Problem Solving and Program Design in C (3rd Edition) [Paperback]

Jeri R. Hanly (Author), Elliot B. Koffman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 2, 1998

This bestselling text maintains its classic features like the gradual introduction of pointers and the connection between problem solving skills and effective software development. It features early coverage of functions, logical operators, and operators with side effects. The third edition offers updated C code and provides a new "On to C++" chapter, preparing students for future object-oriented programming and C++ courses.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

This bestselling text maintains its classic features like the gradual introduction of pointers and the connection between problem solving skills and effective software development. It features early coverage of functions, logical operators, and operators with side effects. The third edition offers updated C code and provides a new iOn to C++i chapter, preparing students for future object-oriented programming and C++ courses.

0201357488B04062001

About the Author

Jeri R. Hanly is a member of the computer science faculty at the University of Wyoming. She has developed software for target recognition in collaboration with naval researchers in China Lake, California and has taught software engineering seminars for professional developers of computing systems in the U.S. and Canada.

Elliot Koffman is a professor of computer and information science at Temple University. He is one of the country's foremost CS educators, a former chairman of the ACM Task Force for introductory programming methods courses, and author of a number of successful language texts in Modula-2, FORTRAN, in addition to his four editions of Pascal and Turbo Pascal.

0201357488AB04062001

Product Details

• Paperback: 276 pages
• Publisher: Addison Wesley; 3 edition (December 2, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0201357488
• ISBN-13: 978-0201357486
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 7.3 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.8 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (25 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,284,655 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars More bad than good, November 2, 2002

By 

C. L. Beard "clbiii" (Everett, WA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Problem Solving and Program Design in C (3rd Edition) (Paperback)

This book is not for beginners to programming. The examples are hard to follow. They start with a simple idea then the next example adds information to the example and then you get lost. How about one idea at a time and several examples of that one idea. That would be better for beginners. I have read other C programming books and this is not the best. Waite's group books are the best there is. Next in line would be the How to Program series by Deitel & Deitel. The best point of the book is how it discusses pointers. Since pointers are a concept that folds many ideas into one the authors chose to discuss pointers in regards to these separate ideas. Meaning that there is no single chapter on pointers but parts of four different chapters. The other strong point of this book is that you do get a compiler to work with, so it isn't all bad.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Perfect for beginners, November 8, 2009

By 

Hubert Dupont (Créteil, France) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Problem Solving and Program Design in C (6th Edition) (Paperback)

I don't understand how could someone give one star to this book. In this book, there's almost every thing a beginner needs to learn. First and foremost, a beginner must learn to use a "systematic" method to design his programs, so there's a whole chapter on top-down design, and a whole chapter on modular programming, AND at the end of each chapter there's a case study enforcing good program design by applying a consistent framework:

problem,
analysis (data requirements),
design (initial algorithm, refinements and structure chart). Evey step is followed by some explanations.
implementation and
testing.

To learn to solve problems "systematically" a beginner needs to see a consistent method in action, that's the purpose of this framewok and the case study.

To solve problem a beginner needs to learn how to use the usual elementary tools of the trade: selection, loops, recursion, etc. A beginner needs to learn to apply those tools to ask things, to test things, to search things, to sort things, etc. All of which are clearly and fully explained. For each, "tool" and technic, the authors give a taxonomy of their use (loops using sentinelle value, loops using flag, etc.) along with examples and they apply those tools and technics in a case study at the end of each chapter. The authors even take the time to teach you how to trace the execution of each new kind of statement (selection, loop) and recursion. I mean what more can someone want. There's even a clear introduction of linked lists and trees.

This book is thick, 890 pages, because it's meant to teach programming, that is solving problems by using a specific set of tools and technics, the book is not meant to teach a specific langage. It's not a book about C, it's a book using C. You can apply every thing you learned in this books (top-down design, loops, recursion, etc.) in almost any language. In my opinion, you can learn programming in almost any language, because what matters are the tools and the technics not the language. (I happen to like C)

Some reviewers used the word dry to describe the style of writing, I would say precise.

In conclusion:
If you need more than just clear, precise explanations and to-the-point-diagrams to learn stuff, that is if you need lots of color, bells and whistles (kindergarten style) to learn stuff, pass your way.
If you don't know how to use a search engine or a forum when you want to overcome a difficultie, I don't know what to say... maybe stop reading technical books.

PS: Personnaly I find Deitel's books scary, too much colors (it hurts my eyes), too wordy.

From a below average student.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Outdated Comments, August 23, 2008

By 

J. A. Huggins (Tucson, AZ USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Problem Solving and Program Design in C (5th Edition) (Paperback)

For those of you undecided about this book keep in mind that for some reason Amazon.com has decided to keep outdated comments posted on earlier editions of this item. This edition of the textbook was published on July 15 2006. There is only one comment that was posted after the date of release of this book. Why Amazon.com has kept the outdated comments I don't know. I do know that authors normally attempt to improve upon their work when publishing new editions - usually based on direct feedback from users, and also in the case of this subject to make the reader aware of techniques based on newer technology. So before making a decision to buy or not to buy this book, discount all the outdated comments posted here....they were made on older editions and don't reflect the improvements made on the newer material.