The Art of Computer Programming, Volume 4B - Knuth, Donald E.

Résumé :

Now Includes the Long-Anticipated Volume 4B!

Countless readers have spoken about the profound personal influence of Knuths work. Scientists have marveled at the beauty and elegance of his analysis, while ordinary programmers have successfully applied his cookbook solutions to their day-to-day problems. All have admired Knuth for the breadth, clarity, accuracy, and good humor found in his books.

Primarily written as a reference, some people have nevertheless found it possible and interesting to read each volume from beginning to end. A programmer in China even compared the experience to reading a poem. Whatever your background, if you need to do any serious computer programming, you will find your own good reason to make each volume in this series a readily accessible part of your scholarly or professional library.

These five books comprise what easily could be the most important set of information on any serious programmers bookshelf.

This set now includes Volume 4B, the sequel to Volume 4A, which extends Knuth's exploration of combinatorial algorithms. These algorithms are of keen interest to software designers because . . . a single good idea can save years or even centuries of computer time.

Donald Knuth may very well be a great master of the analysis of algorithms, but more than that, he is an incredible and tireless storyteller who always strikes the perfect balance between theory, practice, and fun.

[Volume 4B, Combinatorial Algorithms, Part 2] dives deep into the fascinating exploration of search spaces (which is quite like looking for a needle in a haystack or, even harder, to prove the absence of a needle in a haystack), where actions performed while moving forward must be meticulously undone when backtracking. It introduces us to the beauty of dancing links for removing and restoring the cells of a matrix in a dance which is both simple to implement and very efficient. And it studies the iconic and versatile satisfiability problem and carefully analyses various ingredients of SAT solvers.

Christine Solnon, Department of Computer Science, INSA Lyon

This box set includes the following volumes:

The Art of Computer Programming: Volume 1: Fundamental Algorithms, 3rd Edition

The Art of Computer Programming, Volume 2: Seminumerical Algorithms, 3rd Edition

The Art of Computer Programming: Volume 3: Sorting and Searching, 2nd Edition

The Art of Computer Programming, Volume 4A: Combinatorial Algorithms, Part 1

The Art of Computer Programming, Volume 4B: Combinatorial Algorithms, Part 2

Biographie:

Donald E. Knuth is known throughout the world for his pioneering work on algorithms and programming techniques, for his invention of the TEX and METAFONT systems for computer typesetting, and for his prolific and influential writing (26 books, 161 papers). Professor Emeritus of The Art of Computer Programming at Stanford University, he currently devotes full time to the completion of his seminal multivolume series on classical computer science, begun in 1962 when he was a graduate student at California Institute of Technology. Professor Knuth is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including the ACM Turing Award, the Medal of Science presented by President Carter, the AMS Steele Prize for expository writing, and, in November, 1996, the prestigious Kyoto Prize for advanced technology. He lives on the Stanford campus with his wife, Jill.

Sommaire:

Preface v
Notes on the Exercises xi

Mathematical Preliminaries Redux 1

Chapter 7: Combinatorial Searching
7.2.2 Backtrack Programming 30
7.2.2.1 Dancing links 65
7.2.2.2 Satisfiability 185

Answers to Exercises 370

Appendix A: Tables of Numerical Quantities 656
Appendix B: Index to Notations 660
Appendix C: Index to Algorithms and Theorems 666
Appendix D: Index to Combinatorial Problems 667
Appendix E: Answers to Puzzles in the Answers 671

Index and Glossary 674