C

Books

C for Dummies I-II. (Dan Gookin)   Paperback    Buy It! A two-volume tutorial for beginning C programmers from the ground up. It moves at a slow, but very logical pace. The author takes great care in presenting the basics the simplest way and avoids complicated math and syntax wherever possible. The first volume covers basic language constructs, variable types, functions, program logic, looping and simple console I/O. The second half presents more ANSI C functions, arrays and strings. Only then does the author take on the difficulties of C pointers. The tutorial closes with some file I/O and the basics of using multi-file projects. Throughout these two books the author succeeds in making programming fun with a lot of humor (including comics) and as little jargon as possible. Each chapter ends with a quiz. Plenty of source code is provided for all examples. If you've been stumped by other introductions to C programming, definitely check out these two books!

Chile, the Other September 11 (Pilar Aguilera & Ricardo Fredes) An Anthology of Reflections on the 1973 Coup   Paperback    Buy It! Most people associate September 11 with the World Trade Center tragedy. But before 2001, September 11 was already a day of infamy for Latin America and Chile in particular. On that day in 1973 General Augusto Pinochet led a US-backed coup against the popularly elected government of Salvador Allende and began his repressive 17-year dictatorship. This book is the kind of testimonial that all Americans should read. This anthology includes Ariel Dorfman's essay "The Last September 11", poetry by Pablo Neruda, the song composed by Víctor Jara just before his brutal murder and President Allende's final radio broadcast along with resonant speeches by Fidel Castro and Allende's daughter, Beatriz.