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Useful Reference Books

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25 Sep 2016CPOL 1.2M   605   190
A list of popular reference books sent in by the readers of CodeProject
This article has been opened up so any member who is bronze or above can edit and update. Please add your suggestions!

I get a lot of requests from readers about which books are best for learning MFC, ASP, ATL, etc., but with hundreds of books coming out each year, and technology moving ahead in leaps and bounds, keeping up with what's best is hard. Which books have helped you the most?

Here's a list of faves sent in by readers. If you are just starting out in the industry then don't get lured into buying only books that deal with the language you are working in. Read books on how to program. You will save you and your employer a lot of stress. The "Programming Discipline and Design" section below lists a bunch of great books worth reading.

Programming Discipline and Design

  • Writing Solid Code - Steve Maguire
  • Mythical Man-Month - Frederick P. Brooks Jr
  • Code Complete - Steve McConnell
  • The Art of Computer Programming - Knuth
  • Algorithms - Robert Sedgewick
  • Debugging Applications - John Robbins
  • Taligent's Guide to Designing Programs - Taligent
  • Design Patterns - Gamma, Helm, Johnson, Vlissides
  • The Career Programmer: Guerilla Tactices for an Imperfect World (Apress) - Christoper Duncan
  • Unite The Tribes - Christopher Duncan
  • Advanced Windows Debugging - Mario Hewardt, Daniel Pravat
  • Windows® Internals: Including Windows Server 2008 and Windows Vista, Fifth Edition (Pro Developer) - Mark Russinovich, David A. Solomon, Alex Ionescu
  • The Pragmatic Programmer - Andrew Hunt & David Thomas
  • The Psychology of Computer Programming - Gerald Weinberg
  • Agile Software Development, Principles, Patterns, and Practices - Robert C. Martin
  • Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship - Robert C. Martin
  • The Art of Unit Testing: With Examples in .Net - Roy Osherove
  • Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture - Martin Fowler
  • Domain-Specific Languages - Martin Fowler
  • Continuous Delivery - Martin Fowler

IoT (Internet of Things)

C / C++

  • The C Programming Language (Prentice Hall) - Kernigan and Ritchie
  • The C++ Programming Language - Bjarne Stroustroup
  • Programming: Principles and Practice Using C++ - Bjarne Stroustroup
  • C++ Coding Standards (101 Rules, Guidelines and Best Practices) - Herb Sutter, Andrei Alexandrescu
  • Effective C++, More Effective C++ and Effective Modern C++ - Scott Meyers
  • Exceptional C++ and More Exceptional C++ - Herb Sutter
  • C++ Common Knowledge - Stephen C. Dewhurst
  • Large Scale C++ Software Design - John Lakos
  • Inside Visual C++ - David J. Kruglinski
  • C++ How to Program - H. M. Deitel, P. J. Deitel
  • Thinking in C++ (2nd Ed) - Bruce Eckel

C#

  • A Programmer's Introduction to C#, 2nd edition (Apress) - Eric Gunnerson
  • Inside C#, 2nd edition (Microsoft Press) - Tom Archer
  • Component-Based Development with Visual C# (M&T books) - Ted Faison
  • C# Essentials, 2nd edition (O'Reilly) - Ben Albahari, Peter Drayton & Brad Merrill
  • C# in Depth - Jon Skeet
  • CLR via C#, 3rd Edition - Jeffrey Richter
  • C# Programming Language (Covering C# 4.0) - Anders Hejlsberg
  • Programming Entity Framework - Julia Lerman
  • C# 5.0 In a Nutshell: The Definitive Reference - Joseph Albahari & Ben Albahari

ASP.NET

  • Debugging ASP.NET (New Riders) - Jonathon Goodyear, Brian Peek, Brad Fox
  • Designing Microsoft ASP.NET Applications (Microsoft Press) - Jonathon Goodyear, Brian Peek, Brad Fox
  • Microsoft ASP.NET Step by Step (Microsoft Press) - G. Andrew Duthrie
  • Deploying and Managing Microsoft .NET Web Farms (Sams) - Barry Bloom
  • Professional ASP.NET MVC 3 (Wrox) - Jon Galloway, Phil Haack, Brad Wilson, K. Scott Allen 
  • Beginning ASP.NET 4.5 in C# - Matthew MacDonald

Windows API

  • Programming Windows 95 - Charles Petzold and Paul Yao
  • Programming Applications for Windows - Jeffrey Richter
  • Advanced Windows - Jeffrey Richter
  • Visual C++ Windows Shell Programming - Dino Esposito

