Erlang is the language of choice for programmers who want to write robust, concurrent applications, but its strange syntax and functional design can intimidate the uninitiated. Luckily, there’s a new weapon in the battle against Erlang-phobia: Learn You Some Erlang for Great Good!
Erlang is the language of choice for programmers who want to write robust, concurrent applications, but its strange syntax and functional design can intimidate the uninitiated. Luckily, there’s a new weapon in the battle against Erlang-phobia: Learn You Some Erlang for Great Good!
Erlang maestro Fred Hébert starts slow and eases you into the basics: You’ll learn about Erlang’s unorthodox syntax, its data structures, its type system (or lack thereof!), and basic functional programming techniques. Once you’ve wrapped your head around the simple stuff, you’ll tackle the real meat-and-potatoes of the language: concurrency, distributed computing, hot code loading, and all the other dark magic that makes Erlang such a hot topic among today’s savvy developers.
As you dive into Erlang’s functional fantasy world, you’ll learn about:
Testing your applications with EUnit and Common Test
Building and releasing your applications with the OTP framework
Passing messages, raising errors, and starting/stopping processes over many nodes
Storing and retrieving data using Mnesia and ETS
Network programming with TCP, UDP, and the inet module
The simple joys and potential pitfalls of writing distributed, concurrent applications
Packed with lighthearted illustrations and just the right mix of offbeat and practical example programs, Learn You Some - Erlang for Great Good! is the perfect entry point into the sometimes-crazy, always-thrilling world of Erlang.
Robert posted this comment on the Elixir Forum, I hope he won’t mind me reproducing it here:
I’m glad you like it Rainer… cos I was just going to suggest (in our little book club thread) whether it might be worth us reading this alongside Programming Erlang
There’s more maths-orientated stuff I encountered in PE which got me wondering what other Erlang books were out there and whether any might be suitable to read concurrently with Programming Erlang… and Fred’s book has got some really nice reviews! I did similar with Programming Elixir and Elixir in Action and I really enjoyed reading them together (it helps ‘repeat n reinforce’ things too). I’m up for it if you are
Fred, if you see this, do you have any plans to update this book or do you think it is still good to read with current versions of Erlang/OTP?
Both. It’s gonna be missing some newer features and stuff around releases is better covered by adopting Erlang right now, but for the core language, otp philosophy and approach to design it’s still good.
No starch press has reached out to me for a second edition but they haven’t set up follow up meetings. I’m hoping there will be one though.
I don’t know much about No Starch and how locked in you are, but I wonder if it’s something you could do with the @PragmaticBookshelf? From what I’ve read of Programming Erlang, I think there may be room for something that could be read before it… and from the reviews I’ve seen your book could be a great fit there…
Book contracts typically come with clauses for following editions, even to the point where if you refuse to work on it, they can get a ghost writer to do it and publish under your name. The one exception is when the contract is terminated, usually after it is out of print.
I’ll be working with no starch for this. They’re good editors and publishers anyway.
I’ll post them in a different thread 