Title: The Deitels know their stuff, but can't communicate.
Product review: I am a C++ programmer, and my wife is using this book for a C++ class. I am constantly amazed at the ideas she gets from this book until I read Deitels' bizarre explanations. Also, the exercises are ambiguous, so the course instructor sometimes interprets the requirements differently. The CD contains the exact text of the book, plus audio. Part of the text is presented in sequence, other parts you see in a popup window only if you happen to click on a busy-bee icon. The only use I see for the CD is the search function, which would help to deal with the disorganized presentation of the material. Unfortunately the search returns nothing, or a list of unrelated items. You need to copy the CD to the hard drive to speed up access. The free Visual C++ compiler is nice, but don't run multiple copies to get multiple editors, as you can destroy your source file. Check out Eckel, Lippman, Meyers, Stroustrup.
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