A large part of this book is devoted to a study of possible design procedures for various types of lens or mirror systems, with fully worked examples of each. The reader is urged to follow the logic of these examples and be sure that he understands what is happening, noticing particularly how each available degree of freedom is used to control one aberration. Not every type of lens has been considered, of course, but the design techniques illustrated here can readily be applied to the design of other more complex systems. It is assumed that the reader has access to a small computer to help with the ray tracing, otherwise he may find the computations so time-consuming that he is liable to lose track of what he is trying to accomplish.
This is a review of the first edition. Based on personal experience, this book gives enough information on practical lens design for the optical novice to design one. No computer design info in this edition, if you need to design a specialty lens, get the second edition which would have one more star.