Ask HN: Looking for a book on algorithms and data structures

I better recommend you to try your hands on code-forces, CP Algorithm etc. If you got stuck in any of the problems just read the discussion and given solution. If you continue this you several months then you quickly learning the data structures and algorithms. Because if you don't apply DSA which you will learn from any book then i guess it doesn't add much value to you. In the beginning problems might not able to solve but after giving time and looking solution you will start getting things. And I guess its just a myth or we can say a phobia that you need to know each and every piece of mathematics.

And I think graph is a data structure that you should be work upon. For this you can refer this book Introduction to Graph Theory Subsequent Edition by Douglas Brent West. This book you can just read and practice while solving problems on above coding problem platforms.

So, I recommend you first do code-forces DIV3, DIV2 problems, gain some confidence, and then pick any DSA book.

Or one thing you can also do just filter out problems related to math,Combinatorics etc.on code-forces and try to solve them. Through this approach you will learn to apply the concepts.

I hope this comment add some value to you! Happy coding.

Im not good at maths but to get my work done this books helped me a lot:

https://www.amazon.de/Problem-Solving-Algorithms-Structures-... If I remember correctly it is Python 2

https://www.amazon.de/Algorithms-Illuminated-Part-1-Basics/d...

https://www.amazon.de/Algorithms-Illuminated-Part-Graph-Stru...

https://www.amazon.de/Algorithms-Illuminated-Part-Dynamic-Pr...

I’m in the initial phase of structuring a book that aims to teach some simple algorithms and data structures using Python. The idea is that the reader should do the (guided) exercises to learn how to build those data structures. It’s basically “learn by doing”.

For instance, to teach what a stack is I’ll explain the basic idea of a stack, then provide a base class and the reader must implement each method (init, push, pop, peek, etc) given the requirements and intended results of each functionality.

I already have a kind-of “learn by doing” ebook about Python (https://github.com/joaoventura/full-speed-python), so it’s like a follow-up to that one.

Don’t know if people are interested in a book like this, though..

Another vote for Tim Roughgarden’s work. As someone who recently became a software engineer without a cs degree, his Stanford Algorithms I & II lectures (similar content to his books) have been the best instruction I’ve had on DS&A. I’ve dabbled with Skiena’s book, Grokking Algorithms, CTCI, and I now also have a copy CLRS that I use for reference or to go deeper on certain things. But I revisit Tim’s work all the time. Can’t recommend him enough.