wow. thanks so much you guys. i think i totally understand now! and that bitmath page is AMAAAAZING! really useful.
as a total newcomer, i think i agree with mellis - having absolutely everything compiled into the reference guide may look daunting initaially, but in the long run it saves a lot of confusion. the processing reference is a good example of how newcomers can be introduced to the more basic concepts first, then have the opportunity of expanding on what they've learned. i've also been teaching myself max/msp, which at first seems hideously complicated, but if you work through the pdf tutorials in the documentation it's perfectly understandable, since the examples are so well explained - and if you ever want to find out about something a lot more advanced, the info is always easy to find.
anyhoo...
just one more question - can you put chunks of C++ code into an arduino program? is there any difference between the two? i've never seen C++ code, so i'm a bit confused as to why everyone is talking about C++ when i'm trying to learn arduino...