Beginner at assembler

[winx5]

Hi everyone,

I am new in this forum and new in assembler.
Thanx for letting me be a member here at MasmForum. :bg

I have no previous programming knowledge at all.
I have read that it's advisable to know at least one high level language before starting the long asm journey.
Further more, I am no mathematical genius from nature and math always used to be my weakest side in school.
But still, I am very fond of computers / computing and I really want to learn asm, without learning a high language first.

I'm planning to use the masm32 package (Thanx very much Hutch!  :bg ) .
I have also read tut 1-4 from Iczelion, without too much understanding of the source code, and manged to compile and run.
I believe I need to read some beginners material, before continuing with Iczelion's tuts.

I'm thinking of buying two books as beginner material:

Introduction to 80X86 Assembly Language and Computer Architecture by Richard C. Detmer

Assembly Language for Intel-Based Computers by Kip R. Irvine

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0763717738/ref=pd_sim_b_3/104-2176530-5870314?%5Fencoding=UTF8&v=glance

Are these books good beginner material or should I choose something else?
Do I have any chance of learning asm since I am not gifted with mathematical equations?

Thanx very much for all replies and help! :)

Regards, winx5

[Titan]

Randall Hyde has The Art of Assembly, a comprehensive free online book which might interest you.

- Titan

[hutch--]

winx5,

Titan's advice to have a look at AOA and HLA is good advice. I don't like to discourage anyone but starting from scratch in assembler has a low chance of success where starting with a decent compiler will give you better results and a better framework to learn with. Depends on what you like, there are basic compilers, C compilers and various others that would be more use to you at the moment. The other thing is you need to learn the architecture of Windows which is another task again.

Good luck with it.

[raymond]

winx5

The only maths you need for programming is generally what you learned in grade school, unless you want to write programs requiring higher math skills.

What you do need however, and you don't really learn that in school, is a good logical mind. And that is regardless of the programming language you use. You need to write a set of instructions which will yield the final result which you expect. If you don't succeed (and that happens very VERY often even with experienced programmers), you then have to review your code and figure out why it did not give the expected result. (The computer itself is very rarely at fault; it only does what it is being told to do.)

The more complex your program will be, the more logic you will need. Success is then exhilarating!!!

Wish you the best in your endeavour.

Raymond

[ventsyV]

Check out Kip Irvine's book "ASM language for intel based computers" it is pretty good.
I suggest you learn C/C++ first.
The math you will need is how to switch between numeric systems. You need understanding of how to work in hex and binary and how to convert from one to the other and to dec. Thats all. Good luck

[thomasantony]

Hi,
     I learned ASM knowing nothing but a little GW-BASIC which I had learned at school. I didn't even know win32 programming. But somehow I got thru it :green2 . Good luck to you!! :U

Thomas Antony :U

[Jurgen]

I am learning c c++ and asm at the same time.
For instance, I had a hard time understanding pointers in c. Without asm knowledge a pointer is very abstract.
But thanks to asm, I know that a pointer is nothing more than an adress of some datastructure or variable.
Maybe it has been said before, but asm gives you better understanding of c and c++ (or other languages).

good luck.

[winx5]

Thanx for encouraging replies everyone! :)

@ Titan and hutch:

Thanx for recommending AoA and HLA. Actually, I have read some chapters and compiled some examples.
I also believe it is a good starting point, however, I found it a bit confusing since it uses a c-like syntax.
I'd prefer to use the time on a masm beginner book, instead of learning AoA and HLA first.

@ raymond:

A good logical mind.....Hmmmmmm....I will try my best!  :red  ::)  :U

@ ventsyV:

Thanx, I actually think I will buy the book. :)
I don't want to learn C/C++ first, even though I know I probably should. :eek

@ thomasantony:

Sounds interesting! :clap:
What have you read to learn ASM? Do you use Masm32?
What got u thru it all?

@ Jurgen

Wow! Impressive! Thumbs up for you, learning 3 languages at the same time!  :U
I believe that asm and c++ can help the learner in many ways.
Thanx for informatve post. :)

Regards, winx5

[GregL]

I'm thinking of buying two books as beginner material:

Introduction to 80X86 Assembly Language and Computer Architecture by Richard C. Detmer

Assembly Language for Intel-Based Computers by Kip R. Irvine

Both of those book are good ones for learning MASM. I have them both, I think the Irvine one is a little better. I use them as reference books all the time. Make sure you get the 4th Edition of the Irvine one if you get it.

[thomasantony]

Hi winx5,
Yes I use MASM32. I donwloaded the package and searched the net for tutorials. I stumbled upon iczelion's site and ploughed ahead through the tutorials. I was stuck for sometime with making windows. Then it all somehow cleared up. Then I also found this great forum. Everyone was very friendly and answered all my doubts. :clap:

Thomas Antony :U

[winx5]

@ Greg:

Thx. I actually bought them yesterday.  :bg
I bought the 4th edition of Irvine.
Wich would you recommend to start reading?

@ thomasantony:

Great! I like words like "stumbled upon" and "somehow cleared up".  :U
How long have u been ASM'ing?
How long time did it take before you felt you had the grips of your coding?
:cheekygreen:

winx5

[thomasantony]

Hi,
     I wouldn't want to show myself as a master programmer. I learned much because of this forum. I practiced by making many programs. I joined in 31 August 2003 (got it from teh old masmforum member list  :8) ). I still havn't grasped many things like FPUI programming, DirectX, OpenGL etc. But now I am concentrating on OS programming. I find it very interesting.

Thomas Antony :U

[GregL]

win5x,

Which would you recommend to start reading?

Either one, they cover a lot of the same stuff. But they each cover some stuff the other one doesn't.