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No, this is not a "tell me why I should study X" thread, I recently got the results of my Psychometric (think SAT with nastier relative scores) test (top 1%, wooot/shameless brag) and i'll be starting science studies in October, namely Computer engineering with elements of computer science and applied physics.
I was curious if anyone could recomend any really good books on any of the subjects before I start the intensive coursework, and become a bitter shell of a student with a pathological hatred of science books

The lower division physics texts that I learned from and enjoyed ( as much as one can enjoy from a textbook) is by Young&Friedman, the other by Halliday&Resnick. The latter IMO has a little bit more challenging problems, while the former "teaches" better. It's been a while since I gave either a cursory glance or a quick flip through.

Our first year basic physics study material was an abbreviated version of Young & Friedman's book (University Physics, 11th edition). The abbreviated stuff was good enough that I didn't get the book myself, but a friend who did said it was basically what we were given plus a ton of exercises, so it probably fits the bill here.

Also, I'm guessing the applied physics you get along computer engineering will be electronics. For that we had Microelectronic Circuits, 5th ed. by Sedra & Smith and Electric Circuits, 8th ed. by Nilsson & Riedel. I liked especially the former, which was good because the lectures on that course sucked .

Inside the Machine by Stokes is a basic layman's primer on computer architecture but unfortunately is out of print. Computer Organization & Design by Patterson and Hennessy is a good undergraduate primer, to be followed by Computer Architecture by Hennessy and Patterson. These three (or two, if you can't find Stokes' book) will serve you well.

Introduction to Algorithms by Cormen, Leiserson, Rivest and Stein is a fine book though you may not yet have the mathematical background to handle it. If you find you like the maths, perhaps try and tackle The Art of Computer Programming by Knuth.

.. cliche as it might sound I've always found

'For Idiots'
'For Dummies'
'Introduction to'
'Teach Yourself in X..'

Books to be a good starting point for basics

phongn wrote: Introduction to Algorithms by Cormen, Leiserson, Rivest and Stein is a fine book though you may not yet have the mathematical background to handle it. If you find you like the maths, perhaps try and tackle The Art of Computer Programming by Knuth.

Any ideas for a good book on algorithms and/or data structures that is aimed at the competent programmer with little background in math?

And I second the reccomendation on Inside the machine. It's a good book as an intro, though I don't know how well it will serve compared to Comp Eng books.

Data Structures and Algorithms by Aho, Ullman & Hopcroft and Data Structures and Algorithms in Java by Lafore seem well-reviewed on Amazon. Unfortunately, my knowledge on textbooks is a bit thin here: I had an outstanding data structures professor who obviated the need for one.

For more "pure" algorithm study you'll need to have some knowledge of discrete mathematics (esp. set theory and induction), calculus and linear algebra at a minimum. Statistics and probability also would be good to have.

The Hopcroft/Ullman was quite helpful for me, so I would recommend at least taking a look at it.

For basic physics texts, either Young&Friedman or Giancoli is a good bet; both are very good. Don't use Halliday&Resnick; it was good once, but those days are past. Also stay away from Wolfson and from Knight; Wolfson is far too terse, while Knight just doesn't teach the concepts well at all, and merely teaches you to do the problems.

For the calculus you'll need, if you've not taken it already, don't use Stewart. It's awful at actually explaining what's going on. Once you get past the more advanced notation, Marsden&Tromba is quite good.

Ace, define little background in math. I will also mention, no matter how well you think you know an algorithm, working it out by hand is generally the only way actually learn it (I am assuming you want to get more from the book than just a reference source). That should be obvious, but I can tell you from experiece you'll think you know and understand it when you don't. Any langauge in particular? Are your familiar with the C family, java, or something similar?

Not a book, but MIT has its open courseware which is great if you have time. You can download class notes and transcripts, and watch the lectures online.

Thanks all!
Any advice on good "light" books? That is, less math, more theory or words, to help enthuse an interest in the subject, ideas and whatnot?

On the EE/Circuit Thoery side of CompEng in my coursework, we used Fundamentals of Electric Circuits by Alexander Sadiku and Microelectronic Circuits by Sedra & Smith. For circuit design w/ VHDL we were supposed to use FPGA Prototyping by VHDL Examples: Xilinx Spartan-3 Version by Pong Chu.

[Edit- noticed Karza already mentioned Sedra & Smith- yes, that's a very good book - stupid edit timeout]

For gate-level logic and logic functions and various larger components such as muxes/adders we used Fundamentals of Digital Logic w/ VHDL Design by Steven Brown and Zvonko Vranesic - rather expensive book, and I got more out of lectures anyway.

I second Computer Organization & Design for knowing how to put together your digital circuits on the macro scale.

For circuit descriptions w/ VHDL ( it should be thought of as circuit design instead of programming ) we were supposed to use FPGA Prototyping by VHDL Examples: Xilinx Spartan-3 Version by Pong Chu, but I managed to make do w/o just by going through lecture slides ( http://ece.gmu.edu/coursewebpages/ECE/ECE448/S09 ) and finding various VHDL guides online - the above book should cover that too.

For Physics, I used various editions of Giancoli from HS all the way until 3rd-semester physics.

For math, I've found this site to be helpful as a primer/review http://tutorial.math.lamar.edu/

There might be some (a lot of ) signals processing thrown in, and we had quite a few different ones, a lot of which overlapped, one of which was Linear Systems & Signals by B. P. Lathi - can't seem to find the others.

In CompEng I feel you'll find most of the math more in the Signals, Physics, and EE side, but you'll have to do them anyway so I suggest you get started . My curriculum at GMU didn't really emphasize the CS portion- we just covered various data structures and operating systems, and they've nerfed the CS side even more in the later course catalogs.

As a recent CompEng graduate, good luck.

If you really want to put off the math until later, I suggest going through Fundamentals of Digital Logic and Computer Organization & Design first (CompEng seems to be mostly this), and the other books Phong mentioned (got a bit carried away there listing books that I used rather than "light" books. ) I think Giancoli for Physics is skimmable if you're not really interested in the math to understand stuff on the intuitive/conceptual level.

DEATH wrote:Thanks all!

Any advice on good "light" books? That is, less math, more theory or words, to help enthuse an interest in the subject, ideas and whatnot?

If you're serious about getting into the field, you can pick up serious books

phongn wrote:

DEATH wrote:Thanks all!

Any advice on good "light" books? That is, less math, more theory or words, to help enthuse an interest in the subject, ideas and whatnot?

If you're serious about getting into the field, you can pick up serious books

I can understand him, before getting into such a field, you want to be enthusiastic. Inside the machine should work for that, if he's dead to a CPU's architecture, then he could think twice.

Physics for Dummies. Really.