No comments about Fortran 90 and Engineering Computation.

3 comments about Fortran 90 Programming (International Computer Science Series).

1. This is one of the best books on Fortran 90 programming. Its major strength is that the information in the book is reliable and correct. It may especially be very useful for experienced FORTRAN 77 programmers. I think every Fortran programmer must have a copy of this text in his/her library.



2. Well written detailed coverage of Fotran 90. Clear explanations of obsolete F77 features and other features of the language to avoid using and why. I would recommend this text to anyone wishing to learn F90 from scratch or upgrading from F77. Good example programs, code fragment and many programming exercises with solutions. I am now enjoying the use of derived types and generic functions as well as extending the intrinsic functions.



3. This book explains very well the features of Fortran90 programming, but it is way too pedantic. I would have preferred a more concise, O'Reilly style of writing. Many examples of very simple code are provided to illustrate points - I found them to distract from the points being made. The book could also have benefited from a more Object Oriented focus as many of the new features of F90 over F77 are attempts to move Fortran in this direction.

3 comments about Structured Fortran 77 for Engineers and Scientists.

1. I have used this book in my programming class for many years and it has proven to be reliable and well written. It has a good number of exercises and even some numerical methods applications.



2. Inspite of OOPS and stuff, nothing beats Fortran in writing moderately complex programs without having to learn too many constructs. I routinely handle my data files in fortran rather than go all the way writing 'C' code. Reading/writing arrays with a single statement, good math functions, universal availability etc make fortran a very good scientific tool. (more like an advanced calculator). I will rather write a small fortran program than calculate something in my head. Some scientific packages use fortran as their base language, so a knowledge of fortran is not going to be wasted. And so math/science books use fortran, so you will definitely benefit if you can understand the language. You could probably translate one of those into C/C++ and make some easy money.



3. I used a copy of a previous edition of this book when completing my undergraduate degree. When I had to do a fair bit of programming recently, and needed to brush up on FORTRAN, I purchased this book.

   It is a simple book that outlines the fundamentals of FORTRAN. It is more of a beginners guide than anything else. The shortcoming of this book is that there is no reference or summary section of all the commands - it really isn't a desktop reference. The advantage of this type of book is the number of good examples that it contains.

3 comments about FORTRAN 77 for Engineers and Scientists with an Introduction to FORTRAN 90 (4th Edition).

1. An excellent way for begginers to understand the structure of FORTRAN. Useful also for experienced programmers with a detailed index table.



2. I am returning this item because the printing is unacceptably poor. The book is softbound and yet the pages appear to be photocopies, and not good ones. The syntax definitions (the most important part, for me), are in gray-on-gray box text that, in this printing, is almost unreadable.



3. I have been using this book to teach an introductory university-level mechanical engineering class that emphasizes computer programming. This book adequately covers all important topics in Fortran and contains many real-world engineering applications (such as solving for roots).
   
   The examples are well commented, which is great for students who are beginning to learn how to program.
   
   I feel that this book is designed for someone who has very little experience in computer programming and I would not recommend this book to someone who is already well-versed in other computer languages. A much smaller book, such as "Schaum's Outline of Programming With Fortran 77 (Schaum's Outlines)," would be better for advanced programmers who want to learn Fortran.

No comments about Fortran 77 and Numerical Methods for Engineers.

1 comments about Programming in Fortran (Chapman and Hall Computing Series).

1. Finding this gem will be tough as nails! Maybe try a University Library or an Interlibrary-loan... This is the book that almost all the Univ. of Illinois Chemists that needed to learn FORTRAN turned to... Many of us worked using F77 and this book taught everythign quickly and clearly. After reading this book, you don't really need to turn to any other...

5 comments about Fortran 90/95 Explained.

1. In my opinion this book gives a thorough, yet concise account of the Fortran 90 programming language and its more recent Fortran 95 revision. Its virtue lies in its unambiguous definition of terms, programming constructs, function definitions etc. It is ideal for the experienced programmer who wants to know how to code a specific task in Fortran 90. It is most definitely not suitable, nor aimed at either the novice programmer or the programmer of the Fortran 66 era; both of whom need a slower, more example and algorithm driven, introduction to the Fortran of the 90's.

   I have successfully used this book for teaching, but only to experienced Fortran 77 programmers eager to learn about the new language, and with the aid of highly structured lectures and supervised computer tutorial sessions. I would not recommend it for student self study.

   As an experienced programmer, what I most like about this book is that I can look up a term in the index, be referred to a small number of entries in the text, and rest assured that in those few pages I have all the information I require on that topic. Other Fortran books I have read frequently do not document, or pay scant regard to, important features of the language such as optional arguments to I/O statements or generic function disambiguation.

