Book: Code

Tagline: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software

Author: Charles Petzold

Find Online: http://www.charlespetzold.com/code/

Date Read: March 2018

Why did I choose to read this book?

I can no longer remember if this was given to me as a gift, or if I decided to buy it online because I stumbled across a great conversation about it. I'm pretty sure it was a gift. Either way, this book is incredible and fascinating and I already want to re-read it. It goes a long way towards demystifying the basics of electronic computing, and although it's dated now (especially because of how far transistors have come since it was published), there's a lot of valuable information for non-experts and lateral thinkers who are curious about this subject.

Table of Contents

1. Code: Preface to the Paperback Edition
2. Code: Ch 1 (Best Friends)
3. Code: Ch 2 (Codes and Combinations)
4. Code: Ch 3 (Braille and Binary Codes)
5. Code: Ch 4 (Anatomy of a Flashlight)
6. Code: Ch 5 (Seeing Around Corners
7. Code: Ch 6 (Telegraphs and Relays)
8. Code: Ch 7 (Our Ten Digits)
9. Code: Ch 8 (Alternatives to Ten)
10. Bit by Bit by Bit
11. Code: Ch 10 (Logic and Switches)
12. Gates (Not Bill)
13. A Binary Adding Machine
14. But What About Subtraction?
15. Feedback and Flip-Flops
16. Bytes and Hex
17. An Assemblage of Memory
18. Automation
19. From Abaci to Chips
20. Two Classic Microprocessors
21. ASCII and a Cast of Characters
22. Get on the Bus
23. The Operating System
24. Fixed Point, Floating Point
25. Languages High and Low
26. The Graphical Revolution