How This Book Is Organized
You must crawl before you walk. In Part I, you
learn how to crawl. These chapters teach you enough to write very
simple programs. You start with the mechanics of programming and
programming style. Next, you learn how to use variables and very
simple decision and control statements.
At this point you will have learned enough to create very simple
programs; therefore, in Chapter 7, you embark on a complete tour of the
programming process that shows you how real programs are created.
Chapter 1 gives you an overview
of C++, describes its history and uses, and explains how the language
is organized.
Chapter 2 explains the basic
programming process and gives you enough information to write a very
simple program.
Chapter 3 discusses programming
style. How to comment a program is covered, as well as how to write
clear and simple code.
Chapter 4 introduces simple C++
statements. Basic variables and the assignment statement are covered
in detail along with the arithmetic operators: +,
-, *, /, and
%.
Chapter 5 covers arrays and more
complex variables. The shorthand operators ++,
-- , *=,
=, +=, -=,
/=, and %= are described.
Chapter 6 explains simple
decision statements including if,
else, and for. The problem of
== versus = is discussed.
Chapter 7 takes you through the
steps required for creating a simple program, from specification
through release. Fast prototyping and debugging are discussed.
Part II describes all the
other simple statements and operators that are used in programming.
You also learn how to organize these statements into simple
functions.
Chapter 8 describes additional
control statements. Included are while, break,
and continue. The switch statement is discussed in detail.
Chapter 9 introduces local
variables, namespaces, functions, and parameters.
Chapter 10 describes the C++
preprocessor, which gives you great flexibility in creating code. It
also provides a tremendous number of ways for you to screw up. Simple
rules that help keep the preprocessor from becoming a problem are
described.
Chapter 11 discusses the logical
C++ operators that work on bits.
In Part III you learn how
basic declarations and statements can be used in the construction of
advanced types such as structures, unions, and classes. You also
learn about the concept of pointers.
Chapter 12 explains structures
and other advanced types. The sizeof
operator and the enum type are
included.
Chapter 13 introduces the concept
of a class. This is one of the more
powerful features of C++. Classes allow you to group data and the
operations that can be performed on that data into one object.
Chapter 14 describes additional
operations that can be performed with classes.
Chapter 15 introduces C++ pointer
variables and shows some of their uses.
Advanced programming techniques are explored in Part IV. In this section, you explore a number of
C++ features that let you create complex, yet easy-to-use objects or
classes.
Chapter 16 describes both
buffered and unbuffered input/output (I/O). ASCII and binary files
are discussed and you are shown how to construct a simple file. Old
C-style I/O operations are also included.
Chapter 17 describes how to debug
a program and how to use an interactive debugger. You are shown not
only how to debug a program, but also how to write a program so that
it is easy to debug. This chapter also describes many optimization
techniques to make your programs run faster and more efficiently.
Chapter 18 explains that C++
allows you to extend the language by defining additional meanings for
the language's operators. In this chapter, you
create a complex type and the operators that work on it.
Chapter 19 uses a simple decimal
floating-point format to introduce the problems inherent in using
floating points, such as roundoff errors, precision loss, overflow,
and underflow.
Chapter 20 describes advanced use
of pointers to construct dynamic structures such as linked lists and
trees.
Chapter 21 shows how to build
complex, derived classes out of simple, base ones.
Several miscellaneous features are described in Part V.
Chapter 22 explains how to handle
unexpected conditions within a program.
Chapter 23 shows how to split a
program into several files and use modular programming techniques.
The make utility is explained in more detail.
Chapter 24 allows you to define a
generic function or class that generates a family of functions.
Chapter 25 describes the template
library that comes with C++. This library consists of a number of
"container templates" and related
data structures which let you create very complex and robust data
structures with very little work.
Chapter 26 discusses some of the methodologies used
to design programs, such as structured programming and
object-oriented design. Not only are the design methods discussed,
but also the reasoning that went into the design of the program.
Chapter 27 details the steps necessary to
take a complex program from conception to completion. Information
hiding and modular programming techniques, as well as object-oriented
programming, are stressed.
Chapter 28 describes how to turn C code into C++ code
and addresses many of the traps lurking in C code that bite the C++
programmer.
Chapter 29 describes the
little used do/while statement, the comma operator, and the
?: operators.
Chapter 30 lists programming adages that will
help you construct good C++ programs.
Part VI contains additional
C++ reference information.
Appendix A contains a list of
character codes and their values.
Appendix B lists the numeric
ranges of some C++ variable types.
Appendix C lists the rules that
determine the order in which operators are evaluated.
Appendix D contains a program
that shows how the computer can compute the value of the sine
function.
Appendix E lists information on
the programming resources mentioned in the book.
|
