Slightly off topic, but what I would find a great help with regards to learning Boost is a better description on what each library can do, and more importantly, what problems it solves. For example, perhaps someone has a problem they need to solve that a Boost lib will help with, but just reading through the top level of the documentation may not give them enough of a hint that this is the case. My pet one is simple loading and saving of configuration information in XML. Which library should/can I use for that? Serialisation? Or is there a better option? Or is there a boost lib in the wings perhaps aimed at that particular task? Another is Boost::graph - I see lots of questions about it on the list, but what real world problems does it solve? James ps. If nothing else of course, shared_ptr is ESSENTIAL!!
-----Original Message----- From: Lynn Allan [mailto:l_d_allan@adelphia.net] Sent: 24 April 2006 14:25 To: boost-users@lists.boost.org Subject: Re: [Boost-users] General Boost documentation
John Krajewski wrote:
I'm new to generic programming and finding the various concepts used in Boost quite confusing (named parameters, property maps, etc). Is there general documentation for the programming methods used in Boost? Perhaps a good book to buy?
<alert comment="boost newbie">
Welcome to the club of confused, disoriented newbies <g>.
Several suggestions:
* Start with a VERY basic library and try to absorb "The Boost Mentality".
* Stair-step up to a somewhat more difficult library ... repeat as necessary
* At this point, the Karlsson book, "Beyond the C++ standard library" might be helpful. For my purposes, the book had helpful regex examples (but regex is already relatively well documented, at least compared to several of the other Boost libraries I've wrestled with. Xpressive is very well documented, IMHO)
* Adapt a mindset that learning Boost is critical to your career, so giving up is not an option. (and when your neurons align "just so", Boost is kinda fun <g>)
* Also a humble attitude ... you are "rubbing shoulders" with some very smart people who are VERY busy, but passionate about Boost prevailing in the marketplace.
* Keep notes to share with others to perhaps shorten their learning curve.
I've found participants on this list to be VERY helpful and patient with newbies, but they won't write your code for you.
</alert>
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