Data Structures: A Pseudocode Approach with C]+ [Hardcover]

The author seems to come from the school of thought that places importance on theory over practice. Is it no surprise that the C++ portions (from the helper site) are no more than converted C code with couts? In today's market, you have to write code, not pseudo-code. You have to compete in a global market. This fossilized notion of pseudo-code not only hides the fact that possibly the lazy professors couldn't write code to save their lives, but also is a disservice to students who WANT to not only learn data structures in the context of MODERN engineering practices, but also want to know how to IMPLEMENT data structures - be it C++, C#, Java - as well.

I'll wrap up with a final word for students and professors:
- Professors: Please don't torture your students with this book.
- Students: If your professor uses this book... Run!!

Since I was already very familiar with most concepts ( ie. actually programmed them ), I have to say that no book has made me more confused or angry than this one. Ideas that are simple are obscured with inappropriate examples / wordings, so I actually had to read many paragraphs TWICE, to get the point of the author. Even the pictures are far from refined, and the presentation is quite amateur. There were several times I just wanted to throw the book at the wall in disgust.

As a first (and unbelievable) example, from page 2 you are given the "Commandments" of good Pseudocode. One such rule is never to use identifiers such as 'i' or 'j', as they should instead be given an 'english' name such as 'student'. On page 6, we have the first code example, where they proceed to use 'i' and 'j' within the code. Then they explain that, oh yes, 'i' and 'j' is actually a loop tradition in C++! So we're already confused! By page 6. Now, the beautiful thing is that you can read this for yourself right now, with Amazon's page excerpts. This sets the level of presentation for the rest of the book.

My apologies to those who may like this book, but please take time to explore other books before this one. Programming is far easier than is explained in this book. At this level of programming development, a bad experience can be most discouraging. And this book is very, very bad.

This book gave me exactly that.

I was able to convert the book's pseudocode into C code without
peeking at the author's actual implementation. This is how easy the
book is to understand (given you know what pointers and dynamic memory
allocation are and how to use them).

I'm not sure what the other readers are complaining about. This isn't
a book about software engineering (and the author implicitly implied
it each time he said such topics are outside the scope of the book).
Another reader wanted more examples. There are times when I want
hand-holding myself but only in specific topics such as game programming.
This is a book on data structures and algorithms not data structures

and algorithms used in encryption, compression, file management, etc.

By the way, I'm referring to the previous edition (in C).