Fundamentals of Sequential and Parallel Algorithms

Rating:
Summary: Too many assumptions
Review: I had to purchase this book for a class, taught by the authors no less - and I must say the book is put together very well visually. There are some parts of the book that are elegantly written, and explain some things in good detail, but they seem to be in the minority. On the whole, there seem to be way to many assumptioms made while going through the book. When explaining something, they point to an excercise for further detail, in which they ask you to proove what you were going to look up more information on, instead of actually giving the information you were requesting. If you have to buy the book there's no real way around it, but if you're interested in learning about algorithms and have no prior knowledge, I would not recommend this book.

Rating:
Summary: Great introductory text
Review: I recently used this book in an undergraduate course on algorithm design and analysis. While some areas of the book are lacking (specifically answers to critical exercises and some concepts were a little rough in their explainations), overall the book provides a good introduction to both sequential and parallel algorithms.

The diagrams provided in the text help with understanding how more complex algorithms work and allow the reader to trace the operation of the algorithm. This proved invaluable to my studies as I could not only read the psuedocode, but also see the execution without writing a program myself.

While some areas of the book need a little work, I think it serves as a useful textbook for class as well as a reference afterwards.

Rating:
Summary: Well written, full of pseudocode and examples
Review: I took the undergrad/grad version of the class from one of the co-authors last quarter and found it to be quite enjoyable. I agree that an answer key to at least some of the exercises would be helpful if you were trying to work through this material on your own, but I was quite impressed with the diagrams and figures, especially the ones illustrating the operation of the pseudocode. I felt the book had a good mix of theoretical discussion with more practical "hands-on" treatment of the specific algorithms discussed. Is it "Algorithms for Dummies?" No. But if you work through the illustrations as you read the text, I found it quite understandable, and don't know how you could simplify it any further without losing something in the translation. All in all, I was quite pleased.


Rating:
Summary: This incomplete text is a poor learning tool
Review: In several places in this book, there are concepts central to the field of algorithms left completely out. On numerous occasions, the book will be missing a vital proof useful for many of the problem sets. The proof will be mentioned, but only in its own problem, expecting the user to derive the proof on his or her own. That would not be a problem if this text, like most GOOD texts, included an answer key so the student could learn. There are entire bodies and methods of proofs only to be found in the problem sets, with no examples in the text. It is difficult to learn and do the work when it is never stated what is expected.

Rating:
Summary: Explains nothing, condenses 1000s pages material into 100s
Review: This book makes so many assumptions and explains so little it may as well be written in greek (which most of it actually is since it uses so many symbols). This book might make a great graduate or doctorate level book if you already know most of what is in the book but which to examine it more in depth. This book is horrible on its own and any professor using it as an undergrad book must be friends with Berman and Paul. Like someone else noted it is full of things refering you to problems and proofs as examples. Like in Chapter 14 it will say "based upon the proof you did in problem. 2.14" instead of explaining what they are talking about and often even asking you to prove or figure out something on your own as basis for another proof or problem.

Rating:
Summary: Appealing book
Review: This book will help anyone learn about the design and analysis of algorithms-even without the prior knowledge of algorithms. It starts with the basic principles, using good and proven examples such as factorial computation. Anyone with basic mathematics knowledge will have no problem following the authors.

If you look at the book's table of contents (e.g. by clicking on the link above), you can see that not only does this text cover the vast field of sequential algorithms (starting from the simple ones all the way to the special algorithms such as Red-Black tree), but it also covers the relatively recent area of parallel algorithms.

Having both a sequential and parallel side, this book is rather unique. Others discuss only sequential algorithms or specialize in parallel algorithms. Here, you get good coverage for both areas, especially sequential algorithms.

The examples are constructed for a wide audience, test your knowledge of the presented material, and challenge your mind. The book should appeal to beginners, advanced students, and algorithm enthusiasts.