Beginning Assembly, wich book?
Hi all, I was thinking about start of with some assembly. Apparently it's quite handy to know.
Although I'm one of those who absolutely hates digital books, nothing beats a good ol' book!
So, I was thinking of buying one to learn from, could anybody give me some opinion on which one I should boy?
Found this one: Assembly Language Step by Step
Is it good at all?
~root_op
It sounds like you have a fair amount of knowledge on high level programming. (C, C++, Python, PHP, VB, etc..) As such, I recommend the following:
The Art of Assembly Language - Randall Hyde
Based on the x86 architecture, the book is designed for people with experience in high level programming and slowly introduces the world of assembly through high level code. Oh and if you were ever a bit shaky on data representation or the virtual memory setup, which I would expect coming from a VB programmer, you will have that sorted out in no time.
PM me if you have any questions and good luck on your studies.
I should learn some assembly too. It's used to write shellcode, and is also useful in cracking software. It just sucks that there's different versions of it for different chipsets/architectures. The AT&T and NASM and all that. Just some light reading I've done on the subject, I've learned a little bit from reading about writing shellcode, but I need to learn the basics and fundamentals. Glad this thread came up, it reminded me I was going to look into this. Thanks for the good recommendation on the book!
Yeah, i found this Art of Assembly book quite handy aswell. I had a sneak peak at it on the intranetz and it seems really good. Sure the book isn't like "How to begin with programming" but it seems to explain most of ASM.
Although, does it involve Intel reference aswell? Or is it just x86 in general?
Thank you all for your replies!
Although, does it involve Intel reference aswell? Or is it just x86 in general?
I am not too sure exactly what you're asking here, but I will take it as: Does the book make reference to the Intel architecture or just x86 overall? The book is made around the x86 architecture which is Intel's child, basically. If you were trying to contrast against, say, AMD, well, there is no major differences in the basic instructions you will learn, AMD is compatible with the x86.
In my experience, having read and understood most of the book, I would have no problem moving to another architecture and learning it from scratch. You will end up understanding assembly in an overall view, not just specifically to x86. In one form or another, the architectures all have the same basic idea in mind.
I will warn: it can be a bit dry at times. Just take it slow, there is a lot of material to take in, but as I said, by the end you will have a fairly encompassing view of assembly.
root_op wrote: Because i don't want to learn about Win32, i hate Windows to be honest and i prefer linux, and i don't want to be limited to Windows programming either. But thanks for your oppinion though!
nice to see that u like linux… take a look at this: http://www.amazon.com/gp/cdp/member-reviews/A1G6DKZ5RD2765?ie=UTF8&sort_by=MostRecentReview
Hope it helped, Cyph3rHell.
Oh! So it contains Assembly? :o
Well i ordered Art of Assembly, but apperantly it's out of stock in every f*cking webbook shop (There aint a regular bookshop in about 6miles from here). But the other books i'm thinking of buying are also:
Linux Device Drivers 978-0596005900 Understanding the Linux Kernel 978-0596002138 The C Programming Language 978-0201700732
But now i also read some about that Linux System Programming is a very good source of information for what i want to do, so thank you very much for that! I'll order that aswell:happy:
Ive just got the art of assembly for some light ahem reading, and its really good. It ties in a fair amount of computer science knowledge (von newmann architecture for example), which is pretty necessary for programming assembly (even though its pretty basic it gives a new perspective when talking about stuff like memory management).
Definitely looks to be a good read, though admittedly i'm not that far through it.
root_op wrote: By the way, good to hear from you again jjbutler, been some time :)
I know, ive had a lot of uni work on, but ive got a bit more time free so I applied for admin here, just waiting on cheese to decide and update my member details then il be helping you guys out more often (fingers crossed) :D
Back ontopic, if anyone wants to browse this book while they are waiting for their copy to arrive, PM me and il hook you up :p
root_op wrote: Oh! So it contains Assembly? :o
Well i ordered Art of Assembly, but apperantly it's out of stock in every f*cking webbook shop (There aint a regular bookshop in about 6miles from here). But the other books i'm thinking of buying are also:
Linux Device Drivers 978-0596005900 Understanding the Linux Kernel 978-0596002138 The C Programming Language 978-0201700732
But now i also read some about that Linux System Programming is a very good source of information for what i want to do, so thank you very much for that! I'll order that aswell:happy:
"Linux Device Drivers" is a book I've owned for a while now and can say that I throughly enjoy, but…hold on to your money for a while before buying it. Spend that money of the "Art of Assembly" (highly recommended) and gain a good grasp on assembly before investing in that particular book.
"Beginning Linux Programming" and "Professional Linux Programming" (both from Wrox Press) are very books I highly recommend as well if you have a good grasp on C/C++.
Thing is that i'm a shop-o-holic, also the shipment from where i will order from is quite expensive, so i will order all books at the same time instead, and i looked inte 'Professional Linux programming', seems awesome! I'm quite handy with C at the moment atleast, C++ i can't say since i never tried it.
But i'l add both books to the cart aswell, thanks for the tips! :)