Customer Reviews

Essentials of Programming Languages

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For several years I've taught an advanced undergraduate programming language course using the second edition of this book. Now I think I see why it's priced at $60, and the third edition is only $44. The third edition loses the simplicity and elegance of the second, replacing it with unnecessary abstraction and complexity (expressed versus denoted values), and treating the fun, hands-on part (implementation in Scheme) almost as an afterthought.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

I've taught fundamentals of programming languages, a course for 2nd year undergraduate students, using this book and it's been a success. The reader must know how to program in order to understand the book, I accept that, but the idea of teaching the basis of programming languages by creating one is great. Additionally, the use of Scheme as a language for developing is crucial.
On the other hand, the quality of the book and the paper are good. It has a lot of very decent exercises and the subjects are well-explained.

I had to buy this book for a class, but it's definitely been worth the investment and it's probably one I'll keep after the class is over. Friedman does a great job of relating the concepts covered in the book to examples written in Scheme.