Mathematical Structures for Computer Science | 
| Author: Judith L. Gersting
Publisher: W. H. Freeman
Category: Book
Buy New: $56.05
New (43) Used (36) from $56.05
Avg. Customer Rating:  15 reviews
Sales Rank: 17574
Media: Hardcover
Edition: Sixth Edition
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 784
Shipping Weight (lbs): 3.7
Dimensions (in): 10.1 x 8.2 x 1.4
ISBN: 071676864X
Dewey Decimal Number: 004.0151
EAN: 9780716768647
ASIN: 071676864X
Publication Date: July 7, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Condition: Brand New, HARDCOVER, US student edition *free priority mail upgrade*(ship with delivery confirmation)
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Product Description
The new edition of Mathematical Structures for Computer Science continues to offer a pedagogically rich and intuitive introduction to discrete mathematics structures. It meets the needs of computer science majors by being both comprehensive and accessible. Relevant applications are balanced alongside clear presentation of concepts to help students better understand this text, which has been popular amongst professors and their classes for almost twenty-five years.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 10 more reviews...
 Mathematical Structures For Computer Science Review February 23, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Mathematical Structures for Computer Science was a good buy. It was cheaper than the college book store and in good condition.
 First one hundred pages were a waste February 13, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I was forced to buy this book for class. The first 100 pages have been useless for me. I can't understand why my school is using it. From this point, I'll be reading a Discrete book my wife used 5+ years ago and I'll just work the required problems in this text.
 A good reference July 25, 2005
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
I used this book in my Data Structures class. It has sample problems with solutions in the back of the book so you understand what they were talking about (unfortunately, I cannot say the same for a lot of data structures texts) The sample problems were also good for review for an exam. This was one of the few Computer Science textbooks that I have actually kept as a reference.
 CS Professors Love This Book. CS Students Hate It. May 3, 2005
3 out of 7 found this review helpful
If you are seasoned in the ways of computer science and mathematics, you will probably love this book. However if you are new to the concepts presented in the pages of this book, you will probably hate it. It is particularly bad once you really start getting into the meat of things, around chapter three. The examples and explanations are utterly terse.
Here is how the book defines "cardinality": "...The number of elements in a finite set is the cardinality of the set, so this would be a set of cardinality k." That is the best explanation the book offers as to the meaning of the word cardinality, a word my professor used close to fifty times every lecture, a word that really deserves better explanation than a single sentence, especially with regard to sets.
If I were providing something constructive the author, I would probably say that definitions should be much easier to find and much more detailed and examples of definitions should cover all the angles. I suppose my largest complaint with the book would simply be that if you are a CS student and you REALLY NEED a strong foundation in the concepts of discrete math, this book doesn't quite get there. The book misses its target audience.
Not quite the best, but close February 19, 2005
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
Although there is now consensus over the coverage in a first course in discrete mathematics, the level of difficulty one finds in books for this audience has a wide range. Some opt for the basic approach, with very little rigor, and anything labeled as a proof is either trivial or an advanced waving of the hands. Notational complexity is kept to a minimum, which is fine for the beginner, but limits the value as the student goes on into more advanced courses. On the other end, there are those where rigorous proofs abound, it reads more like a book for traditional math majors rather than one largely designed for computer science majors.
While Gersting is somewhere in the middle, the slant is more towards the advanced. The first four chapters cover logic, the fundamentals of proofs, set theory and relations and functions respectively. This order is in complete agreement with my beliefs. I would not give any book that does not start with these basic topics a second look much less consider adopting it. Graphs are covered in chapters five and six; Boolean algebra in seven and the theory of computation is covered in chapter eight. The treatment is on the high end, but still within the bounds of a first course in discrete mathematics. Worked examples are everywhere and a large number of exercises are at the end of each section. Practice problems are embedded inside the chapters and solutions to all the practice problems are found in an appendix.
While I believe I have found a better book to use in my discrete class, this one is my second choice. In fact I successfully used it for two years, until I replaced it. The primary reasons for the change was that the new book has biographical sketches of mathematicians (something I adore), the font is larger and there are more solutions to the exercises.
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