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3 comments about Going from BASIC to C.

1. This book shows side by side basic to C code. Luckily basic and C are so similar that you do not have to change paradigms to take advantage of the power of C. If you were going from COBOL to C, a side by side reference would get you in trouble; you would end up with a COBOL program written in C. This program would be bulkier after compiling and run slower than the original COBOL. Basic on the other has is not so restricted in coding form and also can take advantage of PEEK and POKE to do addressing and take advantage of VECTORS. This book is not comprehensive of either language. It is a practical starting point. There are ten chapters and a summation. There are no appendixes.



2. This book is usually difficult to find and expensive as a result. I had high hopes of what it promised to do, providing the unique perspective of learning C Programming for programmers versed in the BASIC language. While it is true that Mr. Traister does provide a great deal of "here it is in BASIC, now here it is in C" examples, in my opinion he wastes time in explaining in great detail exactly what the just-a-few-lines little BASIC program is doing - yet, any BASIC programmer would already know exactly that. At most, a very brief summation of what the BASIC program is doing would more than suffice.

   The above is minor quibbling, though, which would be easily forgiven in light of admittedly subjective interpretations of "how much detail is enough detail" in reiterating items one's already supposed to know as a prerequisite for the book, and for the unique benefit of this BASIC - C tutorial.

   The *problem* (and it's a big one) is the author's wrecklessly bad programming examples of C in at least some cases I've spotted, and I'm barely into the book. For example, his example of how to properly code a small C program to utilize the strcat (string concatenation library function) results in incorrect, unpredictable execution. At first, I wondered if it was my compiler. After trying it with several, they all had the same problem, although some compilers might be more foregiving - but is that how you want to be taught how to code - so that it only works in some limited instances? I showed the example to an experienced C coder, who explained how bad the example(s) were. Sure enough, I went and checked a couple of other books, which had error-free, correct examples for strcat, etc.

   I'm not saying his other examples are necessarily as bad. I'll even give him the benefit of the doubt that probably most are not, at least those not dealing with memory-related issues and just instead simple loops, etc.

   But even seeing such bad examples is not the way I wish to learn, so I've filed his book away only to refer to if needed, and will instead try the much-touted "Joy of C" book instead and K & R's famous reference-style book. Also, the pub. date of Traister's book calls into question whether this is pre-ANSI C.

   As of this review's writing, you have one all-star review by one reader, and my own at best "be very careful" review in cross-checking his C examples, or at worst, unfortunately, consider other programming books for more "official" and proper examples, and only skim through this for a very high-level intro.




3. My students translate basic program to C program.
   But C program is not faster than basic program.
   The reason is that string operation in basic is simple, but the student describe string operation much complicated than basic.
   
   This book is very good for such a student.

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1 comments about Visual BASIC: Activities Workbook.

1. This book is the main reason of why I became a computer science engineer, and genius in my field. I totally respect the authors

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