Computer Systems: A Programmer's Perspective, Global Edition

Product Information

MasteringEngineering is an online homework, tutorial, and assessment system, designed to improve results through personalized learning. Must have book for those who want not just know how to build yet another application, but for those who want to know how this yet another application working under the C language shell. It's written for computer science students, and goes into a lot of detail about modern operating systems concepts such as virtual memory, processes, and signals.

He has taught computer systems courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels for 20 years on such topics as computer architecture, introductory computer systems, parallel processor design, and Internet services.All the chapters are excellent, except maybe chapter 7 on linking and chapter 8 on exceptional control flow. If I read a chapter from start to finish, absorbing every word, I could understand the material well enough, but it got so caught up in jargon and what-ifs that it was incomprehensible as a quick lookup guide. It starts with computer architecture basics (data representation, CPU, memory, I/O devices), goes through operating systems basics (processes, threads, memory, files, etc. Virtual memory is an important concept, but sadly it gets short shrift in computer science education. The book is well-written, comprehensive, and highly accessible, making it a great choice for both students and professionals.

I highly recommend Computer Systems: A Programmer’s Perspective for anyone who feel they need a better grasp of these ideas. In 2004, he was awarded the Herbert Simon Award for Teaching Excellence by the CMU School of Computer Science, an award for which the winner is chosen based on a poll of the students.Having read for breadth and gleaned a low-resolution understanding of the topics, I imagine I will revisit this as-needed for deeper reference throughout my future studies and career (and have already encountered a couple real-world problems where this lower-level knowledge has helped me debug and find solutions).

Using practical examples and problems the book walks the student through all the hardware and software knowledge that is required to understand how a program comes to life on a computer.This book explains the important and enduring concepts underlying all computer systems, and shows the concrete ways that these ideas affect the correctness, performance, and utility of application programs. Concise without leaving out important knowledge, meanwhile you don't need to worry about understanding the material. I've come across numerous texts during my undergrad that try to explain fundamental concepts like processes, threads, virtual memory (and so on) and fail to do so comprehensively.