MFC

  • Programming Windows 95 with MFC - Jeff Prosise
  • MFC Internals - George Shepherd and Scot Wingo
  • Professional MFC with Visual C++ - Mike Blaszczak

ASP

  • Professional ASP Techniques for Webmasters - Alex Homer

Database

DELPHI

CE

  • Windows CE Developers Handbook - Terence A. Goggin
  • Programming Windows CE - Douglas Boling (Microsoft Press)
  • Essential Windows CE Application Programming -Robert Burdick (Wiley)

COM / DCOM / COM+ / ATL

  • Essential COM - Don Box
  • Professional COM Applications with ATL - Sing Li and Panos Economopoulos
  • Creating Lightweight Components with ATL - Jonathan Bates
  • Inside ALT - George Shepherd and Brad King
  • Understanding DCOM - William Rubin and Marshall Brain
  • Programming Distributed Applications with COM and Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 - Ted Pattison
  • Inside OLE, 2nd Edition - Kraig Brockschmidt

WPF / Silverlight / Windows Phone / WinRT

  • Windows Presentation Foundation Unleashed - Adam Nathan
  • Pro WPF In Visual Studio x - Matthew MacDonald
  • Windows Phone Unleashed - Daniel Vaughan
  • Silverlight x Unleashed - Laurent Bugnion
  • Programming Windows - Charles Petzold (yes, he's done a Windows 8 version)
  • Building Windows 8 Apps with C# and XAML - Jeremy Likness

OOP (Object-Oriented Programming)

  • Head First Object-Oriented Analysis and Design - Brett D. McLaughlin, Gary Pollice, and Dave West

Web Pages/WebMatrix

  • Beginning ASP.NET Web Pages with WebMatrix - Mike Brind and Imar Spaanjaars
  • Building ASP.NET Web Pages with Microsoft WebMatrix - Steve Lydford

WINDOWS 8 DEVELOPMENT

  • Windows 8 Apps with XAML and C# Unleashed - Adam Nathan
  • Programming Windows 8 Apps with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript - Kraig Brockschmidt

JavaScript/jQuery

  • JavaScript & jQuery: The Missing Manual - David Sawyer McFarland
  • Murach's JavaScript and jQuery by Zak Ruvalcaba and Mike Murach
  • Building A JavaScript Framework - dailyjs

HTML

  • HTML5 24-Hour Trainer - Joseph W. Lowery and Mark Fletcher
  • HTML & CSS: The Good Parts - Ben Henick
  • Responsive Web Design - Ethan Marcotte

CSS

  • CSS3: The Missing Manual - David Sawyer McFarland

AJAX

Android

  • Introduction to Android Application Development: Android Essentials - Joseph Annuzzi Jr., Lauren Darcey, Shane Conder
  • Beginning Android Tablet Application Development - Wei-Meng Lee
  • Programming Android - Zigurd Mednieks, Laird Dornin, G. Blake Meike, and Masumi Nakamura
  • Android Recipes: A Problem-Solution Approach - Dave Smith and Jeff Friesen

Android Studio

  • Android Studio Application Development - Belén Cruz Zapata
  • Getting Started with Android Studio - Barbara Hohensee
  • Android Studio: How to guide and tutorial - Clive Sargeant
  • Android Developer Tools Essentials: Android Studio to Zipalign - Mike Wolfson, Donn Felker

Matlab

OpenCV

Regular Expressions

Security

  • Introduction to Pattern Recognition A Matlab Approach - Sergios Theodoridis and konstantinos koutroumbas
    • Learning OpenCV Computer Vision - Gary Bradski and Adrian Kaehler
    • OpenCV.2. Computer.Vision.Application. Programming.Cookbook - Robert Laganière
    • OpenCVReferenceManual - Intel
    • Beginning ASP.NET Security - Barry Dorrans
    • SQL Injection Attacks and Defense - Justin Clarke

License

This article, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)


Written By
Founder CodeProject
Canada Canada
Chris Maunder is the co-founder of CodeProject and ContentLab.com, and has been a prominent figure in the software development community for nearly 30 years. Hailing from Australia, Chris has a background in Mathematics, Astrophysics, Environmental Engineering and Defence Research. His programming endeavours span everything from FORTRAN on Super Computers, C++/MFC on Windows, through to to high-load .NET web applications and Python AI applications on everything from macOS to a Raspberry Pi. Chris is a full-stack developer who is as comfortable with SQL as he is with CSS.

