C: A Reference Manual, 5th Edition

To be honest, I haven't done a lot of C programming. But when I need to, this is the place to go. It has reference material for just about anything you can imagine about the C language. And the cross referencing throughout the book is great. For me it replaces K&R without a doubt.The thing that I value the most about it, is that it is a true reference. It's not meant to be a "teach you C" book, it's a book that assumes you know what you're doing, and you just need to look up information about the language. And I must say, everything is *thoroughly* covered. Then going beyond the C language in terms of syntactical grammar, it includes reference for the standard C library.So, even if you've been programming C for years, you would probably enjoy this book, and possible learn something you didn't know, just from it's completeness. Or, for new developers to C, I would use this as a supplement to another "teach you C" style book. When going through a "teach you C" style book, look up the concepts that may be confusing, or incomplete in this book, and I'd bet you'll learn twice as much just from having this next to you.Enjoy!

Harbison & Steele is a very good, modern and complete C language reference. Quality-wise it is in the same league as Kernighan & Ritchie book.I gave it 4 (four) points instead of 5 solely because of the poor manufacturing quality of the 5-th edition print. It is printed on a low quality paper. One cannot use highlighters, for the color markings protrude onto the opposite side of the sheet. I do not expect the book to last long. The content, on the other hand, is great!

If you haven't programmed before, not a book for you (but then, C is not the language for you). If you do have experience, and think mathematically (that is, you value precision and are not afraid to think) you will love it, as I did. Guy Steele was a programming language design God (check out the "lambda, the ultimate..." papers), who has sadly not fulfilled his promise (although Scheme has been enormously influential), and this book is his swan song, and almost succeeds in making C look like Scheme -- in truth, they are quite similar -- both are assembly languages for abstract machines). The real old-times (as opposed to semi-old-timers like me) learned C from C Programming Language (2nd Edition), and you should have K&R on your bookshelf, but it really is not as clearl as Harbison and Steele.

This is simply the best C reference in existance. Both the index and the contents are perfectly useful and expertly implemented. Whenever I'm coding this book lives on my desk. To top it all off it is printed on very high quality thin paper - it's thin size belies the tresure trove of information within. Everything you'd want to know is not only contained in its pages but most importantly can be found quickly. Concise, accurate, readable. The perfect resource.

I come from a strong C++ background. I picked this book up because I needed to give myself a crash course on what limits C has relative to C++. I picked up a "reference manual" rather than a ground-up tutorial because I didn't want to have to sift through hundreds of pages of absolute beginner material. I thought this book would be the solution. Man, was I wrong! So this book didn't meet my expectations, but beyond that I can hardly see how this book is usable even as a reference manual.Complaint 1: The organization is terrible.Example: From the first page of Chapter 4: "...some aspects of C's declarations are difficult to understand without a knowledge of C's type system, which is described in Chapter 5." So why not reverse the order of chapter 4 and 5???? I've never seen a book for any programming language that discusses declarations before type systems. Just stupid! Also, right off the bat the book comes out with full program examples in Chapter 2. So the fact that Chapters 4 and 5 take steps backwards to talk about the type system and declarations makes no sense at all.Complaint 2: Most of the examples are so abstract they're hardly worth publishing.Complaint 3: Absolutely cryptic layout.Example: Pages 388-400 contain the most unreadable tabular breakdown of output format specifiers I've every seen. I'm better off just using my C++ book by Herbert Schildt.Complaint 4: Target audience confusion.Example: Every chapter is concluded by an "exercises" section, as if this book is supposed to be a full-blown tutorial. However, the title of the book is "Reference Manual" and, as I said in Complaint 2, the sample code is very abstract. This book in no way qualifies as a tutorial. The "exercises" section is just wasted pages.I bought this book because of its high ratings from other reviewers. I have generally had good luck with this approach over the years, but not this time. STAY AWAY FROM THIS BOOK. It is not suitable either as a tutorial or reference manual.

Great reference book. It is definitely NOT a tutorial, so if you're just starting with C, you might want to supplement it with another resource. It is very thorough, though, and covers every aspect of the language from basic syntax to commonly-used functions.

I've been using the Harrison/Steele manual (4th ed.) for years. As a reference manual, it is unsurpassed. I decided to update to the 5th edition recently and all I can say is: don't. For some reason, Prentice Hall has decided to print this edition on a low-weight, cheap paper. Whereas the 4th edition had clean, crisp text on bright paper, the 5th edition's text visibly bleeds along the paper fibers. This results in a smudged, blurry look to the text and makes reading more difficult. If you don't need the material on internationalization or complex arithmetic, you should find a copy of the 4th edition. Your eyes will thank you.

My third edition of this essential book

All c composer you get on Microsoft website no need to buy book

Dopo averne letti a decine credo di poter affermare con ragionevole certezza che si tratta del miglior manuale sul linguaggio C mai scritto. Dettagliato quanto un documento di specifica standard ma chiaro ed accessibile. Niente o davvero poco, dopo averlo letto, resterà un mistero per quanto riguardo il linguaggio C.Sicuramente non adatto come primo testo. Abbinato al testo di Van Der Linden può rappresentare un passaggio importante per la carriera di un programmatore che si definisca tale.

This book is not intended to learn C but rather to explain clearly all characteristics of C, the differences between C standards etc. It does just that very clearly and completely and is much more explanatory and precise that any answer you may find when googling for a particular issue !

Cに関しては色々本がありながらも、結局、古い「プログラミング言語 C」をリファレンスとしても使っている人が多いのではないでしょうか。C 言語を日頃使っている人に「プログラミング言語 C」の代わりにリファレンスとして使って欲しい本です。英語ですが、リファレンスとして使うなら問題はないと思います。良書です。また、ANSI C, C99 などの違いも説明しており、C の違いも意識してプログラミングしたい人にも役立ちます。C の standart library に関してもきちんと説明されています。