HN Books @HNBooksMonth

There is a distinct lack of Hopcroft and Ullman from this list:

Introduction to Automata Theory, Languages, and Computation, 2nd Ed.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Introduction-Automata-Theory-Langua...

Which is basically all the goodness in Structure and Interpretation... and any book on compilers and interpreters. Basically, though I don't reckon that any modern courses teach from Hopcroft & Ullman, it's a major textbook in the field (unfortunately the 2nd ed is easier to find but the 1st has the works).

Another foundational text is Andrew Tennebaum's book on Operating Systems:

Operating Systems Design and Implementation

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Operating-Systems-Implementation-Pr...

To be honest I don't how it compares with the book proposed in the article, since I haven't read that book.

Finally, two personal recommendations for anyone interested in AI (as a study of advanced CS concepts and not just as a way to make a quick buck with a shallow understanding of a few machine learning tutorials):

Artificial Intelligence: A modern approach (Russel & Norvig)

http://aima.cs.berkeley.edu/

And the free pdf of AI Algorithms, Data Structures, and Idioms in Prolog, Lisp, and Java:

https://www.cs.fsu.edu/~cap5605/Luger_Supplementary_Text.pdf

Which doubles as a good textbook for programming languages in general.

I loved the MINIX book: https://www.amazon.com/Operating-Systems-Design-Implementati...

http://www.amazon.com/Operating-Systems-Design-Implementatio...

That's the book Linus Torvalds read. :)

I love his Operating Systems book [0] which explains OS Concepts using Minix code

[0] - http://www.amazon.com/dp/0131429388

⬐ ptaipale

BTW how different is the 3rd edition from the 1st? I had it for my OS course (along with the Silberschatz book), but it was >25 years ago. Still have the Minix disks somewhere, I think. It was awesome to get a # prompt on a 8086, but in the end, what mattered was to have GNU utils, gcc, emacs and X11 on a 386, which meant Linux.

⬐ maaku

Completely different. MINIX was 100% overhauled.

⬐ petilon

I recommend buying your computer books in India. US Price for this book is $150 USD. India price is around Rs. 427 which is around $7 USD. Textbook prices, like everything related to education and healthcare are excessively high in the US. A reasonable price would be around $50, which is what this book would cost if it wasn't a textbook.

The same book in Amazon India: http://www.amazon.in/Operating-Systems-Implementation-Tanenb...

Update: Cheaper books bought in India may not be commercially exported out of India

⬐ SSLy

Yeah, do they ship to Europe?

⬐ switch007

I sourced it in the UK as an (IIRC) "International Edition"

⬐ carlesfe

Not to Spain, at least: "Sorry, this item can't be shipped to your selected address."

⬐ lobo_tuerto

And not to México either... :(

⬐ LeonRobrotsky

Just look on AbeBooks:

http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?isbn=978812032...

⬐ a3n

Irony of ironies: if you look at the bottom of Amazon's front page, you'll see they own Abe.

⬐ None

None

⬐ zerocrates

After Kirtsaeng [1], I don't think so... (at least as far as US law is concerned)

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirtsaeng_v._John_Wiley_%26_Son....

⬐ j-b

I was eager to take your advice. Problem is it can't be shipped to the US.

⬐ have_humility

See LeonRobrotsky's suggestion with AbeBooks.

Another suggestion is Barnes & Noble. (Yes, really.)

I myself had borrowed a copy through interlibrary loan back in November after checking Amazon for <$50 dollar copies, only to be blown away that they were more like $160-$190. If you've used ILL, though, you probably know how tedious it can be.

A couple of weeks ago, I had to kill some time, so I meandered into a Barnes & Noble for the first time in years and on a whim tried to look up Operating Systems: Design and Implementation on bn.com. Turns out, bn.com operates not just to sell B&N wares, but also apparently as a sort of hub for third-party sellers, (just?) like Amazon. I was surprised to see the market rate for used copies was $34.50, so I snagged one.

Meanwhile, the AbeBooks link above has a shrink-wrapped copy for $16.52.

Takeaway: don't assume that Amazon is the end-all-be-all, even for books.

Get the Minix book:

http://www.amazon.com/Operating-Systems-Design-Implementatio...

Tanenbaum's ineffable "Operating Systems Design and Implementation" and MINIX (a learning OS) existed then, and was what Linus Torvalds studied before creating Linux:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/0131429388

Yes, you're right. For my OS class when I was in school, instead of doing the proposed homework, I convinced the professor to let me do a x86 OS. We were a group of 3. I started doing everything in C with as little as assembly as possible, but the other two decidet to do an all-assembly little monster.

At the end of the course, we had only the boot loader and a little command interpreter, aside from FAT-12 support.

Then, much later, I messed with OS by playing with the code from the Minix Book [1].

Last year I wrote a little emulator for a virtually unknown architecture that can run uClinux on a modern browser (i.e., Chrome)[2].

