The Craft of Prolog (Logic Programming)

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Summary: The Craft of Prolog
Review: The contents are too confusing and it is definately not for the beginner/intermediate level who want to learn and understand more about prolog.

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Summary: "Where to go next" in your quest for prolog mastery
Review: The spirit of this book is exemplified by this quote: "If your Prolog code is ugly, the chances are that you either don't understand your problem or you don't understand your programming language, and in neither case does your code stand much chance of being efficient."

This book is O'Keefe's attempt to wipe out both root and branch of bad prolog code. A close reading of this book will not only give you a deep understanding of prolog and logic programming, but it will put you into mental contact with O'Keefe's profound insights into the kind of thinking necessary for being a topflight progammer.

I should mention that this book is not just for prolog programmers. It contains mindbending observations on programming available absolutly nowhere else. Unfortunately, like the scholar of the middle ages who had to master Latin and greek, you'll have to learn prolog before this book will yield up its treasures.

As O'Keefe unambiguously states in the opening paragraphs, this book should NOT be your first, or even your second, book on Prolog. There's no royal road to knowledge; you'll have to pay your dues. But after you've achieved a good foundation, this is the way forwared to enlightenment.

Rating:
Summary: Indispensable Classic
Review: This book, although not an introductory text, is widely considered the indespensable classic in writing good Prolog code. Try searching for it in the newsgroup comp.lang.prolog some time on DejaNews.

Prolog does a wonderful job of hiding what is really going on. This book reveals the wonderous truth.