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Re: Re: Re: Recommendations for a programming book?

• To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
• Subject: [mg55863] Re: [mg55837] Re: [mg55778] Re: Recommendations for a programming book?
• From: János <janos.lobb at yale.edu>
• Date: Fri, 8 Apr 2005 01:36:39 -0400 (EDT)
• References: <d2tfqb$qp3$1@smc.vnet.net> <200504060711.DAA13529@smc.vnet.net> <200504070910.FAA12961@smc.vnet.net>
• Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com

Andrzej,

Can you show, how to include the material from Michael's DVDs into  
the Help of Mathematica, just as Wolfram's book is shown there ?   
Then if that also could be achieved that when I look let's say  
RealDigits in the Help. then under

See Section 3.1.3

I could have

See Trott's P.2.4.2

or something like that, that would be great.

Thanks ahead,

János


On Apr 7, 2005, at 5:10 AM, Andrzej Kozlowski wrote:

>   I think I have read almost all books on programming in  
> Mathematica and
> find Michael Trott's book by far the most interesting. Maeder's  
> book is
> elegantly written but actually you do not need it to learn how to  
> write
> good packages or how to document them: a better method is to select  
> one
> or two standard packages provided with Mathematica and study them
> carefully. To me this seems a relatively trivial issue, not worth a
> whole book. Maeder's two books entitles The Mathematica Programmer I
> and II, based on his articles in the Mathematica Journal are in many
> ways more interesting.
> Wagner's book is a good book on programming but it hardly shows you  
> how
> to solve a serious problem. For the latter Mastering Mathematica by
> Gray is better but it comes nowhere near Michael's book. The value of
> Michael's book is not really that there are "things in there that are
> no where else" but rather that shows how to use Mathematica to solve
> problems about which it is sometimes hard to believe that they can  
> even
> tackled with a computer program. It is completely wrong to say that is
> has  "a huge number of unnecessary references". The worked out  
> problems
> and exercises touch on countless topics in Mathematics and physics and
> the references are needed for the necessary background. I doubt that
> there is anyone who knows more than a fraction of the material
> involved; references are a must in this sort of work.
> As for Wolfram's book; well I think trying to learn Matheamtica  
> form it
> is a bit like trying to learn mathematics form an; I do not know  
> anyone
> who has got very far with this approach. But, as a basic reference it
> has no substitute.
>
> Andrzej Kozlowski
>
>
>
>
> On 6 Apr 2005, at 09:11, David Bailey wrote:
>
>> I remember when I first obtained Mathematica, how impressed I was  
>> with
>> Stephen's book. I think the examples are particularly well chosen  
>> - not
>> too simple as to fail to illustrate what a command does, but not so
>> complicated that you have to work hard to understand them.
>>
>> Because the book with the software is so good, it does seem hard to
>> beat
>> it! I have yet to read Michael Trott's book, and what you say is
>> interesting. I wonder if anyone else can offer an opinion.
>>
>> As regards such things as checking that a function does not
>> inadvertently access global variables, I think this is something  
>> for a
>> piece of checking software to enforce - it is not so much a lack of
>> knowledge, but a mistake that you are trying to eliminate.
>>
>> David Bailey
>> dbaileyconsultancy.co.uk
>>
>>



------------------------------------------
"The shortest route between two points is the middleman"  Ayn Rand

• References:
  • Re: Recommendations for a programming book?
    • From: David Bailey <dave@Remove_Thisdbailey.co.uk>
  • Re: Re: Recommendations for a programming book?
    • From: Andrzej Kozlowski <akoz@mimuw.edu.pl>