Opinions/personal experiences on the following four CompSci books

[elias001]

For the following four books, has anyone used them in a course or for self study?

Compiler Construction Principles and Practice 1st Edition by Kenneth C Louden

Programming Languages Principles and Practices 3rd Edition by Kenneth C Louden, and Kenneth A Lambert

Programming Languages 2nd Edition by Allen B Tucker, Robert E Noonan

Concepts of Programming Languages 9th Edition by Robert W Sebesta

If yes to either, can you share your opinions about your personal experience using them. I am looking for the following:

1) In terms of how the materials are presented in terms of ease of understanding,

2) How up to date is the information or in the manner the topics are presented? (I am not sure if it matters in either cases for programming languages or compiler)

3) How much theory vs concrete examples or hands on exercises are presented or emphasized?

Thank you in advance.

 

[sbrothy]

Haven’t they been reviewed? Links would have been nice. It’s a little much to expect people to find them all and review them for you.

Although I’d gladly offer my opinion.

 

[Filip Larsen]

Sorry, none of the titles or authors ring a bell for me even if the topic is familiar, but I also don't teach CS for a living so my library on the topic are rather old by now. For instance, I still have 1st edition of the dragon book on my shelf.

 

[sbrothy]

For example, the first one:

Reviews:

https://www.amazon.com/Compiler-Con...enneth-Louden/dp/0534939724?tag=pfamazon01-20

It’s from 1997 though. There must be something more recent.

 

[sbrothy]

I haven’t read it I admit but at least it’s fairly recent and I trust the competency of the author:

https://stroustrup.com/programming.html

 

[elias001]

@Filip Larsen and @sbrothy oh if you two have never used any of the books, that is fine. I just thought if anyone have used them, what they have to say about it.

 

[sbrothy]

Also, I’m not sure you need several books covering the basics of programming. Wouldn’t it just confuse or complicate matters?

 

[sbrothy]

I’d imagine the basics are the core concepts. The abstract concept of programming and the difference of the types of languages and when to use what. Learning something about hardware (Security rings, processor types etc) and something on assembler level to get an understanding of talking directly with the chip (or hardware in general). And then maybe then dive deeper into a not too high level language like C or C++; maybe branch into a JIT language like Java.

Maybe then web development. I don’t think there’s no way around that this day and age…

EDIT: Understanding operating systems. The list is long.

It’s a rather broad topic and a steep learning curve.

 

[elias001]

@sbrothy the three books on programming languages paradigm, I am not sure if info gets outdated. The book on compiler writing, I am not sure how user friendly it is. Writing hardware, that is just learning VHDL, Verilog and Vlsi. I can learn about those later. Actually I think i need to do some reading on applied electromagnetics and electronic circuits before I tackle those languages. That is my impression.

 

[sbrothy]

Or start with QED and work your way up.

Nah, I’m joking. You decide where to start.

 

[elias001]

@sbrothy ah thank you.

 

[WWGD]

I believe there's an important element of subjectivity involved, so that others' reviews may only help you so much. So I suggest you try to browse through a few pages of each to see how they feel to you.