Recommend a beginner's book for Visual Basic

[Katz, Lena B.]

When I'm writing videoprocessing algorithms, I still need to write memory efficient code (that's about the only place you can really stress a processor and its memory these days).  I'm just glad that the ceiling for how much code can be written has been raised.  I've never had to write self-modifying code, and I'm glad of it (even if it is fun).
 
Writing clear, clean, and debugable code should be what every sane programmer aims for.  Whatever language you're writing in.
 
Lena

	-----Original Message----- 
	From: eprime at mail.talkbank.org on behalf of Doug Fuller 
	Sent: Thu 6/30/2005 7:10 PM 
	To: Leisha Wharfield 
	Cc: eprime at mail.talkbank.org 
	Subject: Re: Recommend a beginner's book for Visual Basic
	
	

	Indeed - it's a natural consequence of the growth explosion
	in hardware resources:
	
	Back in the day when you only had 64kb of memory, you had to
	write memory-efficient code.  Back in the day when you had
	circuits running in the sub-megahertz range, you had to
	develop fast algorithms.  This is why Y2K happened -
	programmers sacrificed century datespace for other purposes.
	
	But THESE days, processors are fast, and memory is cheap -
	bloat and inefficiency are running wild.  I'm still trying to
	understand why a mail reader requires an HTML interface, for
	example...
	
	>   I agree with the ideal of writing clean code, but I
	>   think those of us who still believe in it are
	>   quickly becoming dinosaurs. To people coming up, "it
	>   just doesn't matter."
	>
	>   Leisha
	>
	>   Doug Fuller wrote:
	>
	> I've always found C an easier language to learn (I didn't
	> really grok VB until after I'd taken enough C++ and Java to
	> translate).
	>
	> So, I'm gonna recommend
	> http://www.cplusplus.com/doc/tutorial/ .  Of course, the
	> memory management is unnecessary (your student shouldn't be
	> looking at "Advanced Concepts", as they don't exist in VB),
	> and all the syntax will be different.  But, hey, that's part
	> of what learning programming is about... learning that the
	> syntax doesn't really matter.  What matters is what you want
	> to do, and how difficult it's going to be.
	>   
	>
	> As someone coming from a C/C++/Java background, I can't
	stand
	> VB.  Why does Microsoft have to reinvent the wheel (i.e.
	> standard library functions) in everything they do?  Things
	> like substring functions.  In almost every computer
	language,
	> it's called substr().  I spent an hour digging through the
	> worthless help pages finding that it's called Mid$() in VB.
	>
	> Now, having said that, I do want to briefly address that
	last
	> quoted paragraph - syntax does matter, insomuch as it
	> contributes to readability/maintenance.  In the spirit of
	> collaboration and/or modification, knowing how to write
	clear
	> code and document it well will save time and effort in the
	> future if you or a collaborator decide to tweak parameters.
	> 
	--
	Doug Fuller
	dfuller at wayne.edu
	Research Assistant, Wayne State University
	Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurosciences