More Programming Pearls: Confessions of a Coder: Confessions of a Coder

What do topics ranging from organic chemistry to Napoleon's campaigns have to do with computer programming? This collection of essays demonstrates the many varied aspects of programming, showing how programming can be both a fun and elegant science. Some of the essays cover programming techniques, like how profilers can provide insight into the dynamic behavior of programs, and methods for making data files self-describing. These techniques deal with real programs and they are realistically illustrated, using the C and Awk languages. Bentley also provides the reader with some tricks of the programmer's trade, like a collection of rules of thumb and hints for finding simple solutions to hard problems. These essays also originally appeared in the author's column in Communication of the ACM, and have been substantially revised, incorporating new sections, problems, and reader comments. 0201118890B04062001 Pt I: Programming Techniques -- Profilers -- Computing Primes, Using Profilers, A Specialized Profiler, Building Profilers, Principles, Problems -- Associative Arrays -- Associative Arrays In Awk, A Finite State Machine Simulator, Topological Sorting, Principles, Problems -- Confessions Of A Coder -- Binary Search, Selection, A Subroutine Library, Principles, Problems -- Self-describing Data -- Name-value Pairs, Provenances In Programming, A Sorting Lab, Principles, Problems -- Pt. Ii: Tricks Of The Trade -- Cutting The Gordian Knot -- A Quiz, Some Solutions, Hints, Principles, Problems, Debugging -- Bumper-sticker Computer Science -- Coding, User Interfaces, Debugging, Performance, Documentation, Managing Software, Miscellaneous Rules, Principles, Problems -- The Envelope Is Back -- A Warm-up For Cool Brains, Performance Rules Of Thumb, Little's Law, Principles, Problems, Quick Calculations In Everyday Life -- The Furbelow Memorandum -- The Memo, Principles -- Pt. Iii: I/o Fit For Humans -- Little Languages -- The Pic Language, Perspective, Pic Preprocessors, Little Languages For Implementing Pic, Principles, Problems -- Document Design -- Tables, Three Design Principles, Figures, Text, The Right Medium, Principles, Problems, A Catalog Of Pet Peeves -- Graphic Output -- A Case Study, A Sampler Of Displays, Principles, Problems, Napoleon's March To Moscow -- A Survey Of Surveys -- The Problems Of Polling, The Languages, The Pictures, Principles, Problems -- Pt. Iv: Algorithms -- A Sample Of Brilliance -- A Sampling Of Sampling Algorithms, Floyd's Algorithm, Random Permutations, Principles, Problems, A Big Success Story -- Selection -- The Problem, The Program, Analysis Of Run Time, Principles, Problems. Jon Bentley. Includes Index. Programming Techniques Profilers Associative Arrays Confessions of a Coder Self-Describing Data Tricks of the Trade Cutting the Gordian Knot Bumper-Sticker Computer Science The Envelope is Back The Furbelow Memorandum I/O Fit for Humans Little Languages Document Design Graphic Output A Survey of Surveys Algorithms A Sample of Brilliance Birth of a Cruncher Selection The C and Awk Languages A Subroutine Library Solutions to Selected Problems Index