On LISP: Advanced Techniques for Common LISP


Paul Graham - 1993
    On Lisp explains the reasons behind Lisp's growing popularity as a mainstream programming language. On Lisp is a comprehensive study of advanced Lisp techniques, with bottom-up programming as the unifying theme. It gives the first complete description of macros and macro applications. The book also covers important subjects related to bottom-up programming, including functional programming, rapid prototyping, interactive development, and embedded languages. The final chapter takes a deeper look at object-oriented programming than previous Lisp books, showing the step-by-step construction of a working model of the Common Lisp Object System (CLOS). As well as an indispensable reference, On Lisp is a source of software. Its examples form a library of functions and macros that readers will be able to use in their own Lisp programs.

Elements of the Theory of Computation


Harry R. Lewis - 1981
    The authors are well-known for their clear presentation that makes the material accessible to a a broad audience and requires no special previous mathematical experience. KEY TOPICS: In this new edition, the authors incorporate a somewhat more informal, friendly writing style to present both classical and contemporary theories of computation. Algorithms, complexity analysis, and algorithmic ideas are introduced informally in Chapter 1, and are pursued throughout the book. Each section is followed by problems.

Your Career in Animation: How to Survive and Thrive


David B. Levy - 2006
    Here’s an insider’s guide to getting into that industry, staying there, and getting ahead. Author David B. Levy has interviewed the top pros in animation, including Steven Hillenburg, creator of SpongeBob SquarePants; Al Brodax, producer of Yellow Submarine; Teddy Newton, character designer on The Incredibles; Linda Simensky, senior director of PBS Kids; John R. Dilworth, creator of Courage the Cowardly Dog; and dozens of others to get their insights on creating a portfolio or reel, meeting animators, networking, and making the leap from working for others to pitching and selling. A resource section lists animation schools, film festivals, studios, Web sites, and publications to get budding animators off to an animated start.

Computational Fairy Tales


Jeremy Kubica - 2012
    The goal of this book is not to provide comprehensive coverage of each topic, but rather to provide a high level overview of the breadth and excitement of computer science. It's a quest that will take you from learning the basics of programming in a blacksmith's forge to fighting curses with recursion. Fifteen seers delivered the same prophecy, without so much as a single minstrel to lighten the mood: an unknown darkness threatens the kingdom. Suddenly, Princess Ann finds herself sent forth alone to save the kingdom. Leaving behind her home, family, and pet turtle Fido, Princess Ann must face goblin attacks, magical curses, arrogant scholars, an unpleasant oracle, and rude Boolean waiters. Along the way she must build a war chest of computational knowledge to survive the coming challenge.

Prediction Machines: The Simple Economics of Artificial Intelligence


Ajay Agrawal - 2018
    But facing the sea change that AI will bring can be paralyzing. How should companies set strategies, governments design policies, and people plan their lives for a world so different from what we know? In the face of such uncertainty, many analysts either cower in fear or predict an impossibly sunny future.But in Prediction Machines, three eminent economists recast the rise of AI as a drop in the cost of prediction. With this single, masterful stroke, they lift the curtain on the AI-is-magic hype and show how basic tools from economics provide clarity about the AI revolution and a basis for action by CEOs, managers, policy makers, investors, and entrepreneurs.When AI is framed as cheap prediction, its extraordinary potential becomes clear: Prediction is at the heart of making decisions under uncertainty. Our businesses and personal lives are riddled with such decisions. Prediction tools increase productivity--operating machines, handling documents, communicating with customers. Uncertainty constrains strategy. Better prediction creates opportunities for new business structures and strategies to compete. Penetrating, fun, and always insightful and practical, Prediction Machines follows its inescapable logic to explain how to navigate the changes on the horizon. The impact of AI will be profound, but the economic framework for understanding it is surprisingly simple.

Head First PHP & MySQL


Lynn Beighley - 2008
    Packed with real-world examples, this book teaches you all the essentials of server-side programming, from the fundamentals of PHP and MySQL coding to advanced topics such as form validation, session IDs, cookies, database queries and joins, file I/O operations, content management, and more.Head First PHP & MySQL offers the same visually rich format that's turned every title in the Head First series into a bestseller, with plenty of exercises, quizzes, puzzles, and other interactive features to help you retain what you've learned.Use PHP to transform static HTML pages into dynamic web sites Create and populate your own MySQL database tables, and work with data stored in files Perform sophisticated MySQL queries with joins, and refine your results with LIMIT and ORDER BY Use cookies and sessions to track visitors' login information and personalize the site for users Protect your data from SQL injection attacks Use regular expressions to validate information on forms Dynamically display text based on session info and create images on the fly Pull syndicated data from other sites using PHP and XML Throughout the book, you'll build sophisticated examples -- including a mailing list, a job board, and an online dating site -- to help you learn how to harness the power of PHP and MySQL in a variety of contexts. If you're ready to build a truly dynamic website, Head First PHP & MySQL is the ideal way to get going.

