After years of dipping into random chapters for reference I read through the first 2.5 volumes sequentially until life got too busy. I plan on gifting the current full set to myself this xmas- but even if you just dip into it like a coffee table book it’s a wonderful read that breaks up tough sections with humor.
The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth
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Re: The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth
#22The valuable prose aside, I never liked that code examples were in a pseudo assembly language.
There are M/MIX assemblers and interpreters you can download and run - in some ways they're better than "real" programming languages because they're explicitly for instruction so usability concerns like package managers and build automation support don't get in "the way" of operating them.
Re: The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth
#23I am not a believer, but pray that whichever $DEITY is watching over Donald Knuth allows him a healthy and long life to reach the achievement of finishing volume 7.
What he needs to do is start sketching the rest so that it can be finished after his death in his vision.
Re: The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth
#24I am not a believer, but pray that whichever $DEITY is watching over Donald Knuth allows him a healthy and long life to reach the achievement of finishing volume 7.
I think there's a proof that he can at best asymptotically approach volume 7.
Re: The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth
#25The valuable prose aside, I never liked that code examples were in a pseudo assembly language.
consider the alternatives. it could have been written in PL-1 and rapidly become dated. or it could have been written in a slightly higher level custom language and that would also have to be taught and would be less clear about what was going on under the hood. or a kind of pseudo-code that would also admit ambiguity. or it could have been rewritten in pascal, and then java, and then javascript and then rust.
given the timespan and the focus on complete analysis of running times and not just asymptotics, in the end maybe it wasn't so terrible a choice.
Re: The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth
#26Re: The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth
#27I am not a believer, but pray that whichever $DEITY is watching over Donald Knuth allows him a healthy and long life to reach the achievement of finishing volume 7.
I think there's a proof that he can at best asymptotically approach volume 7.
but what distraction could it be now? There seems to be nothing to be done for TeX
Re: The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth
#28I am not a believer, but pray that whichever $DEITY is watching over Donald Knuth allows him a healthy and long life to reach the achievement of finishing volume 7.
What he needs to do is start sketching the rest so that it can be finished after his death in his vision.
There’s no second Don Knuth vOv
Re: The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth
#29The valuable prose aside, I never liked that code examples were in a pseudo assembly language.
It's the only thing he could've done if he wanted the books to stand the test of time
Re: The Art of Computer Programming by Donald E. Knuth
#30From Future Plans...
> And after Volumes 1--5 are done, God willing, I plan to publish Volume 6 (the theory of context-free languages) and Volume 7 (Compiler techniques), but only if the things I want to say about those topics are still relevant and still haven't been said. Volumes 1--5 represent the central core of computer programming for sequential machines; the subjects of Volumes 6 and 7 are important but more specialized.