[TUHS] Book: "You Are Not Expected to Understand This"

[TUHS] Book: "You Are Not Expected to Understand This"

[Dave Horsfall]

I spotted this when glancing through a book catalogue; well, with a title 
like that how could I miss it?

Subtitled "How 26 Lines of Code Changed the World", edited by Torie Bosch 
and illustrated by Kelly Chudler (can't say that I've heard of them).

Summary:

``Programming is behind so much of life today, and this book draws together
  a group of distinguished thinkers and technologists to reveal the
  stories and people behind the computer coding that shapes our
  world.  From how university's [sic] databases were set up to
  recognise only two genders to the first computer worm and the
  first pop-up ad, the diverse topics reveal the consequences of
  historical decisions and their long-lasting, profound implications.
  Pb $34.99''

Lines of code, eh? :-)

Abbey's Bookshop: www.abbeys.com.au

Disclaimer: I have no connection with them, but I'll likely buy it.

-- Dave

[TUHS] Re: Book: "You Are Not Expected to Understand This"

[Kenneth Goodwin]

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Maybe it is just me, but I don't recognize any of the contributors listed
either at the bottom

On Sat, Nov 12, 2022, 7:20 PM Dave Horsfall <dave@horsfall.org> wrote:

> I spotted this when glancing through a book catalogue; well, with a title
> like that how could I miss it?
>
> Subtitled "How 26 Lines of Code Changed the World", edited by Torie Bosch
> and illustrated by Kelly Chudler (can't say that I've heard of them).
>
> Summary:
>
> ``Programming is behind so much of life today, and this book draws together
>   a group of distinguished thinkers and technologists to reveal the
>   stories and people behind the computer coding that shapes our
>   world.  From how university's [sic] databases were set up to
>   recognise only two genders to the first computer worm and the
>   first pop-up ad, the diverse topics reveal the consequences of
>   historical decisions and their long-lasting, profound implications.
>   Pb $34.99''
>
> Lines of code, eh? :-)
>
> Abbey's Bookshop: www.abbeys.com.au
>
> Disclaimer: I have no connection with them, but I'll likely buy it.
>
> -- Dave
>

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[TUHS] Re: Book: "You Are Not Expected to Understand This"

[Rob Pike]

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I find it fascinating how, just a few years after the difficulty of stack
switching required a commented challenge in the Unix source, we were using
setjmp and longjmp to do this with no fuss at all. Once the problem is
solved, the solution can simplify dramatically.

See https://github.com/plan9foundation/plan9/blob/main/sys/src/9/port/proc.c
for instance - almost all of sched is bookkeeping and a comment about
locks. The little burst at the bottom, starting around line 163, that does
the work is so compact. (setlabel and gotolabel are setjmp and longjmp.)

Insight.

-rob


On Sun, Nov 13, 2022 at 11:26 AM Kenneth Goodwin <kennethgoodwin56@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Maybe it is just me, but I don't recognize any of the contributors listed
> either at the bottom
>
> On Sat, Nov 12, 2022, 7:20 PM Dave Horsfall <dave@horsfall.org> wrote:
>
>> I spotted this when glancing through a book catalogue; well, with a title
>> like that how could I miss it?
>>
>> Subtitled "How 26 Lines of Code Changed the World", edited by Torie Bosch
>> and illustrated by Kelly Chudler (can't say that I've heard of them).
>>
>> Summary:
>>
>> ``Programming is behind so much of life today, and this book draws
>> together
>>   a group of distinguished thinkers and technologists to reveal the
>>   stories and people behind the computer coding that shapes our
>>   world.  From how university's [sic] databases were set up to
>>   recognise only two genders to the first computer worm and the
>>   first pop-up ad, the diverse topics reveal the consequences of
>>   historical decisions and their long-lasting, profound implications.
>>   Pb $34.99''
>>
>> Lines of code, eh? :-)
>>
>> Abbey's Bookshop: www.abbeys.com.au
>>
>> Disclaimer: I have no connection with them, but I'll likely buy it.
>>
>> -- Dave
>>
>

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[TUHS] Re: Book: "You Are Not Expected to Understand This"

[Larry McVoy]

On Sun, Nov 13, 2022 at 12:12:32PM +1100, Rob Pike wrote:
> See https://github.com/plan9foundation/plan9/blob/main/sys/src/9/port/proc.c
> for instance - almost all of sched is bookkeeping and a comment about
> locks. The little burst at the bottom, starting around line 163, that does
> the work is so compact. (setlabel and gotolabel are setjmp and longjmp.)

This reminds me of code I did for Udi Manber as a grad (or undergrad)
student.  He wanted a user space threads library so I wrote one.
It's where I learned how to write swtch() where you enter as one thread
and exit as another one.  99% of the code was C that did all the stuff
you could do in C and then a small amount of assembler that did the flip.

I had heard that swtch() was hard but it really isn't that bad.
The assembler makes you learn that stuff but you need to know that stuff
anyway.  I do agree with people who say you aren't a kernel engineer if
you haven't written, or at least understood, that code.

[TUHS] Re: Book: "You Are Not Expected to Understand This"

[Stuff Received]

On 2022-11-12 19:02, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> I spotted this when glancing through a book catalogue; well, with a title
> like that how could I miss it?
>
> Subtitled "How 26 Lines of Code Changed the World", edited by Torie Bosch
> and illustrated by Kelly Chudler (can't say that I've heard of them).
>
> Summary:
>
> ``Programming is behind so much of life today, and this book draws together
>    a group of distinguished thinkers and technologists to reveal the
>    stories and people behind the computer coding that shapes our
>    world.  From how university's [sic] databases were set up to
>    recognise only two genders to the first computer worm and the
>    first pop-up ad, the diverse topics reveal the consequences of
>    historical decisions and their long-lasting, profound implications.
>    Pb $34.99''
>
> Lines of code, eh? :-)
>
> Abbey's Bookshop: www.abbeys.com.au
>
> Disclaimer: I have no connection with them, but I'll likely buy it.
>
> -- Dave

Does subscribe to COFF anymore?  I mentioned this a few weeks ago on 
COFF (https://minnie.tuhs.org/pipermail/coff/2022-October/001315.html) 
with only one reply.

N.

[TUHS] Re: Book: "You Are Not Expected to Understand This"

[Dave Horsfall]

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On Sat, 12 Nov 2022, Stuff Received wrote:

> Does subscribe to COFF anymore?  I mentioned this a few weeks ago on 
> COFF (https://minnie.tuhs.org/pipermail/coff/2022-October/001315.html) 
> with only one reply.

Haven't seen anything from COFF for some weeks now; anyway I figured that 
is was more "historical Unix" than "old geezer" stuff, hence TUHS.

-- Dave

[TUHS] Re: Book: "You Are Not Expected to Understand This"

[Dave Horsfall]

On Sun, 13 Nov 2022, Dave Horsfall wrote:

> Disclaimer: I have no connection with them, but I'll likely buy it.

The book just arrived (that was fast!); I'll review it when I get a 
chance, as I'm flat out like a lizard drinking right now.

-- Dave