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 | | Data Structures and Software Development in an Object Oriented Domain, Eiffel Edition (Object and Component Technology Series) by Jean-Paul Tremblay, Grant A. Cheston ISBN-10: 9780137879465 ISBN-10: 0-13-787946-6 ISBN-13: 9780137879465 ISBN-13: 978-0-13-787946-5 Hardcover 2001-03-08 Prentice Hall Find Lowest Price |
Reviews | ||
Wretched book for a wretched class I took a full two semesters of Computer Science from the professors who actually wrote this textbook. The course was easily one of the worst I have ever taken in university and I could spend pages detailing how much I hated it, but instead I'll simply talk about the book. Data Structures and Software Development in an Object Oriented Domain attempts to introduce students to the concepts of Software Engineering, as well as expanding upon the theory and application of various data structures AND all the while explaining the Eiffel programming language, and therein lies the problem. Quite simply, it bites off much more than it can chew. The textbook is massive; over 1000 pages, with the words packed in tight with a teensy-tiny font making it hard to read. Every chapter goes into a ridiculous level of detail that would never be covered in class, even through two semesters. The sheer information density makes for difficult reading, especially when trying to extract the essentials. Some sections border on incomprehensible simply due to the density of the material...so much so that during class, the professor actually photocopied and clarified the material from his own textbook as handouts! The general exposition itself is incredibly dry and unintuitive, and you'll find yourself skipping over pages and pages until you find whatever it is your looking for. I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say that half the material could be thrown away. Clear and concise it ain't. Compounding this problem is that the chapters are poorly laid out and do not flow logically. Sections as diverse as timing anaylysis, arrays, binary trees, implementation of abstract data types (ADTs), etc. are thrown about willy-nilly. The Data structures bits are mixed in with software engineering bits, making for disjointed reading. As if to acknowledge this problem, near the beginning of the book one finds a nonsensical schematic of each chapter's "prerequisites". Why this was done instead of simply arranging the chapters in a more logical order is beyond me. Data Structures and Software Development in an Object Oriented Domain is a ridiculously bloated and expensive textbook that I would never recommend, but like most college texts you will have no choice in buying it. Buy it, and then sell it the day classes are over. | ||
As a student I had the pleasure of being one of the test audiences for this particular book. I'm basing my review on my copy, 1,000+ pages of photocopied draft. I was introduced to it via a full-year course taught by Dr. Temblay and Dr. Cheston. The book is basically about a couple things: Writing superior Data Types via OO processes and an introdution to OO developement. The section on datatypes is very good. The datatypes are constructed using string OO processes (the cd contains all the code for the datatypes created in the book) and are a good learning process. There is an emphasis on abstraction and generics in the design which is an intelligent way to do things, and I learned a lot about datatypes and OO through this. The section on formal ADTs, however, I found incomprehensible, but others may have different opinions. The authors do focus on important OO concepts like UML and use cases, the brief section on software design suggests using the waterfall method. This section is fairly good, and is a decent introduction for a subject that can be fleshed out in further classes. It is still introductory however. For instance, patterns are not heavily mentioned, nor other development practices. Other ideas focused on were mathematical induction, a strong section on testing, sorting theory and files as well as algorithm timing and reccurence relations. This is a good book, and most undergrad students could likely learn a lot from it, assuming they are willing to spend a little time learning eiffel. | ||