Probably Approximately Correct: Nature's Algorithms for Learning and Prospering in a Complex World


Leslie Valiant - 2013
    We nevertheless muddle through even in the absence of theories of how to act. But how do we do it?In Probably Approximately Correct, computer scientist Leslie Valiant presents a masterful synthesis of learning and evolution to show how both individually and collectively we not only survive, but prosper in a world as complex as our own. The key is “probably approximately correct” algorithms, a concept Valiant developed to explain how effective behavior can be learned. The model shows that pragmatically coping with a problem can provide a satisfactory solution in the absence of any theory of the problem. After all, finding a mate does not require a theory of mating. Valiant’s theory reveals the shared computational nature of evolution and learning, and sheds light on perennial questions such as nature versus nurture and the limits of artificial intelligence.Offering a powerful and elegant model that encompasses life’s complexity, Probably Approximately Correct has profound implications for how we think about behavior, cognition, biological evolution, and the possibilities and limits of human and machine intelligence.

Elements of Programming


Alexander Stepanov - 2009
    And then we wonder why software is notorious for being delivered late and full of bugs, while other engineers routinely deliver finished bridges, automobiles, electrical appliances, etc., on time and with only minor defects. This book sets out to redress this imbalance. Members of my advanced development team at Adobe who took the course based on the same material all benefited greatly from the time invested. It may appear as a highly technical text intended only for computer scientists, but it should be required reading for all practicing software engineers." --Martin Newell, Adobe Fellow"The book contains some of the most beautiful code I have ever seen." --Bjarne Stroustrup, Designer of C++"I am happy to see the content of Alex's course, the development and teaching of which I strongly supported as the CTO of Silicon Graphics, now available to all programmers in this elegant little book." --Forest Baskett, General Partner, New Enterprise Associates"Paul's patience and architectural experience helped to organize Alex's mathematical approach into a tightly-structured edifice--an impressive feat!" --Robert W. Taylor, Founder of Xerox PARC CSL and DEC Systems Research Center Elements of Programming provides a different understanding of programming than is presented elsewhere. Its major premise is that practical programming, like other areas of science and engineering, must be based on a solid mathematical foundation. The book shows that algorithms implemented in a real programming language, such as C++, can operate in the most general mathematical setting. For example, the fast exponentiation algorithm is defined to work with any associative operation. Using abstract algorithms leads to efficient, reliable, secure, and economical software.This is not an easy book. Nor is it a compilation of tips and tricks for incremental improvements in your programming skills. The book's value is more fundamental and, ultimately, more critical for insight into programming. To benefit fully, you will need to work through it from beginning to end, reading the code, proving the lemmas, and doing the exercises. When finished, you will see how the application of the deductive method to your programs assures that your system's software components will work together and behave as they must.The book presents a number of algorithms and requirements for types on which they are defined. The code for these descriptions--also available on the Web--is written in a small subset of C++ meant to be accessible to any experienced programmer. This subset is defined in a special language appendix coauthored by Sean Parent and Bjarne Stroustrup.Whether you are a software developer, or any other professional for whom programming is an important activity, or a committed student, you will come to understand what the book's experienced authors have been teaching and demonstrating for years--that mathematics is good for programming, and that theory is good for practice.

Cybersecurity and Cyberwar: What Everyone Needs to Know(r)


P.W. Singer - 2013
    Today, our entire modern way of life, from communication to commerce to conflict, fundamentally depends on the Internet. And the cybersecurity issues that result challenge literally everyone: politicians wrestling with everything from cybercrime to online freedom; generals protecting the nation from new forms of attack, while planning new cyberwars; business executives defending firms from once unimaginable threats, and looking to make money off of them; lawyers and ethicists building new frameworks for right and wrong. Most of all, cybersecurity issues affect us as individuals. We face new questions in everything from our rights and responsibilities as citizens of both the online and real world to simply how to protect ourselves and our families from a new type of danger. And yet, there is perhaps no issue that has grown so important, so quickly, and that touches so many, that remains so poorly understood.In Cybersecurity and CyberWar: What Everyone Needs to Know�, New York Times best-selling author P. W. Singer and noted cyber expert Allan Friedman team up to provide the kind of easy-to-read, yet deeply informative resource book that has been missing on this crucial issue of 21st century life. Written in a lively, accessible style, filled with engaging stories and illustrative anecdotes, the book is structured around the key question areas of cyberspace and its security: how it all works, why it all matters, and what can we do? Along the way, they take readers on a tour of the important (and entertaining) issues and characters of cybersecurity, from the "Anonymous" hacker group and the Stuxnet computer virus to the new cyber units of the Chinese and U.S. militaries. Cybersecurity and CyberWar: What Everyone Needs to Know� is the definitive account on the subject for us all, which comes not a moment too soon.What Everyone Needs to Know� is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press.

