20 of 24 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A wise man and a foolish question, January 5, 2000
Reading some of the other reviews, I felt compelled to write. I used the third edition for all three courses in calculus I took at UMCP, and had Dr. Gulick for the second one. I would suggest that any terrapins who need to take the course do it with him, because he FOLLOWS THE TEXT EXACTLY. This means that you can actually skip an occasional class: if you do the reading and twice as many problems as assigned. But about the book...Honestly, I cannot see how anyone could fault it. I have seen physics, engineering, business, even French majors reading it with out difficulty. Now the problems, they can be tough. But complaining about them is like complaining the weights in the gym are heavy.Calculus, like any other skill, can only be acquired by effort, by doing. If you are willing to put a little in, you will get a lot out of this book. If you expect to sit back and subliminally absorb it, no text will be of much use to you.
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4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Fair, many errors in the solution manual, October 11, 1999
By A Customer
In the main text book it states that the problems were checked, yet this solution manual has so many errors I have to wonder what grade the reviewer received in his calculus class. Some answers are wrong, and some completely misinterpret the entire problem.
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Compare this text with others on the market before you buy., July 17, 2007
This review is from: Calculus (Hardcover)
I used this text when I attended The University of Maryland, College Park (UMCP.) In fact, I had a class with one of the authors. Since then, I have graduated and had a quite successful technological career. I have tutored many people from other schools in calculus and I took a related class at MIT during one semester.
Therefore, I have seen many textbooks and have a fair basis for comparison.
In my view, the textbook has little value relative to texts used at other schools (perhaps that's why it's not more widely used.) The primary value of this textbook is that it packs three semesters of stuff into one volume. That being said, even the "Calculus for Dummies" book would be better in getting you through enough material that is the equivalent of the first 2/3 of the Gulick text.
The text is awkward.
Further, can you believe that in class, one of the authors had us do the unanswered problem sets (every other problem had solutions), but wouldn't hand back the graded work? All we got back was a letter grade. There was little feedback at all as to what we did or did not understand. I needn't describe how happy the students weren't about that.
To do well, you really need to find another text and do many extra problems on your own with solution sets provided.
Having seen the texts used at other schools, I did feel a bit cheated.
Don't take my word for it. Definitely COMPARE other texts with this one before you buy it...just borrow a copy from a math or engineering library somewhere and judge for yourself.
If, however, you are taking calculus at UMCP, well, I guess you are stuck buying "The Brick." Just do as many extra problems as you can.
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