Stanley B. Lippman is the coauthor of one of those invaluable C++ textbooks ( C++ Primer with Josee Lajoie) and knows how much it takes to explain all aspects of the C++ programming language in minute detail: it takes 1,237 pages. Now, that is too much to get going real quick, he says. Drawing from his own experience, he told us an anecdote about learning programming languages. 

He had been asked to solve a programming problem. Being as he is fluent in C++, he solved it easily in C++. They liked it?and asked him to rewrite it in Perl. His fellow programmers weren't heavy-duty programmers, but knew Perl, Tcl, and the like. Being fluent in C++, but knowing nothing of Perl, he was in a bind and he decided to read a book and learn enough Perl really quickly to rewrite his C++ program. Fortunately, he found the right book for that purpose, learned Perl in a couple of days, reimplemented his programming, and decided that there should be an equivalent book for learning the essential of C++. Here is that book. 

Essential C++ is what it promises to be?a book on C++ that leaves out countless details and focuses on the core language. You learn just what you need to get your job done using C++. It is, however, not a textbook for absolute beginners who want to learn programming. There are other titles available for that purpose (see The Practice of Programming by Brian W. Kernighan and Rob Pike, for instance). Instead, it is for practicing programmers who already know what they want to say, but need to learn how to express it in C++. For instance, you will not find a comprehensive discussion of operator overloading or multiple and virtual inheritance, because you won't need that for solving an average programming problem. 

The strength of Essential C++ is its omission of distracting details. Lippman teaches C++ novices what they need to know in digestible doses. He starts with basic elements of C++ programming and guides the learner through procedural programming, generic programming, object-base and object-oriented programming up to programming with templates, and eventually exception handling. In all cases he provides enough details to be productive. You find practical and concise examples, and references to other books are provided where further details might be needed. You cannot claim you're a C++ guru after reading Essential C++ ?it sure takes more to really understand that language in depth?but you'll be capable to program in C++. 

Essential C++ offers fast-track learning of the sophisticated kind for practitioners with no time to waste. 

Angelika Langer develops and teaches classes on advanced C++, STL, multithreading, internationalization, and Java. She served on the ANSI/ISO C++ Committee from 1993 to 1998. Klaus Kreft is a software architect and consultant with 15+ years of experience in industrial software development. He works for Siemens Business Services in Germany. Langer and Kreft are authors of "Standard C++ IOStreams and Locales: Advanced Programmer's Guide and Reference" (Addison-Wesley, 1999) and are columnists for C++ Report magazine.