far more efficiently. Most importantly, you’ll master rigorous defensive programming techniques, so you can use any language to create software that protects itself from malicious activity and defects.
Through practical projects you’ll apply what you learn to build confidence in your new skills. Shaw teaches the key skills you need to start writing excellent C software, including
Setting up a C environment
Basic syntax and idioms
Compilation, make files, and linkers
Operators, variables, and data types
Program control
Arrays and strings
Functions, pointers, and structs
Memory allocation
I/O and files
Libraries
Data structures, including linked lists, sort, and search
Stacks and queues
Debugging, defensive coding, and automated testing
Fixing stack overflows, illegal memory access, and more
Breaking and hacking your own C code
It’ll Be Hard at First. But Soon, You’ll Just Get It–And That Will Feel Great!
This tutorial will reward you for every minute you put into it. Soon, you’ll know one of the world’s most powerful programming languages. You’ll be a C programmer.
Watch Zed, too! The accompanying bonus content contains hours of passionate, powerful teaching: a complete C video course! Access the videos by going to https://learning.oreilly.com/course/learn-c-the/9780134434452/.
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