Dr. Dobb's Bookshelf

The personal computer and the Internet and other technologies that have been built on it are changing the world as profoundly as the printing press or the Industrial Revolution. Fire in the Valley tells colorful and sometimes hilarious tales of the personal computer pioneers. It also captures the odd medley of influences ? wild risk-taking, 60's consciousness, rebellion against bureaucracy, kitchen-table engineering ? that were essential to making the personal computer. (read more)

Recently SETI became a popular past time with the release of the SETI@home screen saver, which runs on more tan 2 million PCs, analyzing data from the Arecibo radio telescope for signs of extraterrestrial life. This fascinating book explains how likely it is that someone will be found, just what kind of signals are being looked for, and how to communicate with them. (read more)

For audio and programming professionals wishing to add sound to their applications, Kientzle (senior technical editor, Dr. Dobb's Journal) introduces the basics of sound and Csup++, as well as practical assistance with: accessing sound services on Win32, Mac OS, and UNIX platforms; file compression/decompression; and playing the popular MIDI and MOD music files. The complementary CD-ROM contains the book's source codes, sample sound files, compiler project files, contributed software, and related data. (read more)

Network Programming with Perl is a comprehensive, example-rich guide to creating network-based applications using the Perl programming language. Among its many capabilities, modern Perl provides a straightforward and powerful interface to TCP/IP, and this book shows you how to leverage these capabilities to create robust, maintainable, and efficient custom client/server applications. (read more)