Write Great Code, Volume 2: Thinking Low-Level, Writing High-Level 1st Edition

by Randall Hyde (Author)

10 customer reviews

ISBN-13: 978-1593270650

ISBN-10: 1593270658

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The second volume in the Write Great Code series supplies the critical information that today's computer science students don't often get from college and university courses: How to carefully choose their high-level language statements to produce efficient code. Write Great Code, Volume 2: Thinking Low-Level, Writing High-Level, teaches software engineers how compilers translate high-level language statements and data structures into machine code. Armed with this knowledge, a software engineer can make an informed choice concerning the use of those high-level structures to help the compiler produce far better machine code--all without having to give up the productivity and portability benefits of using a high-level language.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"Exceeds its goal of helping developers pay more attention to application performance . . . a must for any high-level application developer." -- Free Software Magazine, May 9, 2006

"If you want to know what's really going on with your programs . . . you won't find an easier introduction." -- DevX, April 14, 2006

From the Back Cover

No prior knowledge of assembly language required!

In the beginning, most software was written in assembly, the CPUs low-level language, in order to achieve acceptable performance on relatively slow hardware. Early programmers were sparing in their use of high-level language code, knowing that a high-level language compiler would generate crummy, low-level machine code for their software. Today, however, many programmers write in high-level languages like C, C++, Pascal, Java, or BASIC. The result is often sloppy, inefficient code. You dont need to give up the productivity and portability of high-level languages in order to produce more efficient software.

In this second volume of the Write Great Code series, youll learn:
How to analyze the output of a compiler to verify that your code does, indeed, generate good machine code
The types of machine code statements that compilers typically generate for common control structures, so you can choose the best statements when writing HLL code
Just enough 80x86 and PowerPC assembly language to read compiler output
How compilers convert various constant and variable objects into machine data, and how to use these objects to write faster and shorter programs

With an understanding of how compilers work, youll be able to write source code that they can translate into elegant machine code. That understanding starts right here, with Write Great Code, Volume 2: Thinking Low-Level, Writing High-Level.

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Product details

Series: Write Great Code (Book 2)
Paperback: 640 pages
Publisher: No Starch Press; 1 edition (March 18, 2006)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1593270658
ISBN-13: 978-1593270650
Product Dimensions: 7 x 1.5 x 9.2 inches
Shipping Weight: 2.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 10 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #253,777 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #23 in Books > Computers & Technology > Programming > Languages & Tools > Assembly Language Programming
- #66 in Books > Computers & Technology > Computer Science > AI & Machine Learning > Machine Theory
- #86 in Books > Textbooks > Computer Science > Object-Oriented Software Design

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Stfn

Excellent ( except for HLA )

August 26, 2010

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

The book is really good in teaching the best way to code in order to produce faster/smaller programs, taking advantage of the hardware. A lot of the concentrated info contained here is hard to find elsewhere and would require extensive research in several compiler theory and computer architecture manuals.
After reading the text your understanding of software/hardware interface will be improved by several orders of magnitude.
The only small annoyance is the fact that a lot of times Mr Hyde start the discussions on various topics using HLA listings as example and even if he provide details on MASM/TASM applications he does so comparing these to HLA. Hence you have to always study the HLA examples ( HLA is some kind of low-level language the author developed ).
Since I'm not interested in HLA ( probably like a lot of the readers out there ) I did not like the ( small ) additional effort it required.
Overall this book is a little gem.

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Lance C. Hibbeler

Overall, totally worth it

August 21, 2008

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

I read the first volume of this book, and it was a great, informative read. After volume 2, I have this to say:

This book is not a cookbook for writing better code. Hyde explains why certain programming constructs are better than others (and in what cases), and backs it up with evidence from the assembly code (that is the entire premise of the book). Finally, solid proof of (and against) what I've been hearing all along from instructors and other programmers on message boards or face-to-face communication. That in mind, it would have been nice to have a summary of the tips at the end of the chapters, or the end of the book, as a quick-reference kind of thing. These concepts are the perfect thing to consider when fine-tuning your code. I take the stance that if you fine-tune as you go, you have less work later, so I took notes as I read and have started implementing changes for the better (with evidence that it is better) in some of my coding.

