[Tutor] what's a state machine?

[Alan Gauld]

> >The secret is to model the machine as a big table:
> >
> >Current State|Event|Action|Next State
> >
>
> This is fascinating stuff. Are there textbooks devoted to this kind
of
> topic? If so, can you recommend any?
>

Yes several. Depends how theoretical you want to go
- state/automata theory, Mealy/Moore machines etc...

For a fairly straightforward discussion of real time systems including
a table driven state machine you could try

Title: Intro to Real-Time Software design
Auth:  Allworth & Zobel
Pub:   MacMillan

Dunno if its still in print but you can probably get it second
hand from Amazon if not.

Alan G
Author of the Learn to Program web tutor
http://www.freenetpages.co.uk/hp/alan.gauld