What are must read books for entry level C programmer?

I'm a big fan of older programming books, and one of the favourites in my collection is Thomas Plum's 'Reliable Data Structures in C' book from way back when (1985!).

While it pre-dates ANSI C and contains a few quirks you wouldn't necessarily want in production code, I found the book to be a lucid and fantastic resource to help explain how data structures work in C, as it gives hands on applications through the building of a working piece of admin software (albeit a slightly outdated one!).

If you're aware of how pre-ANSI C differs from C89/99 et.al with regards to function and parameter declaration, it's worth buying a used copy on Amazon just to leaf through - there are copies going for a single cent (plus shipping) at the moment.

His first book 'Learning to Program in C' is also great reference to read alongside K & R (which should be mandatory reading for anyone looking to learn C, not necessarily for the code style or examples but to get a handle on the ethos of the language).

Re: What are must read books for entry level C programmer?

#10

Post by cauterized » Wed, Jan 18, 2017, 12:30 PM UTC

pixpop wrote: post #2

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_C_Programming_Language

It's not called the bible for nothing.

Anecdotally:

Going into college, my only coding experience was in HTML and a month of fiddling with BASIC ten years earlier.

I picked this (required reading) up a month ahead of my first CS class and read the first few chapters on my own. Even though I didn't have a computer to compile on, it gave me a huge advantage going in compared to others who had never programmed before. (Though not nearly as much as those who had taken classes in high school.)

Edited to add:

It will give you a good introduction to the language, but to an older standard. I haven't written C since college. My possibly wildly incorrect understanding is that code written to this standard will compile and run as intended on more modern compilers and systems, but the book won't introduce you to more modern features and conventions.