College Book World, in association with Amazon.com, provides you with the security, reliability, selection and price you’ve come to expect from the largest, most trusted names in online shopping. |
|
|
| The Annotated Turing: A Guided Tour Through Alan Turing's Historic Paper on Computability and the Turing Machine | 
 enlarge | List Price: $29.99
Buy New: $14.50
You Save: $15.49 (52%)
Buy New/Used from $14.50
Avg. Customer Rating:   (based on 8 reviews)
Sales Rank: 16200
Category: Book
Author: Charles Petzold
Publisher: Wiley
Studio: Wiley
Manufacturer: Wiley
Label: Wiley
Languages: English (Original Language), English (Unknown), English (Published)
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 384
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 8.8 x 6.1 x 1
ISBN: 0470229055
Dewey Decimal Number: 511.352
EAN: 9780470229057
ASIN: 0470229055
Publication Date: June 16, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
|
| Similar Items:
|
| Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
Programming Legend Charles Petzold unlocks the secrets of the extraordinary and prescient 1936 paper by Alan M. Turing Mathematician Alan Turing invented an imaginary computer known as the Turing Machine; in an age before computers, he explored the concept of what it meant to be computable, creating the field of computability theory in the process, a foundation of present-day computer programming. The book expands Turing?s original 36-page paper with additional background chapters and extensive annotations; the author elaborates on and clarifies many of Turing?s statements, making the original difficult-to-read document accessible to present day programmers, computer science majors, math geeks, and others. Interwoven into the narrative are the highlights of Turing?s own life: his years at Cambridge and Princeton, his secret work in cryptanalysis during World War II, his involvement in seminal computer projects, his speculations about artificial intelligence, his arrest and prosecution for the crime of "gross indecency," and his early death by apparent suicide at the age of 41.
|
| Customer Reviews: Read 3 more reviews...
 A difficult but rewarding book November 30, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Petzold makes a great effort towards explaining Turing's famous proof. Turing's scheme of variable naming was extremely difficult for me to follow and so many formula's, particularly towards the end of the book where they become increasingly complex, were beyond me even with Petzold's clear and complete explanations. I was able to follow Petzold's explanations for why Turing takes the path he does throughout the book and overall feel that though I couldn't grasp some of the technicalities, I have an appreciation for the logical path Turing went down in envisioning his machine, and the role he played in the emergence of computers.
Make sure you're well-grounded in math to get the full effect here... November 16, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This is one of those books that you'll love if you're into mathematics or hard-core computer science, but you'll become somewhat of a skimmer if you don't have the chops to keep up with theory and proofs.. The Annotated Turing: A Guided Tour Through Alan Turing's Historic Paper on Computability and the Turing Machine by Charles Petzold. And in case you're wondering, I fall into the second category. :)
Contents:
Part 1 - Foundations
This Tomb Holds Diophantus
The Irrational and the Transcendental
Centuries of Progress
Part 2 - Computable Numbers
The Education of Alan Turing
Machines at Work
Addition and Multiplication
Also Known as Subroutines
Everything Is a Number
The Universal Machine
Computers and Computability
Of Machines and Men
Part 3 - Das Entscheidungsproblem
Logic and Computability
Computable Functions
The Major Proof
The Lambda Calculus
Conceiving the Continuum
Part 4 - And Beyond
Is Everything a Turning Machine?
The Long Sleep of Diophantus
Selected Bibliography
Index
In order to give the reader a better understanding of Turing's paper on computing machines, Petzold takes each section of the original paper and adds commentary and background. The parts of the actual Turing paper are set off in shaded areas with a different font, preserving the line breaks, formatting, and even the typos when possible. By the time you're done with the book, you have a complete copy of Turing's original work. Petzold does a very good job in laying the foundations for concepts and conclusions in the paper. For instance, he provides a concise explanation of rational, irrational, real, and transcendental numbers in a way that most people can follow. It's important to understand those ideas, as they quickly come into play when the dissection of the paper begins. He also provides historical background on Turing and his counterparts. This is important because you should understand that back in the 1930's, the idea and concepts of automated computing were still in their infancy. If you try and judge his work based on what we know today, you may not get the full implication of how radical this was back in his time.
So is this a book that everyone will enjoy? In a word, no. This book deals with some heavy math theory, and to get the most out of it you'd have to either have a solid background in math or be willing to spend a lot of time trying to understand it. I'll admit that most of the details were far over my head, and as such I missed a significant amount of the impact of this book. Having said that, I can also see how Petzold did a very good job in breaking down a complex subject and making it attainable to a reader that isn't at the same level of Turing. In fact, I'd venture to guess that without a book like this, many would not have the opportunity to dig into Turing's work with any degree of depth or success.
 Hard to tell... November 13, 2008
1 out of 4 found this review helpful
I bought this book out of interest in the paper that Alan Turing wrote, and because I liked "Code" which was written by Petzold. I am not done with the book to set this in stone yet, but I'm currently teetering between 3 and 4 stars because this book doesn't seem quite as readable as "Code" was.
With "Code" I felt like it was an excellent and very interesting book, a good description of technology that non-science lovers could read. This one so far seems a little more dry, but time (and more pages) will tell.
 If you like math, you love this book! November 2, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
I'll be honest, I am not a mathematician but I like mathematics, partly because I love computer programming. If I read the Turing paper as is, I would not understand it, but the way Petzold is explaining things makes it all easy to understand. You feel this is his toy project, his hobby.
I own two other books by him : 3D Programming for Windows (Pro - Developer) andProgramming Microsoft Windows with C# (Microsoft)and everywhere when it comes to math the author explains things in a way that even a newbie to the subject(say matrices) could understand it.
So "The annotated TURING" is fun to read, also because of the detailed historical information it contains.
should be on every aspiring mathematician's bookshelf October 21, 2008
7 out of 7 found this review helpful
this is a fantastic book. It manages to explain simply and clearly the entirety of turing's landmark paper and providing a thorough grounding on the base mathematical knowledge. though I had taken some set theory in college, I am fairly confident that even a devoted highschooler with some experience in geometry proofs could understand and follow this book. Of course, I should also mention that this book is written extremely well such that at no point did I feel bored. when was the last time you found a math book completely riveting?
|
College Book World, in association with Amazon.com, provides you with the security, reliability, selection and price you’ve come to expect from the largest, most trusted names in online shopping.
Our association with Amazon.com provides you with the utmost in security and reliability. Browse our store and add items to your cart and have peace knowing that your order will be processed and fulfilled through the Amazon.com network.
The obvious question is why shop our store versus going directly to Amazon.com? Our commitment is to present you with focused products that have been specially organized and presented. You could view us as your own personal shopper or concierge. You still end up purchasing from the same major store. We save you time finding the product you are looking to find and streamline the process for you.
While we all like the great prices and selection found at the large mass wholesalers, but it is easy to get lost in the process. We are committed to making shopping quick and easy. |
|
|
|
|
