Rating: 
Summary: What a rip off man.
Review: I got this book from Chapters/Indigo in Canada and lost the receipt for return. Oh my god this is the worst book for begginers it expects you to already have knowledge programming terms. This is for someone who has done all sorts of programming before and wants to switch to C++. This book is supposed to be for someone who does not know all this programming jargon atleast that is what the title depicts.
I bet C++ for Dummies would be a good alternate.
Rating: 
Summary: Highly comprehensible introduction and more
Review: I picked up this book after one hour comparison to other books available in our B&N bookstore. After one week of studying C++ I can say the book completely fulfilled my expectations, and more: I feel quite fluent in C++ now ... As a foreigner, I have to recognize Al Steven's very rich English; I have learned something from the newspaper/high style as well ... I only can recommend the book to everyone who wants to start with C++. Tiny errors in some listings stimulated me to correct them to get running examples, and this way I learned even more!
Rating:
Summary: There are better texts to learn C++
Review: I purchased this book at my local generic book store since its offerings in C++ texts were quite limited. I regret making the decision to buy this book.Al Stevens makes note that his book does not require any prior programming experience, but I found his textbook extremely difficult to work with and often unreadable. His explanations of looping and nesting were awful; had I not purchased Steven Prata's C++ Primer Plus, I would never understand these concepts. His style of writing is hard to follow. For a C++ text, it is surprisingly small and concise, but that is because Stevens makes extensive use of undefined jargon that leave the reader in the dust. Often the order of topics presented left me fumbling around referring to other parts of the text to figure out what was going on. If the reader has no prior knowledge of C, this text would likely be practically unpalatable. It would be wise to find another textbook. If you're looking for an introductory C++ text, I suggest Prata's C++ Primer Plus. If you're an advanced programmer looking to brush up on technique and theory, Stroustrup's The C++ Programming Language would be the most prudent choice.
Rating:
Summary: A worthy goal, but...
Review: I really tried to like this one. When I bought it, I liked the intro where Mr. Stevens said he wouldn't throw technical jargon at the reader, but then he does precisely that. Of course, C++ is full of jargon. The problem is that he frequently uses terms he doesn't define, combining such jargon into indecipherable explanations only an engineer could understand. Once I got past the stuff in the first few chapters which I already knew, I was lost. Take pointers (please). Unlike Bruce Eckel's book (Thinking in C++, Vol 1), Mr. Stevens never explains WHY they are useful, or what practical benefit they provide. You are lead through rote steps and left with no understanding. The material is too terse. Learning such a complex topic as C++ is more than learning syntax. Yes, he tells you the mechanical things you can do with pointers, but never says why you would want to do them in the first place. Same with unions; his very brief description left me completely in the dark. Once again, Bruce Eckel to the rescue. The idea of a book like this is a good one, but if it claims it is for programming beginners, it must deliver. This one seems more geared toward impressing beginners with the author's knowledge. I don't think that was his intention, but that is the result.
Rating: 
Summary: NOT for beginners!
Review: I recently decided to learn the C++ programming language and was having a difficult time as I have NO prior programming experience, except for the ancient BASIC language. I have to say that this is probably a good book for intermediate or advanced programmers, but definately not one that assumes no prior knowledge. I read about halfway (if that) through it and discovered I was almost falling asleep. The author uses words that almost make your headspin and you find yourself wondering what you just read. At first I thought it was just me, that I was ignorant or something, then I went and bought a few other C++ books and found that the language is NOT as difficult as he made it out to be in Teach Yourself C++. I'm not at all insulting the author, just stating that you need SOME knowledge in programming to understand his teaching point of view. It's like being taught spanish by someone that can't even speak english yet. HEED my warning, this is NOT for beginners!
Rating:
Summary: JUST THE BEST C++ TUTORIAL I HAD SEEN
Review: I use C++ since 1991/92 specially because I had in hands the first edition of this book. After taking contact to the fifth edition, Al shows he had not loose the ellegance of his program writting nor his teaching skills.
Rating: 
Summary: Programmer Renaissance
Review: I'm an Assembler and Algol programmer from way back (1960's) wanting to hone up my C skills into C++. This book managed to bring together all the features I needed, in the order that I wanted it, and to the level of detail I need to survive as an IT professional. You get the tutorials and the opportunity to try things for yourself and to make mistakes (in private). What more can you ask for the price? Get this book - it's a bargain! And its informative.
Rating:
Summary: Good Tutorial--Pretty Complete
Review: I'm not finished with this book, but am very pleased so far. Stevens' organization and completeness are excellent. He tries to go from simpler concepts to more complex ones, and not get ahead of himself. It's difficult to do this with a topic like programming, where everything is interrelated! The instruction is pretty easy to follow, and the examples are very apt and easy to understand, with good variable names. Unlike most C++ books, Stevens' does not assume you know C. I did notice a couple of places in the book where it might be hard to get the concept if you had never used C at all, but I think if you kept reading and tried the examples, you could figure it out. I highly recommend this book to anyone who needs to learn C on their own. The only criticism I have is about the editing and proofing quality (typos in code, scratches on printing plates) but only editorial types like me would notice such details. Well worth the money if you don't have time to take a C++ class.
Rating:
Summary: Teaches Basic C++ to beginers
Review: If you don't know C, but want to learn c++ in dos this is the book for you. I have yet to finish it but from the 3 chapters I have read, and the cd, this is a great beginers book. If your looking for something on windows programing..look else where.
Rating:
Summary: Good way to learn C++ quickly
Review: If you've never done any programming before, this book probably isn't the best place to start. But if you even a basic knowledge of some other language (like maybe you dabbled in QBASIC, and have a basic knowledge of entry level programming concepts), than this book is a good way for you to learn C++ quickly. Al Stevens explains concepts in an easy to understand manner using short, concise examples. However, there are two reasons I can't quite give this book five stars. The first is the source code formatting in the code listings. The use of whitespace could be a lot better. For example, there are no blank lines seperating variable declarations, conditional blocks, or loop blocks from the rest of the code. So seeing the different blocks of code is not always obvious. I'm not sure if this was done to save space on the pages or what, but it does make for some code that could be a lot more readable with the addition of some blank lines. The second, is that there are some glaring oversights in some of the code samples, and even in some of the text. For example, program 4-3 passes an integer variable to the pow function of the standard C math library. The text to go along with this program states that because the compiler will automatically promote variables to the type needed by the function, that we can pass an integer to the function, even though it expects a double... Well, yes and no. And in this case, it doesn't work. Because the pow function is overloaded, so the compiler doesn't know whether to promote the integer to a float, a double, or a long double. So to compile program 4-3, you need to provide an explicit cast to convert the integer to a double. But the text doesn't mention anything about this, and it's not in the source code either, so the compiler bombs on this program. This is a pretty basic oversight from a programmer as experienced as Al Stevens. Other than those two complaints, this book is well written, and serves its intended purpose quite well. The book strikes a happy middle ground between assuming a great deal of programming knowledge on the part of the reader, and thus being too complicated for many readers, and assuming no programming knowledge on the part of the reader, and thus boring those who dabbled with QBASIC a few years ago by going over very basic concepts. I would recommened it to anyone who has a basic familiarity with any programming language, and who wants to learn C++.
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