Programming Languages: Concepts and Constructs [Paperback]

Ravi Sethi (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0201590654 | ISBN-13: 978-0201590654 | Publication Date: February 1996 | Edition: 2 Sub

Programming Languages: Concepts and Constructs, Second Edition retains the "character" of the original, emphasizing concepts and how they work together. This classic book has been thoroughly revised to provide readable coverage of the major programming paradigms. Dr. Sethi's treatment of the core concepts of imperative programming in languages like Pascal and C flows smoothly into object-oriented programming in C++ and Smalltalk. The charm of functional languages is illustrated by programs in standard ML and the Scheme dialect of Lisp. Logic programming is introduced using Prolog. Novices, who have been introduced to programming in some language, will learn from this book how related concepts work together while designers and implementers willp be exposed to the major programming paradigms. Example programs from the book are available as source code. These are available by anonymous ftp at ftp://ftp.aw.com/cseng/authors/sethi/pl2e. 0201590654B04062001

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Novices, who have been introduced to programming in some language, will learn from this book how related concepts work together while designers and implementers willp be exposed to the major programming paradigms.

Example programs from the book are available as source code. These are available by anonymous ftp at ftp://ftp.aw.com/cseng/authors/sethi/pl2e.

0201590654B04062001

About the Author

About Ravi Sethi Ravi Sethi, director of Computing Science Research, has been at AT&T Bell Laboratories in Murray Hill, New Jersey since 1976. He has held teaching positions at Pennsylvania State university and the University of Arizona, and has taught at Princeton University and Rutgers. Dr. Sethi is co-author of the "dragon book", Compilers: Principles, Techniques and Tools and has written numerous articles. His books have been translated in Japanese, German, French, Italian, Spanish, and Korean. 0201590654AB04062001

Product Details

• Paperback: 640 pages
• Publisher: Addison-Wesley; 2 Sub edition (February 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0201590654
• ISBN-13: 978-0201590654
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 7.7 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #42,258 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Just because it's challenging doesn't mean it's bad, January 20, 2005

By 

Mark R. Ackerman - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Programming Languages: Concepts and Constructs (Paperback)

I hated this book when it was the assigned text in my programming languages course. But having just graduated with a BS in CS, I went back and looked thru this book after seeing the negative reviews here. After taking courses like compiler and multi-threaded programming, I feel the book does an excellent job of showing how programming languages evolved, and why. Some of the examples are a little abstract(i agree that the quilt example is too hard to follow, and is spread over too many pages), but for a book that is trying to show the reasons languages evolved it does a good job.

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An fantastic book in my opinion, April 18, 2006

By 

Avinash Meetoo (Mauritius, Indian Ocean) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Programming Languages: Concepts and Constructs (Paperback)

Most of the previous comments are either very favourable to the book (i.e. 4 or 5 stars) or completely against it (1 star).

According to me, this book is a fantastic book IF YOU LIKE PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES. These are the languages I use (from time to time) on my Linux box: AWK, Scheme, LISP, C/C++, Java, Python and Ruby. I'm also trying to understand AspectJ, Oz and Erlang. I think this book is made for persons like me who find pleasure discovering and using new programming languages (and paradigms).

I can understand that if you are a professional programmer (i.e. doing it for a living), this book is of (relatively) little value.

Personally, I love this book!

8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Hey, this book isn't that bad, May 14, 2001

By 

meerkat "Captain Meerkat" (Moscow, ID USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Programming Languages: Concepts and Constructs (Paperback)

OK, so it has a stupid bear on the cover, but as far as methodical organization it actually falls in mid to upper range for books on this topic. I think it is quite reasonable as far as content, clarity, and organization. It is not overly chatty but friendly and less dry than most. It does not shy away from defining terms which some books do. The previous reviews are shockingly harsh. There is an opening for a concise easy to read book in this area and I think this book is a reasonable start.