Customer Reviews

Discrete Mathematics (4th Edition)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(13)

 

 

I keep thinking as I'm forced to use this book for a college course, that Discrete Math would not be so confusing to me if not for this textbook. With a good textbook, I believe the concepts would not be very difficult, but this book makes them so. True, they have many examples - very few of which cover the complex things you are then asked to do in the Exercises. If I could give it negative stars, I would, since it doesn't teach us but confuses us.

I was a student of Mr. Ross's, taking Discrete Math, a few years ago. He's is a very intelligent man and seemed to enjoy teaching. Unfortunately, he was not very good at it. And same goes for this text book of his. His attitude and approach in the classroom and the book's alike might be helpful if the student has already mastered the majority of the covered topics, in which case, this book becomes useless.

I do not recommend this to anyone trying to learn discrete mathematics for the first time (or any other time). The author of this book leaves out much too many details. This book is much too vague. Even the solutions provided are brief. Not much insight, not enough examples. Combine this book with a bad teacher, and you will have an extra difficult time passing a discrete math course. Why should about one-fourth of the students take this course 2 or more times? This book could be used for reference, but why bother? Get a better book instead. Look elsewhere for better explanation of the concepts so important to computer science.

I had a very strong mathematical background coming into college, and it's a good thing I did. This book managed to take concepts I understood very well coming into my discrete math class and make them confusing. The examples are not well explained and the text itself is very unintuitive. I just ended up skipping the reading and doing the problems. If you have any sort of discrete math experience, don't bother with this book. If you don't, try to find something better.

Pros:1) Typeset with TeX, this book is extremely legible2) Many examplesCons:1) Far too many examples2) conversational tone gets old, fastI must strongly disagree with the statement that readers should have a strong mathematical background. I would consider my mathematical background extremely strong for a student; I'm no Wiles, but I am planning on studying cryptography in grad school. This book bored me.In fact, perhaps the strongest selling point for this book is the author's expected audience: students without a strong mathematical background. The chapters and sections are intended to be read straight through as prose, with examples clearly illustrating concepts along the way, and often proofs are suggested to follow from examples.All this drives the mathematical students bonkers, as they have a difficult time using the book for reference use after having read the book through once. The book seems to fall into the trap of not proving enough and using examples for proofs. Maybe I just tired of reading example after example and missed the proofs.I was fairly dissapointed with the induction chapter (chapter four) -- first a notion of "loop invariance" is introduced with the well ordering property of the natural numbers as its proof. Then, from loop invariance comes induction. All without a proof of WOP.I think my Foundations course (first semester) proved WOP from axioms of set theory, so a proof would not have been extraordinarily tough.All in all, this book might work out alright for students starting from scratch, but students with any mathematical background will be driven nuts by the conversational tone, impracticallity of use as reference material, and endless streams of examples.I will admit, math texts historically have been short on examples -- this book more than makes up for centuries of neglect.

I have read "Discrete Mathematics" by Epp, Rosen and Ross which are the three most common discrete math texts that I encounter at university.

Of these three, I would rate Epp's book as my favorite because it has the clearest explanations and is so easy to read that you can't help but feel like you understand all of the content completely. The only failing that Epp's book might have is that it is not as thorough in its coverage of the material as some of the more technical books. I would say that it covers about 90% of the material and leaves out some of the more obscure topics.

Rosen's book would be the most thorough, covering every topic in meticulous detail and offering a jumping point for other texts in cryptography and number theory. Although this book is more complete than Epp's, it is also less readable and requires more effort to get through. Ideally you would use Epp's book to learn the material and then go to Rosen's book for a technical reference.

For those of you who are considering Ross's book, I have one thing to say and that is don't. Although I have read this book and done a lot of the problems in the first 3/4 of the text, this book is neither clear in its explanations like Epp nor is it as complete as Rosen's book. If you are assigned this book for a course, my suggestion would be to buy Epp's book and photocopy the Ross homework problems from a friend's textbook.

Take the advice of someone who has read all three books. If you have to buy just one, then get the Epp book. It is better to understand 90% of the material completely rather than 100% of the material partially.

This book will cost you much more than the principle "investment" of $100+, given the time required to interperet Ross's examples, and in many cases, un/re-learn the material.

This is one of the worst books I ever purchased for a class (4th edition). The price is ridiculous and entirely undeserved. These authors take simple subjects and make them incomprehensible. The introduction to proofs in chapter 2 is a perfect example. They try to expose the concepts thru chatty dialog and fail miserably. The student is left more confused than before they read the material. Rosen's book is a lot better.

I am a very competent student who recieved two A's the class taught with this book. This book is bad and should be noted as so!

This is the worst math book I have ever encountered. I had to buy it for my Discrete math class. The examples are vague and and leave you wondering how the solution was reached. Ross & Wright should be banned from writing math books. Don't waste your money on this book. I absolutely hate it!