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Title: Beginning Visual C++ 6 by Ivor Horton ISBN: 0-7645-4388-1 Publisher: Wrox Pub. Date: 26 August, 1998 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $49.99 |
Average Customer Rating: 3.87 (116 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Real World Programming
Comment: I am an engineer who has decided to learn Visual C++ and has never programmed before. The first half of the book covers console applications (DOS programs). The second half covers many topics in MFC and one in ATL. When Ivor explains about console applications, it is easy reading in which you can cover more pages per hour and have a good understanding on the topics. The second half of the book is a much more difficult topic to learn and I needed to slow down a bit to understand it. I understood each chapter perfectly well only due to the fact that I did not go on to the next chapter until I knew the previous chapter by heart. It is like learning from a Math textbook from high school. The book starts out easy but then later becomes very complicated so you need to know all of the content in previous chapters and not impatiently speed through the book. It took me three months for the first half and nine months for the second half. Ivor Horton does an excellent job explaining very difficult material in a real world setting. This is what makes it different from a math textbook. A typical math textbook only covers math and not how to apply mathematics in a real world application. Ivor Horton concentrates on this book being applicable to the real world. He does assume the reader is familiar with mathematics to the level of trigonometry. If you are not familiar with this, some examples in the book may be confusing. Other people who reviewed this book and gave it only one star seemed to me that they wanted a quick and dirty session of how to program in Visual C++ from scratch. If they want quick programming, then they should go read a book on Visual BASIC scripting, not Visual C++.
Rating: 5
Summary: Brevity doesn't mar this spectacular text
Comment: This text of nearly 1,200 pages attempts to do it all: take a neophyte with little or no knowledge of programming and 1) teach C++ programming - not just a quick once over, but the whole darned language, right from soup to nuts; and 2)teach Microsoft Windows programming in C++, including full coverage of Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) and ActiveX controls; and 3)oh yeah, just as a side note, also teach the use of the Visual C++ integrated development environment!
This is just not possible to do in 'merely' 1200 pages; 3,000 might be more appropriate, and 4,000 would certainly not be wasted. So it's not surprising that there's a slight sense of brevity in some of the topics covered.
What is truly amazing is just how well Horton manages to pull this off. A combination of skilled writing, careful editing and towering educational skill has resulted in what must truly rate as THE single best text out there on Visual C++ programming. No other book even comes close; no other book is even in the same ball park. This book sets a new standard of excellence that, sadly, most authors will never achieve.
The book starts with a quick 1 chapter 'once over' of the Microsoft Visual C++ Integrated Development Environment (IDE), explaining how to start a simple DOS window application and pointing out various useful features of the editor. At the end of this chapter you won't be an expert in the IDE, but you will be able to get a project created, a file started and start entering code.
From here to about the half way point Horton does a masterful job of teaching the practical basics of programming in C++. He not only teaches the language, syntax, and idiosyncrasies; he also teaches basic programming concepts, covering such topics as decision structures, loops, strings, sorting... basically everything you'd expect to learn in a full college 'programming fundamentals' course.
From the mid way point on through to the end of the book, Horton concentrates on teaching the practical aspects of programming in the Windows environment using Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC). He pulls this off just as well as the first half of the text; although occasionally theory is a little bit terse or 'skimpy', the practical usage of MFC is well presented and thoroughly discussed.
Really, the only way to improve this text would be to double or triple it in size, and really let Mr. Horton take off. I considered - briefly - reducing my ranking of this book to 4 stars, simply because it attempts to do so much. But I just couldn't do it; this book is just too good, it achieves so much, it is so clearly written. It's an absolute masterpiece! To give this book less than 5 stars would be somewhat analogous to dismissing the Mona Lisa, simply because it was mounted in a rather indifferent frame.
For readers with absolutely no knowledge of computers at all, who don't know the difference between a bit and a byte and couldn't define either one, I might recommend Mr. Horton's "Beginning C++: The Complete Language". This text is approximately 950 pages of what amounts to DOS - style programming in C++. Because of the concentration on just C++ programming - there's no mention of windows in this text - there's much more room to delve into theory as well as practise. Mr. Horton puts the space to good use, with the result that every concept is extremely clear, and nothing is left unsaid.
I own both texts, and have found it very helpful to be able to cross reference between the two. While the C++ DOS programming covers much the same ground in both texts, it is covered somewhat differently; and this can help to clarify concepts that might have remained muddled otherwise.
If you have even the most basic grounding in programming, the Visual C++ text is probably all you need. With a concentration on practicality, this text starts with first concepts and gives you everything you need to start writing complex, windows based programs in C++ using Visual C++ from Microsoft.
If you're only planning on buying one text... this is it. If you want the BEST text... this is it. And if you don't RUN to the nearest bookstore and see what I (and others) are talking about, you're short changing yourself severely. Because this book can do a lot more then take up space on your bookshelf. This book can actually teach you C++. You can actually learn to write complex Windows based programs - even obtain employment as a competent C++ programmer - with nothing more then Visual C++, and this book.
Hear that soft tapping sound? That's opportunity, knocking. And if you give it a chance, this book can change your life.
Charles Worton, MCP, MCP+I, MCSE, A+
Rating: 5
Summary: Excellent book for beginners and mid level programmers
Comment: Ivor Horton has an exceptional talent for organizing and presenting C++ that makes it easy to learn. This is a very difficult lanuage, but if you persist, you will learn with his book. It is the best C++ learner book I have found. He leads you through each chapter expanding on the previous. It is slow going at first because you need to know so many things to begin programming. It becomes easy after you get half way through the book and all the pieces of the puzzle start coming together.
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Title: Introduction to MFC Programming with Visual C++ by Richard M. Jones ISBN: 0130166294 Publisher: Prentice Hall PTR Pub. Date: 22 December, 1999 List Price(USD): $39.99 |
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Title: Practical Visual C++ 6 by Jonathan Bates, Timothy Tompkins ISBN: 0789721422 Publisher: Que Pub. Date: 19 August, 1999 List Price(USD): $29.99 |
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Title: Special Edition Using Visual C++ 6 by Kate Gregory ISBN: 0789715392 Publisher: Que Pub. Date: 14 August, 1998 List Price(USD): $39.99 |
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Title: Ivor Horton's Beginning C++ : The Complete Language ANSI/ISO Compliant (Wrox Beginning Series) by Ivor Horton ISBN: 186100012X Publisher: APress Pub. Date: 08 December, 1997 List Price(USD): $39.99 |
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Title: Programming Windows, Fifth Edition by Charles Petzold ISBN: 157231995X Publisher: Microsoft Press Pub. Date: 11 November, 1998 List Price(USD): $59.99 |
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