Prolog Books

I remember contacting with Mr.Bratko via mail as I was a university student and I couldn't beleive that this book came from such a modest personality.
The most challanging language, the most challenging programming book I have ever faced with.
Force your IQ with this one.

... a horrible Prolog tutorial.

This is not a good first book on Prolog. If you are new to Prolog and Logic Programming, you should read 'Art of Prolog' first.

Prolog is quite different from other languages, and you'll need some time to get it. This book doesn't give you that time: after briefly introducing the basic concepts, Bratko dives at breakneck speed into recursion and list processing.

Don't get me wrong, this is a magnificent book on how to do AI with Prolog, but it shouldn't be your first Prolog book. It's an excellent second book.

I find the book does not adequetly explain the more complex code examples. First of all the code is not adequetly commented. Secondly, it does not explain the code well for programmers. First when introducing a program like in the expert systems shell chapter it should first define an interface for the program, and explain each goal listed. It should adequetly explain what each goal and clause should hope to achieve. Also, for the more complicated programs it should draw some type of diagram, maybe a flow chart or something that explains the concepts involved. It leaves too much figuring out and guessing for the reader. It is not very user-friendly!
On the positive side, it does an adequate job of explaining concepts when complex code is not involved. I found that I could follow along on even the more advanced chapters mostly everything at least until code was suddenly introduced. Then it became a guessing game as to what it was trying to do.
The author does not seem to realize that it is more difficult to try to understand somebody else's program than it is to write your own program from scratch. As a consequence the reader wastes a lot of time trying to guess what his program is doing.
Note: this review is of the 2nd edition and does not necessarily reflect the 3rd. But, then again, every other review on this page prior to mine is about the 2nd edition as well!

Although this text is always mentioned in the same breath as other introductory textbooks on prolog, I don't think I've ever seen it described as "the best."
The book which usually takes the palm in such comparisons is "Art of Prolog." While "Art of Prolog" is an outstanding book, I think that now, in 2006, it has been eclipsed by the 3rd edition Bratko's book. Why?

Simply this: Bratko's textbook is (as far as I'm aware) the _only_ textbook on prolog which treats the language as a living, developing language! Other textbooks are great for their time, but they are unfortunately stuck in their time. Its as if nothing has happend to the prolog language since February 16, 1987. But this isn't true at all!

The biggest case in point: constraint logic programming! Bratko's text is the only introductory prolog textbook to even acknowledge the existance of CLP. And Bratko gives very lucid descriptions of it, along with very helpful examples and challenging exercises.

Another case in point: inductive logic programming! An entire new branch of machine learning theory has risen, based on logic programming, and NONE of the other introductory prolog textbooks cover it? Come on guys!

I would love to see a 4th edition of this book, because since this one has been published, logic programming has moved even further ahead. Constraint handling rules (CHR), logical functional languages (like Curry), using prolog for the semantic web, etc etc etc. It might be the best kept secret in computer science, but logic programming is really still one of the most exciting areas of programming, and Bratko's book does the best job of staying abreast of, and conveying the excitment of, this living and dynamic field.

Professor Bratko has done a tremendous job of putting all the fundamental concepts of Prolog and its applications in various areas of AI. Although this book is focused on Prolog, the concepts that he has discussed are so fundamental that they can be implemented in other languages like Java as well.

I recommend this book to everyone who wants to learn Prolog. I would also recommend the readers to use a Prolog system to work out the examples and exercises as s/he goes through every chapter. A DEC10 Prolog system (like SICStus Prolog) would probably be the best companion for this book.

Prolog remains academic but still of great educational value. But to get to that value, you need to get past using prolog like a smart procedural language. This book and especially its last few chapters achieve this goal. For this reason I recommend it as a must read for any decent computer scientist.

I am currently working as a computer hardware design engineer. I have always been looking for new software methodology to improve my hardware design flow. Prolog, and especially its presentation in this book, shows me an interesting and powerful view of how computer programming should be.

Overall, I am a true believer in Prolog and logic programming after reading this book.

This, to me, is one of the 4 best books on computer programming. Unfortunately, it is hard. Not because the book is poorly written - it is like a wonderful story, but because understanding how to think declaratively after being taught something like C or Java is like someone giving you a pair of wings when you're a mudfish.

Thinking declaratively changes how you think about problems and how you write code. It's a career changing experience. This book leads the way.

Top 4:
* Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs (Sussman, Abelson)
* The Art of Prolog by Sterling/Shapiro
* Introduction to Algorithms by Cormen, etc.
* Concepts, Techniques, and Models of Computer Programming by Van Roy and Haridi

Admittedly, this one tends to be a bit pricey. But, the content is pure gold for any programmer. Nowhere is the Prolog paradigm better conveyed than here. And, it is of little value to you if you attempt to learn prolog with a mindset of some other language. Prolog is unique and demands a unique way of looking at computer programming in general. It is dated a bit in that it does not cover all the latest developments in Prolog/AI research but no other Prolog books provide the foundational understanding that it does. Get this one for a solid foundation and then build on it with others. See my listmania list of AI Language books for suggestions of followup titles.

This book is a must for anyone starting to program in Prolog or interested in logic programming.

A downsize of the book (if any) can be that it could have detailed more in the respect of Prolog's applications. The pleasant style of the authors would have made a wonderful introduction into these fields.

A real pleasure to read.

This book is useful for those that need more information about LISP and Prolog, and for my class regarding the subject at OSU, it makes perfect sense

I prefer Symbolic Computing With Lisp and Prolog much more than other books which I have read concerning the subject. It is quite informative, and even has a touch of humor from time to time.

