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OVER THE PAST 30 YEARS I’VE WRITTEN 18 BOOKS on various programming topics. You might wonder,
why so many…? Didn’t I get it right the fi rst time? Well, no, I didn’t…not really. When I wrote
my fi rst book more than 30 years ago, object-oriented programming (OOP) was obscure at best
and unknown to most. Like so many others, I had to go through the OOP learning process before
I could appreciate what OOP was all about. I have a feeling that there are a lot of people out there
who still feel that way.
Each time I teach a programming class, I learn new and better ways to explain things. When I look
out across a classroom fi lled with students and it looks like a still-life painting, it’s time to back off,
retool, and try a different approach to whatever concept it is I’m trying to teach. Every class I’ve
taught has offered new perspectives on how I teach and how students learn. I’ve had the opportunity
to teach both in a university setting and on site at various companies both here and in Europe. Each
experience presented different teaching challenges. Changing my examples and the techniques I use
to teach programming concepts is one of the reasons I came back to teaching after so many years
away…. I missed the learning experience.
A number of the books I wrote were concerned with languages other than C#, but that too provides
for an enriching experience for me as an instructor. The strengths and weaknesses of a language can
be appreciated only if you’ve grappled with some other less-than-perfect languages. The fact that
programming languages continue to evolve supports the conclusion that I’m not the only one who
is still learning. After all this time, the one thing that I have learned with absolute certainty is that
whatever I know today will likely be out of date tomorrow.
Perhaps the question you should ask yourself is, “Why should I buy this book instead of someone
else’s book?” A number of factors come into play, but only one actually makes a difference: This
book provides the techniques, examples, and approach to teaching the various programming concepts
I’ve honed through working with literally thousands of students. I’ve learned what works and
what doesn’t. So many authors today are, no doubt, brilliant coders, but they haven’t had to stumble
through the bad examples and teaching methods that simply don’t work. Writing good code does
not necessarily equate to writing good books.
I think you will find this book informative, clear in its examples, and perhaps even entertaining in
its narrative. I hope you’ll give it a chance…. I think you’ll enjoy the book. Even more important,
however, is that you will come to appreciate all that object-oriented programming and C# can do
for you. |
