Customer Reviews

FORTRAN 90/95 for Scientists and Engineers

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

 

 

Firstly, this book covers Fortran 90 and 95 in great detail, offering many helpful suggestions to those who are used to older versions of Fortran, such as Fortran 77, and highlighting the differences between the 90 and 95 versions. Where this book shines is in the hundreds of examples of and bits of advice on good programming practice spread throughout the book. It's specifically tailored to those "part-time" programmers, scientists and engineers who do not come from a computer science or software engineering background. Most current (and new) Fortran programmers would benefit greatly by learning the programming style found here. I can't agree with all the advice, however, such as abandoning the basic "real" and "double precision" data types in favor of the new "kind" parameterized types. Still, the philosophy behind such advice is sound, and good programmers will know when and when not to use specific language features. One subject unfortunately missing from the book is programming for parallel processors, and other techniques to speed programs up. But most Fortran programmers don't need to worry about this subject and those who do can get O'Reilly's "High Performance Computing" and Jon Bentley's "Writing Efficient Programs". The examples and quizzes within, and the exercises at the end of, each chapter make this a great textbook. The appendices and index make it useful as a reference book. If you program in Fortran 90 or 95, I'd say this book is a must-have.

It is outrightly silly to rate this excellent book one star and insinuate that it is a terrible write-up. Is it the thin index that makes it so bad, or the explanation of do loops using sin(x) series expansion, according to the first reviewer? If you are a scientist or an engineer (the target audience of the book) you'll probably see the wisdom of such an example instead of counting from 1 to 10 as if we are inside a grocery store.

This is an excellent book not just for sake of learning the fortran language but also for writing modern and easily maintanable codes and algorithms. Whether you are a "pure" or "hybrid" programmer, you couldn't ever ask for something more.
I am sure the author will subsequently improve the indexing since most people seem to take an offence in that but the contents are just right.Of course Metcalf/Reid (Fortran 90/95 Explained) is also a very good text but is largely for reference purposes. Metcalf/Reid DOES NOT and will not teach you the nitty-gritty of fortran programming. In Metcalf/Reid, you must already have been there in programming, but Chapman will gradually take you to whatever level you deisre, depending on what you need. Very importantly, Chapman sprinkles throughout the text, several scientific and engineering examples and I guess it is why the text was so named in the first place - Fortran 90/95 for Scientists and Engineers.

It doesn't matter if you figure that you are way too cerebral and that Chapman is too simplistic for you. If you ever want to venture into programming, chances are that you are not an imbecile and any additional little knowledge gained is always an eternal treasure. This is an excellent text for programming in Fortran 90/95 and you'll be grateful that you did own a copy. Period.

This book is an excellent presentation of the capabilities of Fortran 90 and 95. It is detailed enough to cover in depth many programming issues arising in practise, and also summarizes and gives good programming hints, allowing it to be used for quick reference. It also includes many actual source code examples which is the best way to show how all the theory becomes practice. It also includes extensive apendices with descriptions of the intrinsic functions of Fortran. In my opinion one of the best Fortran books that you can find currently.

I had some exposure to Fortran programming in several of my college courses, but have been lacking in the way of a good reference the few times since that I have had to work with Fortran code. As an engineer in an industry that relies heavily on codes written in Fortran, many of them with portions that are 20-30 years old, I was in search of a general reference book that would help me find my way through these codes. Luckily, a colleague had a copy of Fortran 90/95 for Scientists and Engineers, and I liked it enough to buy my own copy instead of borrowing his all the time. I find this book to be very helpful not only because of its concise and clear explanations of Fortran syntax and programming tips, but also because it explains how to understand code written for older versions of Fortran (don't worry, the author clearly labels the old constructs and warns against using any outdated methods). I would recommend this book to anyone interested in better understanding Fortran code in general. It is quite suitable for beginners, as well, with multiple examples and exercises (with answers available on the author's website). I give it only four stars for the simple reason that five stars implies perfection, and there's always room for improvement in any endeavor. By far the best Fortran reference I've found so far, though...

Despite some of the negative comments on this book, I bought it anyway. The remarks that this is not a reference manual is unjust. Chapman never claims that the book is supposed to be a reference manual, so don't expect one. The book is written for those who begin to learn Fortran 95 or want to upgrade their skills to make the transition from Fortran 77.

