Brain Scratch

Oh hai. (I got this from Mil Surplus when I was a teenager over...

Sun, 19 May 2013 22:08:02 -0700

Oh hai. (I got this from Mil Surplus when I was a teenager over 30 years ago) JFGI: “TM 31-210 PDF”

No, this #Apple book should not go to Goodwill. What was going...

Sun, 19 May 2013 20:20:36 -0700

No, this #Apple book should not go to Goodwill. What was going on in Cupertino c. 1997.

Learn You Some Erlang For Great Good! by Fred Hebert

Wed, 06 Mar 2013 06:00:00 -0800

Upshot: A popular Erlang tutorial site becomes a book. Any downsides? Nope, unless you don’t like the style. But you won’t. Support the author!

I was a bit skeptical that there was another “Learn You Some…” book out there written in the same style as the Haskell book. But, as of this post, Learn You Some Erlang For Great Good! by Fred Hebert is one of the six & counting books recommended on Erlang.org. And while $40 seems pricey for an eBook, this one is a monster at 624pp (on my iPad, 954pp). I found the tutorial style very accessible. If you have some programming/scripting under your belt, I think you will too.

So why would you buy what is essentially the contents of the Learn you Some Erlang site? Maybe you work in a secure environment. Maybe you live with spotty or no internet as I used to. Or maybe you’ll be using the book ‘in the classroom.’ The bottom line is, if you seriously want to learn Erlang, and you match the skill level outlined in the book, then this book is for you.

The best part is, you can ‘test drive’ the book via the author’s web site. I recommend you buy the book, either from O’Reilly or NoStarch to get DRM-Free copies for all of your devices.

Aside: Peeking in ePub’s code.. Take a wild guess who assembled the book for NoStarch. Yup, O’Reilly. So you know the ‘build quality’ is there.

Resources

LINK: http://nostarch.com/erlang

SITE: http://learnyousomeerlang.com (sample files available)

Disclosure: I received the eBook download(s) from NoStarch for review purposes.

tacticalneuralimplant: cyberpunkculture: Alien and Blade...

Mon, 28 Jan 2013 03:51:05 -0800

tacticalneuralimplant:

cyberpunkculture:

Alien and Blade Runner apparently take place in the same universe.

MIND BLOWN

parislemon: laughingsquid: Visual Timeline Shows the One...

Mon, 28 Jan 2013 03:39:26 -0800

parislemon:

laughingsquid:

Visual Timeline Shows the One Ring’s Life Cycle in Lord of The Rings

My kind of porn.

Photo

Mon, 28 Jan 2013 03:38:22 -0800

Wow, Apple. You have serious Thunderbolt/Display adaptor bugs in...

Sat, 17 Nov 2012 11:55:07 -0800

Wow, Apple. You have serious Thunderbolt/Display adaptor bugs in Mountain Lion. $AAPL #SQA

Lord Humongous..err, BAD UNCLE LEO is gravely disappointed w the...

Tue, 06 Nov 2012 01:45:30 -0800

Lord Humongous..err, BAD UNCLE LEO is gravely disappointed w the Apple OS X QA Team. MoLi blows.

According to #Starwalk, this is Regulus at Dawn.

Tue, 23 Oct 2012 06:33:40 -0700

According to #Starwalk, this is Regulus at Dawn.

Yeah I know. Damn lazy, still in bed, glasses off… Using...

Wed, 17 Oct 2012 05:01:14 -0700

Yeah I know. Damn lazy, still in bed, glasses off… Using #iTeleport (Taken with Instagram)

klaatu: bigfun: Masamune Shirow Appleseed

Fri, 12 Oct 2012 20:11:39 -0700

klaatu:

bigfun:

Masamune Shirow

Appleseed

ridleygrams: astrocount: Weyland corporation (concept)

Mon, 08 Oct 2012 22:09:30 -0700

ridleygrams:

astrocount:

Weyland corporation (concept)

klaatu: hotvvheels: Fuzz 1973 Mustang Mach I

Mon, 08 Oct 2012 22:08:28 -0700

klaatu:

hotvvheels:

Fuzz

1973 Mustang Mach I

:30 Intermission #footage (Taken with Instagram)

Sat, 06 Oct 2012 21:48:26 -0700

:30 Intermission #footage (Taken with Instagram)

Photo

Sat, 29 Sep 2012 22:29:49 -0700

Tesla and Twainstudio360.org Tesla and Twain Studio 360Mike...

Sun, 23 Sep 2012 22:17:34 -0700

Tesla and Twain
studio360.org

Tesla and Twain Studio 360
Mike Daisey tells the story of Tesla’s salons, where he played fast and loose with technology. “When he had you there, he’d show you inventions, then make you part of the inventions,” Daisey explains. The inventor…

Wow. Japanese phrase book c. WWII #oldjapan #showa (Taken with...

Sat, 22 Sep 2012 09:15:22 -0700

Wow. Japanese phrase book c. WWII #oldjapan #showa (Taken with Instagram)

“Malware Vectors” (Taken with Instagram)

Fri, 21 Sep 2012 10:18:52 -0700

“Malware Vectors” (Taken with Instagram)

“Tap to Tweet, Tap to Post” In both...

Fri, 21 Sep 2012 06:05:51 -0700

“Tap to Tweet, Tap to Post”
In both cases,
“Take the Blue Pill..” (Taken with Instagram)

Regular Expressions Cookbook 2nd Edition by Jan Goyvaerts & Steven Levithan

Fri, 14 Sep 2012 20:38:00 -0700

Upshot: It’s a “Cookbook.” Truth in advertising, you’ll find recipes. Upsides? It’s from O’Reilly. So the quality’s there. Any downsides? Windows-centric, probably not meant to be read cover-to-cover.

I already owned the 1st edition of Regular Expressions Cookbook 2nd Edition by Jan Goyvaerts & Steven Levithan, so when I picked up the 2nd, I was curious as to what changed. Unlike some other O’Reilly books there was no explanation of changes. That said, there’s about 8% more pagecount here.

What you’re getting here is a cookbook, full of recipes, that DO vary by platform. I think the authors do a very good job of covering the sometimes maddening variations of Regex across the 7 programming languages presented. And I was impressed with their inclusion of Unicode issues.

Where the book may come up short is in the Mac & Unix coverage. For instance, the authors encourage you to use their Windows based Regex tools in VMWare Fusion (repeatedly) instead of having CLI or Mac-based tools. This might not be optimal when you’re eye-deep in XCode or another IDE, which tend (also) to be resource hogs.

Also, *as* a cookbook, it’s a dense read of codepoints, differences between programming languages, et cetera. This is NOT an introduction to Regex, despite what the authors may say. There are other ORA books— like ‘Introducing Regular Expressions by Michael Fitzgerald‘— that I’d advise readers to go to first.

Recommendation: Not as high as most of the books I review here, but if you can get past (or do not need) Mac support, then 3/5 star type recommended. If you use Regex up at down, should probably be on your shelf, virtual or otherwise.

LINK: http://shop.oreilly.com/product/0636920023630.do

SAMPLES: What?? No samples? For Regex, maybe unnecessary.

READ: DRMFree Pub using Bookreader.app for Mac, iBooks on iPhone/iPad

Disclosure: I received the eBook download(s) from O’Reilly for review purposes.