Re: Which docs first?

[Stephen Leake <stephen.a.leake.1@gsfc.nasa.gov>]

"Clueless" <chris@dont.spam.me> writes:

> Recentely I've been spending alot of time just reading through the LRM and
> the Rationale. I'm also planning on going through the GNAT source code(as
> per the recommendation found in Aho's Dragon Books).
> 
> My question is this...how much time should a novice spend reviewing the
> official Ada docs( i.e.  the LRM and the Rationale), and compiler source
> code in proportion to the amount of time reading through the tutorials and
> text books that are available for newcomers to the language. Books such as
> Barnes's "Programming in Ada95" for instance, or the tutorials one finds 
> out on the Net? I am assuming that there is nice middle ground somewhere,
> where one can become familiar with the guts of the language without
> becoming overwhelmed by what may appear on the  surface to be an extremely
> complex set of syntax and general language rules.
> 
> Any advice?

It depends on what kind of learner you are. I learned Ada by reading
the Ada 83 manual, then writing code in DEC Ada, then reading the Ada
95 manual, then writing code with GNAT, then reading Norm Cohen's
book, then reading parts of the Ada 95 Rationale. 

And I learned more from reading this newsgroup.

Other people's prefered learning style will differ. There is no
"right" way.

It is useful to be aware of your own learning style.

-- 
-- Stephe