Rating: 
Summary: Fantastic book!
Review: I must completely disagree with the reviewer who says this book doesn't explain the concepts clearly enough for a beginner to understand. This is as boiled down and simple as C++ gets! If you're having trouble understanding it, I'd advise you to get personal tutoring - an option I had considered right up until finding this book. It is superb!
In no time, the reader is learning key fundamentals in such a way as to make them useful right away. Plenty of opportunities to write real C++ programs that actually perform some task or function are included in the post-chapter programming assignments. These assignments may not be as complicated or glamorous as 'create a computerized bridge opponent using the concepts you've been taught to this point', but they are often scaled-down versions of useful real-world applications.
It is then up to the student to see the connection to additional uses, which should ultimately be the goal of any beginning programming book. If students are not learning to create working C++ programs on their own from scratch - meaning that the student-written programs perform useful tasks other than those performed by the code included in the text - they are not really learning to program.
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Summary: The best in all
Review: I've been looking for an excellent C++ book more than two years and finally I've got it. I'd think it is a five stars plus book.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent C++ introduction.
Review: This book is geared towards those students who have had some programming experience; this is not for absolute beginners and the author makes that perfectly clear in its preface. It is a textbook and not a reference (although it is surprisingly thorough) and those searching for obscure bits of technical information should look elsewhere. Savitch's explanations are very easy to understand and well-considered -- he writes in a style that is neither overly technical nor overly conversational (two aspects of CS books that I particularly despise). This book is paced perfectly and the progression of topics is natural and logical. Throughout each chapter there are easy-to-read sample programs, self-test exercises, tips, and warnings and, best of all, there are excellent programming assignments at the end of each chapter that test your newly-acquired knowledge. As is the case for any text of this nature, it doesn't address advanced technical topics but does reach intermediate structures such as binary trees (although only in an introductory fashion).
If you are new to C++ and have some experience with, say, Java, then this book is for you. If you are still at an elementary level and are using an elementary (high-level) language such as JavaScript, you might try a book that begins without the assumption of knowledge this one does.
Highly recommended.
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Summary: Excellent beginning C++ text
Review: This book is much, much better than others like Dale & Weems. It doesn't meander as much, is more coherent, and uses color in a proper fashion.Please beg your professor to use this book!
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Summary: If you want to learn C++ this is it
Review: This is the best book i've come across about C++ easy to follow and easy to understand i recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn C++ there's nothing better than this one out there believe me.
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Summary: The only C++ book I like
Review: This is the only C++ book I have liked. He covers the material so well and does not but you to sleep while he is doing it. It is well broken down and easy to learn. Finally a coding book that is fun.
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Summary: Truly a well written college text book
Review: Walter Savitch, the author of the Absolute C++, first edition, has done an amazing job putting together a book that can be used as a teaching aid for second year or first year advanced Computer Science students. Unlike professional books, the author has geared this book towards students with little programming experience in the real-world at least, and has created problems that can aid the student in learning the material more deeply and more concretely. If I were an instructor, this would the book that I would use, and if I had to take C++ all over again, this is the book I would love to learn from. Color aids and categorized notes, such as "Pitfall" and "Tip", aid the student along the way with little details that go a long way when you are programming. "Example" and "Self-test exercises" further the learning process after each section by testing the student's knowledge of the topic. At the end of each chapter answers are given to the "self-test exercises" and various programming projects are given that mimic the topic covered and at the same time expect the student to think outside of the box to solve the problems. Some of the programming projects given are hard enough that they can used - alone or collectively with other problems in other chapters - as semester long projects or group projects.
Examples are depicted right on spot rather than line-by-line after the example. Colored notes, arrows to the section of code being explained and highlighting of the important code sections are used to depict each and every example. The examples are well-documented and various "screen shots" are used to display what the output would look like. Pictures are inserted when needed, explaining how pointers and references work for example, and they are worth a thousand words. The pictures are easily concise and clear, simple and yet to the point. Being a text book on C++, one would wonder about the authors approach to the C++ language. It would help if the readers on this book have some background on programming, and especially in C++. The author spends one chapter on the basics of the language, but that's not enough for readers with no programming background. A good deal is then devoted to various aspects of programming such as arrays, functions and structures first before the author starts on the in-depth coverage of C++ itself. The Standard Template Library (STL) is used throughout the book to demonstrate and teach C++, starting with Vectors. Each of the classes of the STL are covered in detail throughout the book, but the authors breaks each of the major classes (lists, string, vector, etc...) and places them to teach a specific topic to the students. The author touches on STL first before going in to operator overloading, for example. This way, the students can learn the [semi] advanced features of the language in a context in which it can later be used - more concrete and more applied approach rather than an abstract overview of the features. With that pattern, the string class is covered first before the author starts on pointers, array of pointers, character pointers and pointer and reference manipulation in general. More advanced topics in C++ such as virtual functions, inheritance, templates and exceptions are covered towards the last half of the book. Templates being a rather interesting and possibly complicated topic are covered before the STL container classes such as linked lists and trees are covered. Not too much detail is given on templates and only the basics, as one would expect. Templates are covered just enough to get the students to understand how linked lists work, or how function templates are used in the STL, for example. UML and Patterns? They are covered too. Not in detail, but enough for a lecture or two at the end of the semester. Model-View-Controller, the classic of all patterns is covered first, and examples from the book are used to convey the message and the power of templates.
In closing, I wanted to touch on the web site for the book, and instructions material that is available for this book. Obviously all of the source code from the book is available for download, along with the slides for the students. For instructors, the slides are simply great. What reinvent the wheel? Simply use Savitch's slides for teaching. Example tests are also available for the instructors. If that wasn't enough, the CD in the book comes with an introductory version of the Visual C++ 6.0 to be used by the students. The package (website, CD-Rom and the book) is simply complete!
I would highly recommend this book to any instructor of the C++ programming language.
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Summary: GOOD PRICE USED
Review: YOU WILL NEED THIS BOOK IF YOUR TAKING Course Materials - Pace University | Web Assisted, Pleasantville
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