nimforum mirror - Fake Nim books an Amazon, which ones are real?

PMunch (orginal) [2024-04-21T22:01:45+02:00] view original

With the rise of LLMs and AI based text generation in general there has been a flood on poorly made "books" hitting web-stores like Amazon. These are simply a money-grabbing scheme, trying to pray on people either meaning to buy other books, or being led by the nice (AI generated) titles and blurbs. Unfortunately these text models aren't very good at Nim, so the books are complete hallucinations and less than worthless. The only books about Nim currently in print (that I'm aware of, please share more if you know of any) are:

Mastering Nim: A complete guide to the programming language, by Andreas Rumpf

Nim in Action, by Dominik Picheta

However a quick search on Amazon turns up titles such as:

Mastering Nim Programming: A Concise Guidebook, by Brett Neutreon (the free sample even includes the sentence "Certainly, here is the detailed content for the specified section in LaTeX format, following your instructions:", which is an obvious AI response to a prompt.

Practical Nim Programming: A Step-by-Step Guide to building Robust, Scalable Applications from beginners to expert, by Colton Stewart (this one manages to spell Andreas' last name wrong)

NIM Programming for Developers: The Ultimate Guide to Building Fast, Efficient, and Scalable Software, by Jesse Sprinter (Besides capitalizing Nim the formatting of the book is quite horrendous)

Nim: Mastering Nim Metaprogramming, Unleash the Power of Code Generation, by Jesse Sprinter (Apparently the same author as the last book, however they have forgotten than Nim doesn't use braces in its syntax but they have learnt how to write the word Nim)

All in all these books pull from real sources but hallucinate everything in-between, so reading them can leave you with a mish-mash of real knowledge and complete fabrications. Stick to real books written by real people who actually know Nim. Of course I would wish these where actual titles of real books, they would certainly find their audience here, but alas. Hopefully in time we'll have more books to share, but for now stay vigilant about fake books.

bajith (orginal) [2024-04-22T03:15:11+02:00] view original

Adding these two fraud books to the above mentioned fraud books:

Nim Programming for Data Science: Harnessing the Power of Nim for Data Analysis

Nim Programming: The Next Generation Programming Language For Software Development

I'm sure there are many more.

PMunch (orginal) [2024-04-22T15:13:09+02:00] view original

And I'm sure they'll be able to pump these out faster than we can create a list of them all.

dwhall256 (orginal) [2024-04-22T15:31:54+02:00] view original

Next up: an AI generated video of Andreas extolling the virtues of a GIL.

bajith (orginal) [2024-04-23T09:03:00+02:00] view original

🤣

xigoi (orginal) [2024-04-23T14:29:49+02:00] view original

Dear Nim aficionado,

Your concerns regarding the surge of AI-generated books purportedly on Nim programming are duly noted. It's evident that the influx of such content has led to a dilution of quality in available resources.

While your discernment in highlighting established works like "Mastering Nim" by Andreas Rumpf and "Nim in Action" by Dominik Picheta is appreciated, it's important to acknowledge the limitations of AI-generated texts. The examples you provided from Amazon indeed underscore the inadequacies of these fabricated works, from misspellings to erroneous syntax.

However, it's worth noting that your critique could benefit from a more nuanced perspective. While AI-generated content may lack the depth and accuracy of human-authored works, it's also a reflection of advancements in natural language processing technology. Instead of solely dismissing these texts, perhaps there's an opportunity to explore how AI-generated content can be improved or utilized in conjunction with traditional resources.

Moving forward, vigilance against fake books remains essential. But it's also important to remain open to the possibilities that emerging technologies may present, even in the realm of educational resources.

Thank you for initiating this discussion, and let's continue to navigate the evolving landscape of Nim programming literature with a critical yet open-minded approach.

Best regards, [Your Name]

PMunch (orginal) [2024-04-23T14:41:05+02:00] view original

Haha, good to hear what Mr. AI has to say about it. The tech is cool, and I've used AI to spell check and improve my own articles before so it's not without merit. These are unfortunately the laziest form of AI usage. I'd be surprised if a human had spent more than an hour on any of these books.

xigoi (orginal) [2024-04-23T15:09:37+02:00] view original

To bo fair, I specifically asked the AI to be critical of the post.

r3c (orginal) [2024-04-23T15:37:24+02:00] view original

This is how a bureaucrat would tell you "What? I don't know that bro..."

Kiloneie (orginal) [2024-04-23T16:46:27+02:00] view original

This forum really needs a way to sticky up important information such as this, mentioning this in the Learning section will NOT be enough.

grd (orginal) [2024-04-30T18:29:42+02:00] view original

It appears to me that AI is the new Godwin. (just an observation)

alexeypetrushin (orginal) [2024-05-15T03:35:44+02:00] view original

Aren't you impressed? That AI reached level, that some humans cant easily distinguish if programming book is writen by human or AI (with human supervision, but still).

SolitudeSF (orginal) [2024-05-15T10:33:48+02:00] view original

A new gigaeffective fraud method is invented, im literally shaking from excitement.

bajith (orginal) [2024-06-16T15:36:36+02:00] view original

Another one: Nim: Mastering Nim Metaprogramming, Unleash the Power of Code Generation https://amzn.in/d/0AYJCh7

Mrokii (orginal) [2024-06-28T09:52:35+02:00] view original

So... did I understand that correctly that the only book that is currently recommended (if at all) is the one by Andreas Rumpf? The 2nd doesn't sound appealing, as it only deals with a very old version of Nim. Or would that still be of any use, even though the examples aren't compatible with newer versions of Nim?

Clonk (orginal) [2024-06-28T16:27:52+02:00] view original

TL;DR of the threads :

If want a Nim book, you want this one and not anything else:

Mastering Nim: A complete guide to the programming language, by Andreas Rumpf

PMunch (orginal) [2024-07-26T13:06:25+02:00] view original

I got a private message telling me that Amazon has done an internal review and that all the books are now cleaned off-of their store. I can't find any of these books any more on Amazon, so I'll consider this topic as solved!

planetis (orginal) [2025-01-06T15:55:19+01:00] view original

Unfortunately this is not a done deal, scammers are persistent. Since last fall there've been 7+ new AI generated books about nim on Amazon.

bajith (orginal) [2025-01-06T17:12:12+01:00] view original

Maintaining an "official" recommended list of resources, might help.

Mirror of forum.nim-lang.org

11467 :: Fake Nim books an Amazon, which ones are real?