This book explains the concepts underlying programming languages, and demonstrates how these concepts are synthesized in the major paradigms: imperative, OO, concurrent, functional, logic and scripting.  It gives greatest prominence to the OO paradigm, and uses Java as the main exemplar language.

It includes numerous examples, case studies of several major programming languages, and numerous end-of-chapter exercises. Sample solutions to most of the exercises are provided at the book’s companion Web site

David Watt is a Professor of Computing Science at Glasgow University. His research interests include the design, specification, and implementation of programming languages, and he has published several books on the topic. He has many years of teaching experience on this and other programming subjects.