The Abacus: The World's First Computing System
by Jesse Dilson

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Book Reviews of The Abacus: The World's First Computing System

Book Review: Way too simple and short
Summary: 3 Stars

But still, look at what he teaches you: adding subtraction in detail, and some multiplication and division with doubted validity. He also takes like a bunch of pages describing adding and subtracting decimals. But that's unnecessary because it's the exact same thing with minor differences that he could have stated in a page and replaced with more information, like exponentiation.

The included abacus has height about that of 1 floppy disk and width of that of 1 and 1/4 floppies. It might even be smaller. Plus, it's hard to move and isn't colored (just wood and plastic).

In sum, this book is a total ripoff if you had wanted to do some cool stuff on the abacus. On the other hand, if you just wanted the book for casual purposes, maybe it's worth it. But the author's tone treats you like a moron that can't do arithmetic (he explains things like carrying and borrowing like you're in kindergarten and treats his multiplication and division methods, which are exact replicas from our normal paper ways, like the hardest things in the world)

Summary of The Abacus: The World's First Computing System

Computers & Internet Books

• Subjects > Computers & Technology
• Science & Math > Mathematics