Books on ACE

This page describes the three books that have been published on ACE written by Douglas C. Schmidt, Steve Huston, Umar Syyid, and James Johnson. An essential aspect of ACE is its use of patterns to integrate

C++ language features, e.g., classes, parameterized types, inheritance, and dynamic binding;
Advanced OS mechanisms, e.g., dynamic linking, multi-threading, and event demultiplexing; and
Efficient low-level IPC mechanisms, e.g., Sockets, TLI, SSL, and shared memory.

into a powerful OO toolkit that simplifies the development of concurrent networked applications.

C++ Network Programming (C++NP)

The C++NP books are published by Addison-Wesley in the Bjarne Stroustrup "In-depth C++ Series". These books explain how the ACE toolkit can be used to simplify the development of concurrrent and networked object-oriented software. The two books in the C++NP series thus far are:

C++ Network Programming: Mastering Complexity Using ACE and Patterns
C++NPv1 describes how middleware and the ACE toolkit help address key challenges associated with developing networked applications. We review the core native OS mechanisms available on popular OS platforms and illustrate how C++ and patterns are applied in ACE to encapsulate these mechanisms in class library wrapper facades that improve application portability and robustness. The book's primary application example is a networked logging service that transfers log records from client applications to a logging server.
C++NPv1 was published in mid-December, 2001. The Table of Contents is available online.
C++ Network Programming: Systematic Reuse with ACE and Frameworks
C++NPv2 describes a family of object-oriented network programming frameworks provided by the ACE toolkit. These frameworks help reduce the cost and improve the quality of networked applications by reifying proven software designs and implementations. ACE's framework-based approach expands reuse technology far beyond what can be achieved by reusing individual classes or even class libraries. We describe the design of these frameworks, show how they can be applied to real networked applications, and summarize the design rules that underly the effective use of these frameworks.
C++NPv2 was published in early November, 2002.

ACE Programmer's Guide (APG)

The ACE Programmer's Guide (APG) is a practical, hands-on guide to ACE for C++ programmers building networked applications and next-generation middleware. The book first introduces ACE to beginners. It then explains how you can tap design patterns, frameworks, and ACE to produce effective, easily maintained software systems with less time and effort. The book features discussions of programming aids, interprocess communication (IPC) issues, process and thread management, shared memory, the ACE Service Configurator framework, timer management classes, the ACE Naming Service, and more.

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