Problem Solving in Automata, Languages, and Complexity | 
 enlarge | Authors: Ding-zhu Du, Ker-i Ko
Publisher: Wiley-Interscience
Category: Book
List Price: $118.50
Buy New: $94.80
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Rating:  4 reviews
Sales Rank: 1064382
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1st
Pages: 408
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.5
Dimensions (in): 9.6 x 6.4 x 0.7
ISBN: 0471439606
Dewey Decimal Number: 511.3
EAN: 9780471439608
Publication Date: September 15, 2001
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Product Description
Automata and natural language theory are topics lying at the heart of computer science. Both are linked to computational complexity and together, these disciplines help define the parameters of what constitutes a computer, the structure of programs, which problems are solvable by computers, and a range of other crucial aspects of the practice of computer science. In this important volume, two respected authors/editors in the field offer accessible, practice-oriented coverage of these issues with an emphasis on refining core problem solving skills.
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| Customer Reviews:
 An adequate manual...if you understand the material. May 20, 2008
Undergrad Brad (Dallas, TX)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Ding-Zhu Du was actually a professor of mine, for undergraduate Automata Theory. This is a thorough text concerning some very advanced concepts in computer science. However, it is overly technical and anyone who is not a graduate student studying university-level computer science will find this COMPLETELY inaccesible. Almost no attempt is made to ease the reader into this extremely complex material. There are typos and grammatical errors, but they are not frequent or major enough to impair the reader's understanding of the what is being said. In truth the actual english text in this book is sparse anyway and I sincerely doubt most readers would have understood the descriptions of the material any more clearly had these print mistakes not existed. Example problems are abundant, but explanations of solutions are short, to the point, and rarely comprehensible. As I've stated already, this material is very abstract and complex, and as such these problems BEG for clear, step-by-step descriptions in plain english. I can gaurentee that any undergraduate or self-taught student will be utterly lost in the myriad of symbols and lemmas filling these pages. Chapter introductions are typically a few short sentences and give no perspective as to just what the hell is really going on in the examples. As a companion to solid professional instruction in this material, this text serves its purpose I suppose. I pity any student who misses a lecture and expects this text to fill in any questions he may have.
Honestly, unless you are a professor or engaged in some high-level research, you will gain nothing from this text. As a fourth-year CS student at an accredited state university, I found it intimidating and unreadable (this coming from someone who is well acquainted with needlessly complex mathematical jargon). If you have a legitimate reason to be exploring all the intricate complexities of NP-complete problems, and you already have a solid familiarity with finite automata and computational complexity, you may want to pick this book up. The hundreds of examples may be worth something to a person who is already familiar with these types of problems. If, on the other hand, you have no idea what the hell a nondeterministic turning machine is, you'd better turn your attentions somewhere else. This book isn't going to be the one to explain it to you.
Let me be clear though, this is NOT A BAD TEXT. Rather, due to the extremely difficult technical nature of this material, the text should have been presented at a much slower pace, descriptions of problem solutions should have been much clearer and more detailed, and the text overall should've been much less technical and more approachable if it were indeed meant as an introduction to these concepts for undergraduates. Or, it should simply not be read by undergraduates or self-study students of the discipline.
If this is your required text for an undergraduate computer science course, all I can say is, don't skip your lectures.
Not too verbose February 19, 2005
F. Palardy (California)
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
There aren't so many errors, but there's not much English explanation either. Everything is in symbols, which vary from author to author so another book doesn't help. The symbols are only defined once mostly with other symbols. This book could really use a glossary or a chart like they have on math books. The profs might like it cause there's some neat problems. I'm not sure there's any really good book on this subject. The problem is computer science has never attracted those with strong English skills and it certainly isn't getting better.
 The worst Computer Science book ever! September 15, 2008
mk review27
I have never seen such a poorly written book in any CS subject. Everything from the way the material is presented to the font chosen for the book are the worst of the worst.
Pile of crap! May 16, 2002
Steve Fire (Minneapolis, MN)
7 out of 13 found this review helpful
This book was terrible! It was very boring, overly-technical, and had spelling and grammar errors all over the place! Not very professional... If you are a self-teaching programmer I would recommend that you find a different book because you won't learn much from this one!
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