In the late 1990s, he and his business partner David Cunningham recognized the need for a platform that would facilitate knowledge-sharing among developers, leading to the establishment of CodeProject.com in 1999. Chris's expertise in programming and his passion for fostering a collaborative environment have played a pivotal role in the success of CodeProject.com. Over the years, the website has grown into a vibrant community where programmers worldwide can connect, exchange ideas, and find solutions to coding challenges. Chris is a prolific contributor to the developer community through his articles and tutorials, and his latest passion project, CodeProject.AI.

In addition to his work with CodeProject.com, Chris co-founded ContentLab and DeveloperMedia, two projects focussed on helping companies make their Software Projects a success. Chris's roles included Product Development, Content Creation, Client Satisfaction and Systems Automation.

Comments and Discussions

 
GeneralRe: I'm not the author of this article Pin
Tarek Elqusi4-Nov-13 20:42
professionalTarek Elqusi4-Nov-13 20:42 
QuestionKindle and Cookbooks Too! Pin
diverbw30-Oct-13 9:16
professionaldiverbw30-Oct-13 9:16 
GeneralMy vote of 5 Pin
Oshtri Deka16-May-13 1:14
professionalOshtri Deka16-May-13 1:14 
QuestionGreat list Pin
Mike Hankey10-Feb-13 1:50
mveMike Hankey10-Feb-13 1:50 
QuestionOld book Pin
tuanakka11-Dec-12 4:51
professionaltuanakka11-Dec-12 4:51 
QuestionWindows® Internals Pin
serhiy.semenyuk18-Oct-12 23:14
serhiy.semenyuk18-Oct-12 23:14 
GeneralMy vote of 5 Pin
serhiy.semenyuk18-Oct-12 23:13
serhiy.semenyuk18-Oct-12 23:13 
GeneralMy vote of 5 Pin
fredatcodeproject24-Jul-12 1:58
professionalfredatcodeproject24-Jul-12 1:58 
thanks
good to know
QuestionC++/CLI/MFC book Pin
Brisingr Aerowing31-Mar-12 8:14
professionalBrisingr Aerowing31-Mar-12 8:14 
QuestionNo VB books why...? Pin
Jαved27-Feb-12 1:34
professionalJαved27-Feb-12 1:34 
AnswerRe: No VB books why...? Pin
Chris Maunder27-Feb-12 5:04
cofounderChris Maunder27-Feb-12 5:04 
GeneralRe: No VB books why...? Pin
Jαved29-Feb-12 0:25
professionalJαved29-Feb-12 0:25 
QuestionSuggesting "Pragmatic Programmer" Book Pin
@k@ ?9-Feb-12 10:48
professional@k@ ?9-Feb-12 10:48 
AnswerRe: Suggesting "Pragmatic Programmer" Book Pin
Dave Cross29-Oct-13 5:27
professionalDave Cross29-Oct-13 5:27 
QuestionMore C++ books Pin
Robin Imrie7-Feb-12 22:32
professionalRobin Imrie7-Feb-12 22:32 
QuestionISBN Pin
SpaceSoft3-Feb-12 7:03
SpaceSoft3-Feb-12 7:03 
AnswerRe: IBAN Pin
Ferdinando Santacroce7-Feb-12 9:54
Ferdinando Santacroce7-Feb-12 9:54 
AnswerRe: ISBN Pin
SpaceSoft13-Feb-12 9:34
SpaceSoft13-Feb-12 9:34 
GeneralMy vote of 5 Pin
CS14012-Feb-12 17:52
CS14012-Feb-12 17:52 
GeneralArticle updated Pin
thatraja2-Feb-12 3:37
professionalthatraja2-Feb-12 3:37 
GeneralMy vote of 5 Pin
Monjurul Habib21-Dec-11 6:33
professionalMonjurul Habib21-Dec-11 6:33 
QuestionProgramming Principles and Practice Using C++ (Bjarn Stroustrup) Pin
Eric Goedhart21-Dec-11 1:40
professionalEric Goedhart21-Dec-11 1:40 
QuestionAdvanced Windows Debugging by Mario Hewardt and Daniel Pravat Pin
Dave Calkins20-Dec-11 7:55
Dave Calkins20-Dec-11 7:55 
AnswerRe: Advanced Windows Debugging by Mario Hewardt and Daniel Pravat Pin
Thushan Fernando20-Dec-11 20:57
Thushan Fernando20-Dec-11 20:57 
SuggestionFew SQL books (for starters) Pin
Wendelius20-Dec-11 6:30
mentorWendelius20-Dec-11 6:30 

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