DirectX mindset/learning DirectX

I''d say the latter - start with some of the simple tutorials, get to know the basics then learn what the rest does by DOING, experimenting and observing results. That''s the way I learnt DirectX programming.

Personally I never memorise the specifics of any API. I just keep a mental picture of where things are located in the SDK help file and what features are available but none of the actual specific parameter details.

Also the more you use something in practical terms, the more familiar you get with it - using a non-DX example I never need to look up the documentation for something like strnicmp() because I''ve used it a lot in the past. [Intellisense helps a lot].
Related to that, the more programming you do in a particular area (3D graphics code for example), the more familiar you become with whole techniques (mipmapping for example) - with this familiarity the way the API is laid out starts to be logical and make a lot of sense.

--
Simon O''Connor
Creative Asylum Ltd
www.creative-asylum.com

I agree with Simon, especially the doing part. I should practice this more often than just keep reading! You come to a more understanding by getting your hands dirty so to speak, the more you do the more you understand.

Regards,
Steve

Are you some kind of genious?

The smartest folks I''ve ever worked with recognized that the difference between knowing the answer to something and knowing how to find the answer to something is seldom of much importance.

At least, the time you''re going to invest in commiting things to memory is going to be much greater than the amount it takes Microsoft to revamp the API (this happened between DX7 and DX8).

Get a good, current online reference and flip to it from your coding window. A good IDE will pull up the method signatures automatically for you. Also, starting with a template project and reusable codebase will alleviate the need to memorize things like what order things should be initialized, etc.

Good luck.

Thank you all for your help. I will start ''doing'' right now!