The Object-Oriented Thought Process [Paperback]

Matt Weisfeld (Author), Bill McCarty (Author, Foreword)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0672318539 | ISBN-13: 978-0672318535 | Publication Date: March 23, 2000 | Edition: 1

The Object-Oriented Thought Process is a concise and readable primer. Matt Weisfeld's years of programming, teaching, and writing have given him a flair for presenting highly technical topics in a clear and interesting manner. He is able to blend abstract concepts with ingenious examples and clear illustrations to quickly teach powerful OOP techniques. The code examples are written in Java and UML but are designed in such a way that a reader with no previous experience will still understand them. The Object-Oriented Thought Process is a clear and accessible alternative to the often dry and overly dense books available on the market today.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

The Object-Oriented Thought Process is a concise and readable primer. Matt Weisfeld's years of programming, teaching, and writing have given him a flair for presenting highly technical topics in a clear and interesting manner. He is able to blend abstract concepts with ingenious examples and clear illustrations to quickly teach powerful OOP techniques. The code examples are written in Java and UML but are designed in such a way that a reader with no previous experience will still understand them. The Object-Oriented Thought Process is a clear and accessible alternative to the often dry and overly dense books available on the market today.

About the Author

Matt Weisfeld has more than 18 years' of experience as a professional software developer and project manager using COBOL, Pascal, C, C++, Smalltalk, and Java. He has taught computer science at three universities and currently teaches Java programming at Cleveland State University. He is also the Leader of the Java Special Interest Group of the Greater Cleveland PC Users Group. Over the past 8 years Mr. Weisfeld has published many articles in major computer trade and professional journals, including Dr. Dobb's Journal, Java Report, The C/C++ Users Journal, and Software Development Magazine.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 240 pages
• Publisher: Sams; 1 edition (March 23, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0672318539
• ISBN-13: 978-0672318535
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (56 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,215,430 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

55 of 57 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good introduction for OO newcomers, May 22, 2000

By 

A.M. - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Object-Oriented Thought Process (Paperback)

A good introduction to fundamental concepts of OO. At around 200 pages, it is concise and can be read relatively quickly (compared to the 2,000 page monster-books that are common-place).

Introduces ideas of classes, objects, messages, methods, attributes, inheritance, encapsulation, polymorphism, public interfaces/private implementations, abstract methods/classes, aggregation/association, constructors/destructors, exceptions, overloading, accessor methods, and Interfaces (amongst others).

Moderately experienced OO developers (i.e. you understand the OO terms given above) will probably prefer a more advanced book than this one - this is an introductory text aimed at people just getting started with OO.

Also provides some (basic) guidelines on class design and software development, giving a worked example to illustrate. OO Concepts are illustrated using Java code samples, basic UML, and a quick introduction to CRC cards (this is NOT a Java/UML/CRC tutorial though - rather it is an OO CONCEPTS tutorial).

I found the numerous references to specific pages in other OO books rather irksome, but others may find these useful pointers to more advanced material. I would have preferred a single "Further Reading" appendix instead.

Overall, a good introduction to fundamental OO concepts that all OO developers must know.

35 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Thank God, Finally I Get OOP, May 19, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: The Object-Oriented Thought Process (Paperback)

I can program in C, Assembler, Motorola 68HC11 assembly language and have never been able to shift my thinking from procedural to object oriented programming. I've bought 8 books on Java and C++, trying to understand OOP (Object Oriented Programming) and never got the hang of it. I also couldn't get a straight answer from any supposed C++/Java programmers as to what OOP was. Finally, after reading this book it's cleard up my issues with OOP. With my other books by Deitel, Schlidt, and SAMS, I've lost interest in trying to figure out their meaning of OOP. This book I've shifted my thought process in two hours. This is by far the most useful book I've ever read on any aspect of programming. I reccomend this book to anyone starting out programming or trying to shift from procedural to an OOP language. I wouldn't worry that it has Java examples if you're trying to learn C++, he teachs a thought process and different view point. All I can say is "Thank God this finally makes sense to me!"

37 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Undoes bad habits, September 11, 2001

By 

Linda Zarate "IT Ops Consultant" (Azusa, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Object-Oriented Thought Process (Paperback)

After reading this book I realized why so many development projects that use object-oriented tools and techniques fail - they are staffed by developers who think in the traditional terms of procedures and functions. In retrospect it dawned on me that there is a high probability that developers who started out with procedural languages view objects as functions.

This book provides a compass that will point developers in the right direction by breaking mental paradigms. It does so by getting them to think in terms of states instead of functions, and objects as components, independent of the application being developed, with well-defined interfaces and properties that can be used to create services.

I personally learned a lot about object-orientation, which I can apply to analysis. This book is a quick and easy read, and packs a lot of information and concepts between its covers. I highly recommend it and give it five stars for clarity and content.