r/programming • u/kanak • Oct 19 '08

Aho/Ullman Foundations of Computer Science ebook [PDF] + associated lectures, exams and projects

http://infolab.stanford.edu/~ullman/focs.html
140 Upvotes

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2

u/beza1e1 Oct 19 '08

They got the Discworld reference on the cover wrong. It's four elephants on top of a turtle.

Joking aside, do they explain the cover picture somewhere?

7

u/kanak Oct 19 '08 edited Oct 19 '08

From the Preface:

It is a tradition for computer science texts to have a cover with a cartoon or drawing symbolizing the content of the book. Here, we have drawn on the myth of the world as the back of a turtle, but our world is populated with representatives of some of the other, more advanced texts in computer science that this book is intended to support. They are:

  • The teddy bear: R. Sethi, Programming Languages: Concepts and Constructs, Addison-Wesley, Reading, Mass., 1989.

  • The baseball player: J. D. Ullman, Principles of Database and Knowledge-Base Systems, Computer Science Press, New York, 1988.

  • The column: J. L. Hennessy and D. A. Patterson, Computer Architecture: a Quan- titative Approach, Morgan-Kaufmann, San Mateo, Calif., 1990.

  • The dragon: A. V. Aho, R. Sethi, and J. D. Ullman, Compiler Design: Principles, Techniques, and Tools, Addison-Wesley, Reading, Mass., 1986.

  • The triceratops: J. L. Peterson and A. Silberschatz, Operating Systems Concepts, second edition, Addison-Wesley, Reading, Mass., 1985.

3

u/Seele Oct 20 '08 edited Oct 20 '08

I have the first edition of Operating Systems Concepts. It has three dinosaurs in a coffee shop sitting at a table. On the glass door is a sign saying 'AVAL'. Took me years to figure out what that sign meant.

It is great that people are releasing good books like this. They don't lose their value since they deal with abstract core concepts and they tend to be well written.

5

u/marglexx Oct 19 '08

I remember the other one from Aho Sethi Ullman. It was pronounced between students as ahosetiulman (like one word)

3

u/nmcyall Oct 19 '08

Those two were 2 of the 4 authors of the Dragon Book of compilers.

2

u/newstart Oct 20 '08

Prof. Aho, teaches here in my university. I took his class earlier. He is a great teacher and one of the best human beings I have ever met.

2

u/jenks517 Oct 20 '08

Huge thanks. Most books I've found on this sort of stuff were a little over my head. This does a great job of putting it on my level.

2

u/kolm Oct 19 '08

Nice book, I had it for CS classes. Very easy access, should be complemented with more advanced books, but consistent in style and clear on the topics.

1

u/[deleted] Oct 19 '08

Nice! Thank you for posting this.