Programming Language Pragmatics - Michael Scott

This is an odd book. Its intended niche is to fill in all the details about compilers missed by other compiler books. The result is a kind of general book which is a jack of all trades and master of none. It covers topics ranging from RISC assembly through to coroutines through to message passing, but it's stretched out over so many topics that it feels surprisingly lightweight. It might make sense as an early undergrad compiler text, or an accompaniment to the 'Comparative Programming Languages' course that I did as an undergrad, but I found it rather unsatisfying.

Posted 2004-09-28.