I read this book cover to cover which took me over 3 months, and I was extremely impressed with this collection. Knuth turns computer programming into an art form as the title suggests.
There is a lot of history which Knuth makes interesting by stating which algorithms were remarkable discoveries and which were logical extensions of other algorithms. The analysis is much more in depth than other authors especially with regards to run time performance.
At the end of each section there are tons of problems to solve, and full answers are in the back. I especially liked how each problem has a rating on its difficulty. For example, a problem with a rating 10 is easy, rating 25 might take an hour... up to rating 50 which is an unsolved problem in computer science.
Volume one starts with the first 150 pages being math related to computer science. Then the assembly language is introduced which many of the algorithms are written in. The choice for assembly was made so as to not commit to one specific language's paradigm.
Volume two gets into the heart of the algorithms. A lot of interesting things about floating point calculations, and prime number discovery. My overall understanding of computer science improved a ton here.
Volume three was my personal favorite. Knuth explains searching and sorting very well. The evolution of the "trie" data structure was impressive. At first he shows a way to make a trie in a way I had never seen before. Then he showed another way, and finally he got to the modern way I had seen. With this knowledge, I understood how the trie was discovered, how it was improved, and then improved again. Every other algorithm book just shows the modern trie without explaining how they got there.
Volume four is heavy on math again with a lot about permutations and combinatorics. This was the most difficult of the books I felt but also rewarding.
Knuth's writing is excellent. Each sentence is clear and communicates in a way that makes computer history interesting.
The box set itself is beautiful and the paper is high quality. I wish I could give more than 5 stars for the review.
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