Odd Lots

[jeff_duntemann]

• My editor at John Wiley called and indicated that they want me (finally!) to rewrite Assembly Language Step By Step for a new edition in the spring of 2010. This will be a big job, since DOS will be jettisoned completely (and real mode relegated to a hisorical

Comments

[kevinnickerson]

A new book on assembly? Even I don't write assembly for PC's any more, and we're a real time control shop. I can't see the market being more than a dozen people.

[jeff_duntemann]

For the most part I'd agree--but this book has been in print for nineteen years now in three editions, and has made me more money than all my other writing of any kind put together. It's still selling, if slowly; I'm now banking about $1800 per year from it, which isn't bad for work I did in 1999.

The trick is that the book isn't about writing useful apps or utilities in assembly so much as understanding the x86 hardware platform at the memory/machine instruction level. It's about knowing how the damned thing works, down where the software meets the silicon. There does seem to be a demand for that. If there isn't, we'll know in another year and a half.

Carbon Resistors

[anonymous]

Jeff:

Don't be surprised to find all the 1w carbon composition resistors are significantly above their nominal value if they are "new old stock."

I've written a bit about this at http://www.cliftonlaboratories.com/carbon_composition_resistors.htm with more details in my article published in QEX March/April 2008 issue.

Jack K8ZOA

Re: Carbon Resistors

[jeff_duntemann]

That is a very cool article. I don't think that the resistors sold over at OEM are from the 1960s, or anything close to that. In fact, I was wondering precisely about that, and since they were cheap I crushed one in a vise when I got home to see what the internal architecture was. It was carbon film.

It does make me wonder about the junkbox resistors I've had following me around literally since I was 12 or so. I do test every single component before I use it to make sure the values match the markings, and every so often I spot a bad one.

The interesting thing about the resistors I bought on Monday is that they were very high values (well over 1 megohm) and will be used not as resistors but as forms for RF chokes, which was a convention in a lot of 60s-era magazine projects. The important thing was not their resistive element but that their dimensions matched those of 60s-era 1 watt carbon comp resistors. The dog-bone items (of which I have many) are right out for winding chokes on.

[obreerbo]

Hmm...maybe the Gaians started terraforming Mars? :-)

If only NASA did get 25% of the Federal budget...we'd probably already have Hilbert drives and extrasolar colonies by now.

Will your new assembly language book be concentrating on the Windows or Linux environment? I'd love to see a good assembly-language book using either gas or NASM syntax; the only ones I have use the old Microsoft MASM syntax...

[jeff_duntemann]

The book will focus on NASM, as did the 2000 edition, and I'm almost certain (having spoken at length with the acquisitions editor) that they want a Linux-only edition. I may mention Windows 32-bit console apps in passing, but I would actually prefer not to split the coverage between two OSes. The book is not really about any OS, but to run example programs you need to have an OS that will run your compiler and your editor, etc

[alanajoli]

25%? Are they kidding? That's just plain silly.

On a complete tangent, I've been having some trouble with my e-mail. I sent you a rather long, meandering message not too long ago (in response to our conversation about characterization). Did you receive it? If not, I'll resend. I only ask because you're usually far more prompt than I about replying to e-mail. :)

[chris_gerrib]

That "Christmas on Mars" movie just SCREAMS "craptacular."

[jeff_duntemann]

You can't escape: You've already proven to me that you know a fair bit about Mars. Your homework assignment (obviously) is to see the film and let us know what you think.

[chris_gerrib]

Not sure I need to see the film to tell you what I think...