I prefer Symbolic Computing With Lisp and Prolog much more than other books which I have read concerning the subject. It is quite informative, and even has a touch of humor from time to time.

Robert Mueller has the best, most understandable and down right well written book on this subject I have ever laid eyes on. This book helped me understand more about the subject without ever making it sound tedious or dull. Thank you Mr. Mueller. Admirable work.

This book is an excellent resource for a novice user of Informix. I give this one 2 thumbs up. Even my expert coworker peeks into it once in a great while.

My work place has the Informix books offered by the vendor which can be highly wordy and, for me, unreadable. Also, the book by Paul Mahler, "An Informix 4GL Tutorial" is pure crap. Or maybe the title should have been, "Mahler's Only Way To Do Informix--An Unapproachable approach".

I have used both the first and 2nd editions written by Cathy Kipp. The first edition used a smaller font, was easy to read and was more compact and, after using it as a beginner Informix programmer, I grew attached to it. When I started using the 2nd edition, it took me a while to get used to the larger font or the more spread out documentation. In other words, a command could be covered in a single page on the first edition making it easy to read, but it took 2 pages to cover the same command in the 2nd edition. However, the 2nd edition had more substance over all.

Warning to the buyer! The books page numbers in the index and the actual pages those references are located can be a couple pages off. AFter the index was written, a few more lines were added throughout the book. This screws with your ability to find an indexed item in the book. For example, the index says: Isolation Levels p.446 but the actual page is p.448,9. Although, the plus side is the index is very thorough and make finding needed commands easily (within a page or 2).

Drawback #2, as with most large paperbacks that are used on a daily basis, the book will start falling apart--pages unglueing out of the binder after a few months to a year.

But again, it has definitely been an excellent resource. I almost would give this one 4 stars except, compared to the couple other resources I have seen, this one beats all the rest. Even if it has its couple of flaws.

If you have any questions, I will be more than happy to respond.

This is an excellent reference for anyone who is involved with Informix 4GL development. The book provides all the basics of SQL and 4GL. I often use it from time to time for my development projects.

Ringwood and Huntbach were my professors in graduate school. They taught us a course titled Multi Agent Systems. Much of the areas covered in those lectures find their way in this superb account on AI programming.

The first few chapters are accessible to readers without a strong AI background. The material gets more involving as we go through the book.

Interestingly, the book develops the idea of 'agent-oriented' programming chronologically from the the days preceeding the Fifth generation project to present day multi-agent technologies.

I would highly recommend the book to all AI students, researchers and practitioners.

I was browsing on the Web, and discovered that this was listed on Amazon.
The paper was an elegant piece of research - as author I am biased :-).
The paper was not especially well publicised, and was only one of many papers that could have been listed. It was amazing to me that it was listed here.

This is a wonderful, code rich, book on language processing for computational linguists and language engineers. It is both theory and example rich with considerable detail throughout. The book is clearly written and very well structured!!

Highly recommended!

The book is useful to everyone interested in the subject of Logic Programming. It contains all aspects of Logic Programming in a clear and highly comprehensive manner. The concepts of SLD-resolution, negation as failure and many others have been presented so lucidly that a person with almost no knowledge in the subject can read them like stories. I liked the chapter of hardware simulation very much. I strongly recommend the book at least to those who have already made up their minds to switch to another subject. Readers may just look at the book once to verify my words.

The Sowa work is important for anyone who designs a knowledge based system with a fairly complex rule structure. The mechanics of programming design of a knowledge system involve metalevel programming. The systems designer writes rules and rules on how to use the
rules. A rule has a head, a body (goal). A goal is either a
single or conjunction. A single goal always succeeds. A
conjunctive goal succeeds if both parts succeed. A single goal
succeeds if there is a rule whose head matches the goal and whose
body succeeds.

The programming mechanics of artificial intelligence must be
presented in an easy-to-follow format; otherwise the technical
programming theory and implementation will be more difficult
for a novice to grasp. This work is perfect as a supplemental
text in an introductory or intermediate-level course in
artificial intelligence in a computer science or engineering
program. A strength of the work is that the author provides a good explanation of the basic theory of AI programming
with accompanying examples depicting implementation.

The work is a solid value for the price charged. This presentation would be very helpful in a formal research project
of Artificial Intelligence.

This is a wonderful book for many reasons, but the biggest wonder was that it was ever published! It documents obscure research about an obscure programming language--and the point of the research is to find out why it is so obscure!

If you are a big fan of prolog, but are still wondering why it didn't take off, this book will tell you. For me, the biggest take away messages are these:

1. The very uniformity of the syntax--which makes Prolog "beautiful" in a sense--is a source of obscurity, because since everything is just clauses, its hard to tell what any particular clause is doing. In, say, C, its easy to tell if something is a for-loop or not--the keyword "for" is right there. But in prolog, iteration over a range of values looks pretty much like any other programming statement. There is no syntactic differentiation to help you understand the semantics.

2. In order to understand a prolog program, you pretty much have to be a master of redaction criticism. For example, a prolog program to sum up the values of all the integers in a list of integers is typically written by taking the code for the member/2 function and editing it--adding here an accumulator, there a summation, etc. This is called "Skeletons and Techniques" by Lee Naish and other exponents. It is a very powerful way to develop prolog programs, but someone else wanting to understand _your_ prolog program must first understand how member/2 works, then they must work backwards from the changes you've made to it, first determining how you've edited member/2 and what your editorial changes mean, before they can understand your code. Its very tricky!

Talk about a book which isn't for everyone! But if you are in the business of designing languages, there's lots of interesting insights here just waiting to be gleaned.