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+--- Thread: Will Fundamentals of C/C++ games programming, teach me C++?? (/showthread.php?tid=50)
Will Fundamentals of C/C++ games programming, teach me C++?? - Brian Beuken - 03-17-2018
Well yes, but no....
The book is not designed to be a tutorial for the C/C++ language, you are expected to have learned some of the basics of C/C++ before you start, the code used is deliberately very simple, some can argue too simple, so that a brand new coder won't be too overwhelmed, but it's not a tutorial for the language. Though as you work through the book we learn to use more complex C/C++ concepts, its never in as much detail as a proper C/C++ tutorial will do.
I call it core concepts, the basics of what you need to help you build understanding of how to do things, but there are nearly always better more elegant and possibly simpler ways if you understand the language better.
I do some tutorials for the Raspberry via the MagPi magazine, which attempts to teach basic C/C++ (and OpenGLES2.0) but you really should still be working your way though a book/tutorial and be familiar with how a C/C++ project builds and compiles, the basic concepts of OOP and class based architectures.
I advise all my students to work their way through this book
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Beginning-C-Through-Game-Programming/dp/1305109910/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1521311027&sr=1-2
Its an excellent introduction to C++ and goes through almost all the features of the language. Its sadly quite light on actual game or graphic programming, but its a very easy to understand book with good working examples that you can do at your own pace. Everything you are ever going to need to understand C/C++ is in this book, everything you need to use it, to make games, is in mine.
Of course books are subjective, and other beginner books might be more appealing to you, but make the effort to work your way through a beginners book, understand the build cycle, how to create classes, know how a program flows and understand pointers, references and memory. As well as loops and the concepts of OOP.
Even if your grasp is basic, once you have that, my book is much easier to work with.
RE: Will Fundamentals of C/C++ games programming, teach me C++?? - jomoengineer - 10-13-2018
Brian,
This is a very good explanation and I appreciate your openness. You sure have done an great deal of providing this info to the masses.
I have the 3rd edition of the book "Beginning C++ Through Game Programming" and I did find it fun to go through and interesting. However, like many of the so called C++ books, this one for the most part shows a C take on C++. It does not get into classes until chapter 8 and just briefly covers the subject. It's a good book none the less.
The "C++ Primer" book or " Programming: Principles and Practice Using C++ (2nd Edition)" by Bjarne Stroustrup would be good options as well however a bit more expensive.
Cheers,
Jon
RE: Will Fundamentals of C/C++ games programming, teach me C++?? - Brian Beuken - 10-13-2018
Yes it is a bit slow to get into classes in my view, but I have found it to be the best foundational skills book I've read. Stroustrup is of course the God of C++ so naturally his book(s) is/are a goto, but I find them easier for people with a CS and previous coding background to read than total beginners.
Many of my 1st years students, are lost on the most basic of concepts, like variables, parameters, memory concepts.. And these are pretty much glossed over in a lot of C++ books.
The thing to remember is that the base knowledge of a new coder can be vastly different from our own and what we consider to be obvious and clear, isn't to many people.
So in my 1st classes with students, I try to break it down and show usage of concepts with as little assumption of prior knowledge as possible. Dawson does that well... I didn't do it as well in my book 'cos it would have meant adding a couple of chapters of just tutorial and I felt that was going to be too much.
But as I said tutorial books are very subjective, what I think is a good read, isn't going to appeal to every new coder. So long as they find a book they grasp the concepts with, they won't find anything in mine that is confusing, and hopefully will start to see the very real flaws of design I built into the projects which they can take some pride in fixing.