This was really seeded for me when trying to teach people taking computer science courses who were trying to do practical things like integrate C libraries into their higher level projects, but didn't really understand how things were working under the hood and getting themselves into a mess.
If they understood a little more about how their program was built and run ... from the bottom up, as it were :) ... they would have had less pain.
Of course, it just shows as usual the hardest problem in computer science is indeed, naming!
Perhaps adding a "Prerequisites" chapter might further help in getting the intended audience across?
I associate "from the bottom up" approach with something being explained by starting from the very basics and aimed towards someone completely unfamiliar with the subject.
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This was really seeded for me when trying to teach people taking computer science courses who were trying to do practical things like integrate C libraries into their higher level projects, but didn't really understand how things were working under the hood and getting themselves into a mess.
If they understood a little more about how their program was built and run ... from the bottom up, as it were :) ... they would have had less pain.
Of course, it just shows as usual the hardest problem in computer science is indeed, naming!
Edit: BTW you're right, "Code" by Petzold should be required reading http://www.charlespetzold.com/code/index.html
Perhaps adding a "Prerequisites" chapter might further help in getting the intended audience across?
I associate "from the bottom up" approach with something being explained by starting from the very basics and aimed towards someone completely unfamiliar with the subject.