quote: Original post by Ziphnor
My apologies, but "Shithead fanboy GL groupie." didnt sound to friendly if you get my point. It sounded like an attempt to start a flamewar....

So did "Everything with Microsoft ivolved (sic) it (sic) crap." I don''t stand by Microsoft, but I don''t flame them either. It''s kinda like flaming AT&T, IBM (formerly a major pastime) or Black & Decker.

quote: My problem is probably that i''ve programmed alot in Java, and the Java documentation is excellent(IMHO).

Well, let''s compare apples and apples. Java is a proprietary language from Sun; Visual Basic is a proprietary language from Microsoft. How do the two languages'' documentation compare? Quite favorably, I find.

quote: As a person who constantly swaps hardware this way and that(my computer case is almost always halfopen or closed with no screws product activation IS a problem! Also i always object to anti-piracy schemes that hurts the legitimate user, while going unnoticed by the software pirates.

Well, Product Activation allows you to swap up to 6 periods per 30-day period or so; and Microsoft have been very good at sending renewed license numbers whenever you call. Yeah, it''s an inconvenience, but like all luxuries software comes at a price (just like the price of security is eternal vigilance).

quote: ...when i said i havent decided yet, im just starting to browse through both API''s trying to see which framework i like best. <hr height=1 noshade></SPAN></BLOCKQUOTE> <br>Good luck.

quote: Original post by Oluseyi
Well, Product Activation allows you to swap up to 6 periods per 30-day period or so; and Microsoft have been very good at sending renewed license numbers whenever you call. Yeah, it''s an inconvenience, but like all luxuries software comes at a price (just like the price of security is eternal vigilance).

Ok, I needsta know: How does it work? Do you call them, and they mail/email the numbers? Fax them? Just tell you over the phone line?
Also, is this separate from the thing I heard about Microsoft "renting" say, MS Office, so you have to pay a monthly fee to use their word processor?
I don''t hate Microsoft, but at the same time I am not willing to get screwed because of some anti-piracy policy. Software does have a price, but I always considered it to be the number on the tag when you buy it.
Oluseyi, as you neither love nor hate MS, I figured you could clear this up for me before I go out and upgrade my PC.

Well, I''m not Oluseyi, but perhaps I can be of some assistance ...

quote: Original post by Anonymous Poster
Ok, I needsta know: How does it work? Do you call them, and they mail/email the numbers? Fax them? Just tell you over the phone line?

You can do it either over the internet, or over the phone. If you do it over the internet, the process is automatic. If you do it over the phone, you will have to read out your computer''s ID number and receive an confirmation ID.

quote:
Also, is this separate from the thing I heard about Microsoft "renting" say, MS Office, so you have to pay a monthly fee to use their word processor?

Yes, it is completely separate. XP and WPA have nothing to do with renting software.

quote:
I don''t hate Microsoft, but at the same time I am not willing to get screwed because of some anti-piracy policy. Software does have a price, but I always considered it to be the number on the tag when you buy it.

I agree completely.

What Martee said.

Well to get back to the original topic of this post and get out of this M$ drivel, the best C++ reference in my opinion comes straight from the original source himself, Bjarne Stroustrup. Buy his book, The Annotated C++ Reference Manual. It is a hardcore reference manual which completely outlines the language. For a more lightweight reference with examples you can use Bjarne''s other book, The C++ Programming Language Special Edition.

Cheers and happy coding,
RandomTask

I already looked in "The C++ Programming Language Special Edition", and didnt really like it, it spends to much space on syntax in C++ , of which im pretty familar with. What i need is reference of the libraries that are part of the C++ standard(and so should be available with all C++ implementations). Apart from that i simply didnt like the way the book was structured, it wasnt/isnt really build like a reference book.

I dont know about the "The Annotated C++ Reference Manual", does it use less time on "simple" syntax? I dont really need things like how to make a class declaration etc, i need to know things like "How do i set up a Hashtable?"/"How do i tokenize a string"/"What sort/search algorithms are part of the core c++ libs?".

For Java i really enjoyed O''Reilly''s "In a nutshell" series of reference books, which actually managed to add goood information in extension of the Java Specification available online(which is all you really need for java programming).

Maybe i should take a look at this Annotated C++ reference, thanks for the tip.

Mods, is it possible to delete the flames and anti-(whatever) posts? They don't belong anywhere on GameDev.

Ziphnor: there are loads of references available on the net for C++ core libraries, but what specifically are you searching for? If you're looking for Windows-platform-specific reference, the MSDN docs are the most complete reference ... if you're looking for independent stuff, you might look at http://www.sourceforge.net for some interesting things.

If you have questions regarding Windows specifically, my personal favorite help is http://www.winprog.org/.

I hope that helps at least a little bit... feel free to email me if you have other questions.




MatrixCubed
http://MatrixCubed.cjb.net








Edited by - MatrixCubed on November 29, 2001 6:13:51 PM

If you didn''t like the second suggestion I had, you''d definitely NOT like the annotated c++ reference book. It is specifically a lexicon that strongly describes ONLY what is in the C++ language definition, not what is in the standard C/C++ libraries. You might want to look at "Dietel and Dietel"''s Learning C++. We used to call it "The Bible" at school. I thought you were looking for a precise syntax reference.

RandomTask

One more thing. If you were lucky enough to be on a Unix/Linux system you could just do a "man" on any C++ library topic and pull up a manual page on it. For instance, try "man strcpy". It will give you the manual page for the string copying functions. If you are coding from a console a man page is literally as "at your fingertips" as a book. You just type in the man topic.

Happy transition to C++.
ciao,
RandomTask

man pages are a poor substitution for a cathegorized, hyperlinked reference manual.

Psalm 137:9: "Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones."