Re: [DotGNU]The C# Book - The plan

[Peter Minten]

"D.I.Freeman" wrote:
> 
> Um, at risk of making a stupid suggestion, we should be aiming for something
> about the same size as K&R, its small enough to be light to read and to not
> get bogged down, but well written enough to cover the core of what is needed.
> 
> > > I am standing, what now :-)
> 
> Oh, go on then, I will stand up as someone to help if I can find time.
> (two OSS projects and a degree to do)
> 
> > What do you want to do? If you want to help writing the book please tell
> > us what part you're interested in (for example writing about the basic
> > structure of the language or about some classes in pnetlib).
> 
> Um, do we really need to have a BIIIIG reference book, looking at my book
> shelf the most useful books I have are K&R and JAVA in a Nutshell, personally
> I think we should aim for something like this, where we have one book to
> describe the use of the language, which covers all the stuff others have
> suggested, then we have a book like JIAN which catalogues each of the pnet
> classes, there is no need to have this stuff in an Introductory book. Also
> if we put a SMALL introduction in the nutshell version, which covers the 
> syntax
> but doesn't go into the detail needed to teach a novice, we will then have a
> book which is of more use to a developer coming from another language.
> 
> um, I hope that makes sense, its late here now.

It makes good sense. A big book would be too much too work through in a semester
for students anyway. Taking your suggestions this is a possible new division of
the work into books:

Book A: Installation, compilation, how to use pnet, etc
        Comparison between C# and other languages
        The basics of the language (variables, methods, classes)
        Discussion of the important features of basic classes

Book B: Short introduction to the basics of the language and basic classes.
        Advanced use of the language (inheritance, overloading)
        Discussion of the important features of important classes (Net, IO, etc)
        Discussion of the basics of important DotGNU libs (libxml#, dotgnu.rpc)

Book C: Expert use of the language (attributes, reflection)
        Introduction to IL

Book D: In depth discussion of IL
        Discussion of pnet's design (for compiler classes)

Programmers with experience in another language can skip book A and go right to
book B. This way book B is the in-a-nutshell version.

I've left out a big reference book because this is something that we have the
ECMA specs and documentation in programs for and it's easier to keep those
up-to-date.

It should be possible to put just the right amount of info in these books so
that they fit well into an academic environment, let's say every book should be
doable in 3 months time.