Data Structures and Other Objects Using Java

by Michael G. Main

This book takes a gentle approach to the data structures course in Java. It offers an early, self-contained review of object-oriented programming and Java to give students a firm grasp of key concepts, and allows those experienced in other languages to adjust easily. The book also offers a flexibility which allows professors such options as emphasizing object-oriented programming, covering recursion and sorting early or accelerating the pace of the course. This title meets the needs of professors searching for a book to balance the introduction of object-oriented programming and data structures with Java.

Genres: Programming, Computer Science, Textbooks

848 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1998

Reviews

[Jake · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was left for free at my university and I used it for my data structures course. My index for judging a book like is what I've started calling the "K&R (kernighan and ritchie) index". Not a judge of absolute quality, in some pretentious way, but moreover: how much material do they serve to be in a succinct way that allows me to learn topics on my own. I felt like as the material grew in complexity, the ability of the author to explain it succinctly diminished greatly. I was really rewarded in the first few chapters of the book but quickly put it down when we got to trees.

[Kushal · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think Main’s approach was pretty good for the first half of the book or so, but I think the explanations concerning B-trees could’ve been a lot better.

[Patrick Tilsen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not bad for an introduction to data structures. Decent course material, with mostly solid explanations. Some of them were too thick, some too trivial, but for the most part it was easy to follow without being too vacuous. There are probably better data structures books, even with Java examples, but the multitude of Computer Science students who will undoubtedly get this book assigned will learn much without too much pain.