Programming With Owl for Windows 95

Rating:
Summary: This is THE book for programming with OWL (Borland C++ 5.0)
Review: This is simply THE BOOK for learning OWL (ObjectWindows Library) by Borland to program for Windows. My thanks to Mr. Vic Broquard for writing such an outstanding book. Folks that do Windows programming have probably announced long ago that Borland C++ (version 4.5, 5.0) is far too obsolete. It may be so, but that is beside the point. The author also wrote another book titled "Programming with MFC for Windows 95" for Visual C++ users. That book is also out-of-print, unfortunately; so grabbing a copy of that book (even used) for yourself, if you have a chance, is a wise thing to do. The following are my comments on the book for both readers and the author.

PART A. FOR THE READERS: 1) The author did an EXCELLENT job explaining to the readers how to program for Windows, starting with examples in C-style, then continuing with C++ style using OWL. However, If you have never programmed in C/C++, you could use a book for C/C++ beginners elsewhere. I have read a large number of books on OWL, even the official documents by Borland. Most of those books either scratch the surface when it comes to OWL, or simply give prototypes and definitions of OWL functions with program snippets, leaving the readers with an unfinished and messy puzzle of how-the-heck-can-I-implement-this real-world task. If you follow carefully the discussions in the book, you will see that the concept of C++ classes, inheritance, etc... in the context of Windows programming being unraveled. After finishing the book, the readers should be comfortable using OWL to implement real-worl applications they desire, with using other "for-professionals-only" guides at times for reference, such as the Language Reference by Borland. The readers can also even apply these concepts in the understanding other Class Library employed in other compilers, such as MS Visual C++. 2)There are a lot more good things to say about this book. To name a couple: the text FONTS (Yes, the FONTS!) used are perfect; easy to read and very eye-pleasing. Have you ever put a book back to the shelf at a bookstore and chosen another equivalent one, just because you "JUST HATE THE WAY THE TEXT AND CODE LOOK!". This book has no problem. For all the authors and publishers alike out there, we readers (is it true, or is it just me?) DO CARE how you choose the fonts to print your text in. In addition, the book has only 600+ pages, but full of information. Have you ever noticed that a lot of computer books "out there" having hundreds of pages, but most of those pages are the results of large fonts and/or cut-and-paste sections from the compiler user's guides? Need I say more?

PART B. FOR THE AUTHOR, MR. VIC BROQUARD: Again, thank you for writing such a great book. Your "over 30 years experience as a programmer" and "full-time college computer science instructor" obviously has shown in this product. My "guts instinct" tells me that you must be an EXCELLENT TEACHER. I am saying this based on a very simple belief of mine that "In order to be a good cook, one must know how to eat first." A good teacher must know what is good to present to the students, before worrying him/herself with HOW to present it. I strongly recommend that you invest some of your valuable time and knowledge in writing more books on current topics in Windows programming, using recent tools such as DirectX, OpenGL, etc... I am certain your new products will be truly appreciated by the computer programmers' community. Sincerely.