[1] Operating System Design and Implemenation: http://www.amazon.com/Operating-Systems-Design-Implementatio...

[2] https://github.com/ubercomp/jslm32/

I have been keeping a list of books I used to augment my CS Masters Degree courses on various topics, here are the relevant ones I have found useful for the topics you have listed:

--Computer Organization--:

Computer Systems: A Programmer's Perspective http://www.amazon.com/Computer-Systems-Programmers-Randal-Br...

I liked this much better than Computer Organization and Design by Patterson and Hennessy which everyone has encountered at some point. The developer-centric view was very cool.

--Computer Security--:

Kernel Exploitation: Attacking the Core http://www.amazon.com/Guide-Kernel-Exploitation-Attacking-Co...

Most 'hacking' books are goofy. This one is very good and doubles nicely as a hackers operating systems text.

Web Application Hackers Handbook http://www.amazon.com/Web-Application-Hackers-Handbook-Disco...

Very nice overview for web concerns.

--Operating Systems-:

Operating System Design and Implementation http://www.amazon.com/Operating-Systems-Design-Implementatio...

I don't agree with Tanenbaum's views on micro vs. monolithic kernels but this book is a great mix of theory and implementation.

Linux Kernel Devleopment http://www.amazon.com/Linux-Kernel-Development-Robert-Love/d...

I used this to get a feel for the monolithic implementations of topics covered by Tanenbaum.

--Networking--:

TCP/IP Illustrated Series. More than you would ever want to know.

The following are books from my student days. These are sources from which I happened to learn the "everything in an hour, but longer to absorb" subject matter. I'd recommend Applied Cryptography as excellent, the other is just good.

Algorithms: Introduction to Algorithms (Cormen, Leiserson, & Rivest) http://amzn.com/0262033844

Security: Applied Cryptography (Schneier) http://amzn.com/0471117099

I cannot find my automata book just now. It's down in the garage, and I want to stay inside where it is warm now. As for concurrency, I got part of that from the Tannenbaum OS book:

http://amzn.com/0131429388

But the rest, I actually got from a coworker on the job! We did cover databases and ACID transactions in school, but that wasn't taught very well and I didn't really get it until I was doing real work.

Do some assembly language. It will give you a key advantage over everyone who is too scared to touch it.

Write a compiler and/or interpreter. This can actually be pretty small, and it will also give you an advantage over those too scared of something so seemingly "esoteric."

⬐ tom_b

Shining my tptacek light re: Applied Cryptography

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=639786

Thomas recommends Practical Cryptography instead.

⬐ stcredzero

I actually read Applied Cryptography when it first came out. My experience is that it convinced me that crypto is hard to do right not that it's easy.

"Practical" will be my next technical read.

⬐ tptacek

It came out in, like, 1995 didn't it? I remember that because all my IRC friends immediately got to work on crazy crypto tools with algorithms and ideas cadged from that book. It definitely didn't teach them that crypto was hard.

⬐ stcredzero

It came out in, like, 1995 didn't it?

That would be about right.

I remember that because all my IRC friends immediately got to work on crazy crypto tools with algorithms and ideas cadged from that book. It definitely didn't teach them that crypto was hard.

It's one thing to do some fun project. It's another thing to do something for production. It's yet another thing to read such a book and realize it means there's people who know a lot more about this than you. At the same time, it is a fun read for a techie.

Try this book ( http://www.amazon.com/Operating-Systems-Design-Implementatio... ).

It is written be Andrew S Tanenbaum, the author of minix. The book contains whole of minix source code. Nothing beats learning from reading actual codes. Linus Torvalds was inspired by this book. In his autobiography "Just For Fun", Torvalds describes it as "the book that launched me to new heights".

⬐ vaibhav_90

Thank you I will surely go through the book.

OSDev ( http://wiki.osdev.org/Main_Page ) has a bunch of great stuff. Start at the top and work your way down.

Also, Operating Systems Design and Implementation, aka the Minix book, is an amazing resource.( http://www.amazon.com/Operating-Systems-Design-Implementatio... )

Actually, I'd recommend the latest version of OSDI, which is fairly recent, and contains the complete source for MINIX3 (in text form, and on CD): http://www.amazon.com/Operating-Systems-Design-Implementatio...

⬐ gruseom

So Tanenbaum has two OS textbooks in print? How different are they? Why read one rather than the other?

⬐ mahmud

He has THREE. Don't forget the Amoeba book "Distributed Operating Systems" (not sure if it's in print though.)

⬐ michael_dorfman

OSDI is "the MINIX book". It shows, about as much detail as possible, how a microkernel-based OS is written, down to the actual (complete) source code.

Modern Operating Systems, on the other hand, is a bit higher level (but still fairly nitty-gritty) and examines two monolithic kernels (Linux/Unix and Windows) as case studies.

⬐ kenjackson

Thank you. I'd learned from the original text. I never knew he had released a couple more editions of this.

In fact, I may have to go buy this now!