Dive Into Python 3


Mark Pilgrim - 2009
    As in the original book, Dive Into Python, each chapter starts with a real, complete code sample, proceeds to pick it apart and explain the pieces, and then puts it all back together in a summary at the end.This book includes:Example programs completely rewritten to illustrate powerful new concepts now available in Python 3: sets, iterators, generators, closures, comprehensions, and much more A detailed case study of porting a major library from Python 2 to Python 3 A comprehensive appendix of all the syntactic and semantic changes in Python 3 This is the perfect resource for you if you need to port applications to Python 3, or if you like to jump into languages fast and get going right away.

Python for Data Analysis


Wes McKinney - 2011
    It is also a practical, modern introduction to scientific computing in Python, tailored for data-intensive applications. This is a book about the parts of the Python language and libraries you'll need to effectively solve a broad set of data analysis problems. This book is not an exposition on analytical methods using Python as the implementation language.Written by Wes McKinney, the main author of the pandas library, this hands-on book is packed with practical cases studies. It's ideal for analysts new to Python and for Python programmers new to scientific computing.Use the IPython interactive shell as your primary development environmentLearn basic and advanced NumPy (Numerical Python) featuresGet started with data analysis tools in the pandas libraryUse high-performance tools to load, clean, transform, merge, and reshape dataCreate scatter plots and static or interactive visualizations with matplotlibApply the pandas groupby facility to slice, dice, and summarize datasetsMeasure data by points in time, whether it's specific instances, fixed periods, or intervalsLearn how to solve problems in web analytics, social sciences, finance, and economics, through detailed examples

The Sciences of the Artificial


Herbert A. Simon - 1969
    There are updates throughout the book as well. These take into account important advances in cognitive psychology and the science of design while confirming and extending the book's basic thesis: that a physical symbol system has the necessary and sufficient means for intelligent action. The chapter "Economic Reality" has also been revised to reflect a change in emphasis in Simon's thinking about the respective roles of organizations and markets in economic systems."People sometimes ask me what they should read to find out about artificial intelligence. Herbert Simon's book The Sciences of the Artificial is always on the list I give them. Every page issues a challenge to conventional thinking, and the layman who digests it well will certainly understand what the field of artificial intelligence hopes to accomplish. I recommend it in the same spirit that I recommend Freud to people who ask about psychoanalysis, or Piaget to those who ask about child psychology: If you want to learn about a subject, start by reading its founding fathers." -- George A. Miller

Serious Cryptography: A Practical Introduction to Modern Encryption


Jean-Philippe Aumasson - 2017
    You’ll learn about authenticated encryption, secure randomness, hash functions, block ciphers, and public-key techniques such as RSA and elliptic curve cryptography.You’ll also learn: - Key concepts in cryptography, such as computational security, attacker models, and forward secrecy - The strengths and limitations of the TLS protocol behind HTTPS secure websites - Quantum computation and post-quantum cryptography - About various vulnerabilities by examining numerous code examples and use cases - How to choose the best algorithm or protocol and ask vendors the right questionsEach chapter includes a discussion of common implementation mistakes using real-world examples and details what could go wrong and how to avoid these pitfalls. Whether you’re a seasoned practitioner or a beginner looking to dive into the field, Serious Cryptography will provide a complete survey of modern encryption and its applications.

Database Systems: The Complete Book


Jeffrey D. Ullman - 1999
    Written by well-known computer scientists, this introduction to database systems offers a comprehensive approach, focusing on database design, database use, and implementation of database applications and database management systems. The first half of the book provides in-depth coverage of databases from the point of view of the database designer, user, and application programmer. It covers the latest database standards SQL:1999, SQL/PSM, SQL/CLI, JDBC, ODL, and XML, with broader coverage of SQL than most other texts. The second half of the book provides in-depth coverage of databases from the point of view of the DBMS implementor. It focuses on storage structures, query processing, and transaction management. The book covers the main techniques in these areas with broader coverage of query optimization than most other texts, along with advanced topics including multidimensional and bitmap indexes, distributed transactions, and information integration techniques.

Networking for Systems Administrators (IT Mastery Book 5)


Michael W. Lucas - 2015
    Servers give sysadmins a incredible visibility into the network—once they know how to unlock it. Most sysadmins don’t need to understand window scaling, or the differences between IPv4 and IPv6 echo requests, or other intricacies of the TCP/IP protocols. You need only enough to deploy your own applications and get easy support from the network team.This book teaches you:•How modern networks really work•The essentials of TCP/IP•The next-generation protocol, IPv6•The right tools to diagnose network problems, and how to use them•Troubleshooting everything from the physical wire to DNS•How to see the traffic you send and receive•Connectivity testing•How to communicate with your network team to quickly resolve problemsA systems administrator doesn’t need to know the innards of TCP/IP, but knowing enough to diagnose your own network issues transforms a good sysadmin into a great one.