Does anyone write code in Pascal anymore? Seriously? Hyde discusses examples in C/C++ and Pascal for the most part (favoring Pascal, by my estimation), so it is nice that the book is language-independent for the reader. The assembly examples in the book are in 80x86 and PowerPC...I think it would have been better to release two versions of this book, one where the assembly is 80x86 (because it is so ubiquitous, if for no other reason), and then another where the assembly is in PowerPC assembly. I didn't pick this up to become an assembly language programmer, and quite frankly, the PowerPC examples just confused me. It looks like my cat stepped on my keyboard and it appeared in print.

The tone of the text is sometimes condescending (especially in the first 5-6 chapters), with a not-so-subtle "real men only code in assembly" message. It seriously reminds me of my parents/grandparents whining about how hard they had it growing up...walking barefoot to school in the winter...and only having assembly to work with in writing programs.

So by the end of this book, I think I have met Hyde's goal for the readers. I can't sit down and write an assembly program, but I can read enough assembly to compare different versions of my high-level program to say what is better. As the subtitle suggests, I am "thinking low-level" now as I write my programs (in C...which most programmers would call low-level). I suggest "actively" reading this book and coding up a few examples with your compiler and examining the output, following along in the text. Doing that really made the material click for me.

Overall, it's a good book and definitely worth it. This is a long one though, and takes some time to digest. See you in volume 3!

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Wuping Xin

do not ask what your compiler can do for you, but what you can do for your compiler!

May 8, 2007

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

In this RAD time when anybody who knows drag-and-drop can proudly claim himself software developer, this is the unique book for true, serious, and hardcore programmer that writes native codes. I completely agree that, in order to write efficient and optimized code, you not only need to understand what your compiler can do for you,but also you should know, at least for a minimum level, what you can do for you compiler. In this regard, this book does an excellent job explaining the magic your compiler does for you and what you can do to become part of the magic. As such, I highly recommend this book to any serious programmers.

The only thing I don't like about this book is that it appears to be giving too much space to HLA, which I suspect is a widely accepted assembly dialect that was actually used in any real-life project. And I just feel it is a waste of my time trying to understand and catch up with this HLA language. This results in my taking one star off with the final rate of 4 stars.

Other than that, this is indeed a very good book.

In a previous reivew, it is complained that Java is not touched. This is understandable while it really doesn't seem to be a problem to me. Java after compiling is translated into bytecode that has to be executed on the virtual machine. I guess that is really beyond the intended scope of this book, which is related to the world of native codes that after compiling can be directly executed by the machine.

9 people found this helpful

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August 2, 2010

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Very few books go into the kind of detail that this one goes into. It teaches you to think like a compiler, so you understand the reasoning why certain code is slower that others. It is definitely a good book to get to learn how to optimize code. It talks about current game systems, and assembly that those would use also.

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Amazon Customer

Understanding coding ... is possible!!!

February 20, 2016

Verified Purchase

The balance of "insight" & "knowledge" is Exceptional ! I've been totally absorbed in both vol.1 and vol.2. Very much looking forward to vol,s 3 & 4.

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Most recent customer reviews

Anthony Obi

One Star

I Hate This Book With All my hate Don't buy this book forever the writer will just waste your time don't even think to book this book please I beg of you you will be disappointed...Read more

Published on August 31, 2015

Jeff Pike

How Software Works

How Software Works would also be a great title for this volume. Any high level construct you can think of is analyzed in-depth at a low level.Read more

Published on November 6, 2007

George Jempty

better than nothing

The first 100 pages of this book were fantastic for concepts. After that, there were numerous code listings of various dialects of assembler that were each several pages in...Read more

Published on August 7, 2006

Thomas Duff

Excellent material for serious software developers...

Back in "the day", you really couldn't write high-level code without at least some exposure at some point to lower-level code, like Assembler.Read more

Published on June 25, 2006

Jim Anderton

Help your compiler write better code

I earned my Computer Science degree several years ago. During my studies I learned languages like Assembly, Modula-2, C and C++ and even a little VB in a computer graphics class.Read more

Published on April 14, 2006

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