   If I were only allowed to keep just one Fortran 90 text book this would be the one.




2. Fortran 90/95 explained by Metcalf and Reid is a reference work that covers systematically all the fundamental concepts in the Fortran 90 and 95 programming language standard. The text is concise, yet it is sprinkled with examples. I consult the book often and usually find quickly what I am looking for.



3. There are two types of essential books to be on your bookshelves. Books to learn from and books to reference.

   This book is the essential reference. Once you learn Fortran, this is the book to turn to when you need to know the details of the language.

   I find myself using this book over and over again for my research project. It's short, concise, absolutely accurate and complete, making it the perfect book to have right next to your keyboard.

   In response to the 1 star review, this is _not_ the book to learn the language from if you know nothing about Fortran, but it would be a serious mistake not to stock your bookshelf with this gem of a book.




4. For the experienced FORTRAN 77 programmer, this is the best book you can own for learning FORTRAN 90/95. Don't be fooled by its unimpressive size, the content is what's important and the only metaphor I can find is this: the contents of this little jewel are like concentrated acid. I'm not at all surprised the authors of Numerical Recipes in FORTRAN 95 site this book as their favorite reference. This book is not for the faint at heart, but then, what successful programmer is? This rare jewel combined with Adams, Brainard, Martin, Smith, and Wagener's "FORTRAN 95 Handbook" is all the aspiring FOTRAN 90/95 programmer needs.

   One example of the many gold nuggets I found in this title that I could find mentioned almost nowhere else: Instead of declaring a function as EXTERNAL so that it may be used as an actual argument in a procedure reference, Metcalf and Reid recommend using an interface block in the scope of the procedure reference using the actual function name, and a similar interface block in the referenced procedure (using the dummy argument procedure name), thereby allowing the compiler to envoke all the checking associated with explicit interfaces. Using the EXTERNAL attribute for this scenario does not allow that depth of checking, and, indeed, Chapman makes it seem as if the EXTERNAL statement is required to pass a function name as an actual argument. Adam's et al write that the use of interface blocks makes this use of EXTERNAL effectively obsolescent (p 473).

   I did have one problem with my edition of "FORTRAN 90/95 Explained", the index was bound incorrectly (the pages were out of sequence).




5. If you are new to Fortran and learn by doing, this is not the book for you. It is difficult to find explainations in one location. For example, when writing out a variable to the screen, you may want spaces put into the output. Where do you find the "coding" for spaces? Well, it's hidden very well in an example 20 pages later from the original text on the "write" statement. Also, I am currently writing code and need to use the 'call' statement. Unfortunately, something as useful as the call statement is hard to find in this book. I have had a difficult time using this book as a reference without having to spend a lot of time going through the whole chapter to find the information I needed. Maybe it just needs to be organized differently.

   I learn by looking at other people's coding and interpreting and investigating. This book does not lend itself very well to that type of method. Maybe it works for pure programmers, but I am an engineer and need results quickly. I hope this review helps you.

2 comments about Introduction To Fortran 90/95 (B.E.S.T. Series).

1. Fortran is still widely used in science and engineering, though if you look at new computer books, you can scarcely tell this. Since those usually discuss languages like C, C++ and Java. But when it comes to raw number crunching, and where a GUI might be nice, but is strictly secondary, there is a ton of legacy code in Fortran.

   So there is still a need for a book like this, which discusses how to use the latest version, Fortran 95. What the author strives for is to cover something lacking in many older Fortran texts. Those tend to explain the syntax and how to write small programs, of a few thousand lines or less.

   But there is often little discussion on how to manage the complexity of libraries stretching to 10^5 lines or 10^6 lines of code. How can you maintain and understand and add to these bodies? Issues like unit testing, which quite often discussed in java or C++, are well described here. Design discipline is also emphasised.

   So if you are still writing in Fortran, and are wondering about coping with growing code, consider this book.




2. Precise and consice. Apparently the author knows how to communicate with his audience. The book is very easy to read, and by the time you have finished reading and implementing the examples you will definitely know how to do some basic coding with Fortran 95. Great buy!

No comments about The Fortran 2003 Handbook: The Complete Syntax, Features and Procedures.

1 comments about Numerical Recipes in FORTRAN Example Book: The Art of Scientific Computing.

1. This is really a great book of numerical examples. It teaches you on how to use those "abstract" numerical recipes. From here you will be a good commander of both numerical recipes and numerical programming. You will learn a lot of practical experience. You can not miss it! enjoy it.