The build-up of the book is excellent. After every Chapter I had the feeling I learned something new, and understood how the Fortran 95 features would help me code more efficiently than in Fortran 77 (which I have done for about 20 years). The exercises and examples help a lot in that direction and I really appreciate the way in which Chapman uses real-life problems, like sorting names or phone numbers, or small physics problems.

It has been said in reviews that the index is marginal, but that is clearly fixed in the Second Edition (the index is 20 pages long). Another suggestion that the examples are too simple is also unjust. I've learned quite a bit from them. Don't forget that it is no use to make the examples and exercises so difficult that they become untractable.

On the critical side I can add a few items of discontent:
- There are quite a few typos and errors in the book and despite the reference to the publishers website where errata should be found, that website doesn't even seem to know that the Second Edition exists. All the material there is for the first edition.
- I do not see the use for providing flowcharts AND pseudo code next to the actual Fortran 95 code. The pseudo code is so much like the real code that it is just a waste of space. Flowcharts would suffice.
- Chapman gets a bit repetitive at times. At the end of each Chapter it repeats the "Good practices" and the newly introduced commands and statements basically verbatim from earlier in that Chapter. Also each Quiz quite annoyingly starts with the sentence "This quiz provides a quick check to see if you understand the concepts introduced in this section......"

Overall "Fortran 90/95 for Scientists and Engineers" lives up to its title. Assuming that Fortran 95 is mostly used by scientists and engineers this is a really good book to start learning Fortran 95. At the end of it you will be able to write efficient and correct Fortran 95 code.

Stephen Chapman has managed to create a book that is indispensable to any engineer who is using the FORTRAN language. "Fortran 90/95 for Scientists and Engineers" is an extremely useful guide and teaching tool, no matter what level you are currently at. Whether you are a first time user or a die-hard FORTRAN expert, you will find this book quite valuable.

Chapman has gone to great pains to teach first time users the best techniques and habits. He has also done a stellar job in discussing what changes have been implemented since FORTRAN 77. The discussions on obsolete procedures and techniques are quite useful for anyone who must work with old legacy codes.

Many of the most powerful tools in FORTRAN are quite cumbersome and confusing, Chapman has done an excellent job in explaining and demonstrating these tools through his extensive use of examples.

This book is superb, and is my one and only resource for FORTRAN programming.

I have found this book to be an excellent, outstanding reference. My only complaint is that the index was occasionally not detailed enough to allow me to easily locate a specific topic for which I was looking; on occasion I've had to page through a section to find what I'm looking for. (This review refers to the first edition, although the second edition is now out so this may have been corrected.) Otherwise, I've found it far superior to the two other Fortran books I've used. It contains many examples. In my view it's excellent as both a F77 and F90/95 reference.

This is the only F90 book I have. It contains the answers to all questions I have had about using Fortran, but I found that it takes so much time trying to locate them. I would have like it better, had there been better organisation, good indexing and cross referencing.

I am currently enrolled in a course called high performance computing and this was the recommended text. I basically do not anything about computers let alone programming itself. This course was a 3rd yr maths subject. I found this book really easy to read, I could pick up the concepts and logic behind it all pretty easily and be right into the discussion within seconds. Lots of examples and test cases with concepts explained pretty clearly, even questions that you are likely to ask are all answered. If you never learnt to program, or new to fortran, this is the THE book to read. I pretty much just read this book and teach myself, I find it alot more use of my time than going lectures when I can just read fortran in my time. just for the record, look up fortan in wikipedia, this text is the first reference.

I have been using this text to learn Fortran 90/95. I have used Matlab significantly and understand very minimal C++. I find this book very useful and informative. It outlines programing pitfalls and tips for good programming practices. The examples are very easy to follow and the index is very usable. I would say this is a good book if you are just learning Fortran. Another thing I like about it is the fact that it has a chapter discussing older Fortran practices and the new/ modified commands. I have been using that section a lot to update an old Fortran 77 program I have. Overall it was well worth the $60 or so that I paid. There may be other references that are available online for free, but I like that I can highlight and write in a text, so I prefer printed material to online material.