Contemporary Abstract Algebra

I love this book. It is really well organized, easy to follow along, but still taught in pretty good depth. I recommend it!

so far so good

I had to buy this book for my Abstract Algebra I class. I felt that this book worked OK because of the quality of my professor, but I do not feel it is a good book if you want to teach yourself and are new to the concepts in it. There are many places where the proof will say "clearly" or another similar phrase when it is most definitely not clear to any one but the author. Also the answers on the back of the book are not really answers at all- I remember one problem saying- "see proof of Theorem __ on page ___" which said "refer to Theorem __ on page ___" which said "proof is left as Exercise #___" so while it was clear that the proofs would all be similar- none of them were given, so there really was no answer.All in all I am not selling back my book because I feel that it has some good concepts in it, but I am also hanging onto my notes from class in order to interpret the book at a later date if need be.

Very good condition, excellent book

Gallian's Contemporary Abstract Algebra is a decent text for the topic, and is one of the few texts out there which manages to be a the standard for many universities, but also manages to remain accessible, readable, and enjoyable for students at all levels.The book contains 33 chapters, of which the first (roughly) 22 make up the core of a two semester undergraduate algebra course covering groups, rings, and fields. Most of the chapters are rather short (10-20 pages it seems on average), but this thorough breakdown of chapters makes each and every one rather simple to read and understand, without introducing too much at one time (refer to Herstein's  Topics in Algebra  if you want to see a book which doesn't have enough chapters, teaching what is essentially an entire semester worth of group theory in one overbloated chapter, which is easy to get lost in). Gallian is great at providing examples, and gives definitions and theorems with very clear and concise language. For the most part, he tends to try to use standard terminology and provides plenty of examples and diagrams to aid students with the learning.The final nine chapters of the book, making up roughly 1/3 of the textbook, contains many special topics. Some of these are very standard chapters for abstract algebra texts which are sometimes skipped (even if they really shouldn't be) such as the Sylow Theorems and Finite Simple Groups, but you'll also find chapters on coding theory, Galois theory, Frieze groups, and more. The material presented in these chapters demonstrate the true beauty of abstract algebra, and while it is very unlikely that a traditional course could ever include all of these chapters as part of the core material, these chapters provide great opportunities for student projects, promoting student interest in research, or even a "third" semester of special topics in abstract algebra for motivated undergraduates. Still, the organization be slightly better if these chapters were placed in the book immediately after the pre-req material motivating the topic, and simply tagged as "optional" rather than relegating it to the back 1/3 of the book.The book has some very nice exercises, including some which are more or less standard, and some which present material at a much more advanced level. There is no shortage of exercises either. Each chapter provides anywhere from 20-80 (or so) exercises representing all levels, as well as additional "supplemental" exercises every few chapters. Hints and selected solutions are provided at the end of the textbook for odd numbered exercises, which I would strongly advise not turning to until you believe that you fully understand the material at hand and simply want to check your work. However, solutions and hints are a very excellent key to ensuring that you understand the material. My experience with a lot of textbooks is that they go too far with the solutions (such as giving complete proofs, which isn't helpful because it leads to merely memorizing answers) or aren't thorough enough (I've seen an analysis textbook, for example, which gives hints for a small number of exercises at the end of the book which give unhelpful advice like "this is easy."). Gallian tends to give very brief hints which can motivate a complete proof for students making a serious attempt to know the information, but still requires the student to develop a complete proof without being completely coddled. Of course, for even-numbered exercises, sometimes which are "paired" with the preceding exercises, there are no solutions or hints, but the flow follows along naturally. The book lacks true/false questions, which are actually very useful for an abstract algebra course; however, Gallian places some of these on an interactive (though somewhat buggy) Java applet his website.Some serious mathematicians are put off by the inclusion of history discussions in the text, along with the sprinkling of various pop-culture quotes at different places, and while some textbooks do get a little silly over these things, none of this tends to distract from the ability to learn the material.One unfortunate aspect about this book is that the popularity of it has turned it in to one of those books where the publisher keeps cranking out new editions of the book at a pace that is completely unnecessary. It is great when a new edition is published and contains significant and substantial updates, but the updates to this book have really not been necessary for the past few editions. But with that being said, most of the more recent older editions of the book are sufficient for the material, you just have to be careful with the numbering of exercises.This book is one of the standards for an upper-level undergraduate abstract algebra course and hopefully it will remain that way until somebody comes up with something a little bit better. In the current era, though, it provides an excellent and readable text for students which is capable of further motivating interest in the (pardon the pun) field of abstract algebra.

Perfect!

Good book. Easy to understand, gentle enough as a first text but advanced enough to make you work. This text was required for an introductory abstract algebra course I took.Another user complained about the difficulty of the book and the fact that some of the proofs are not self contained. In particular he mentioned caleys theorem as an example. I had no problem competing the extra steps required not listed in the theorem when I read it.

This is an alright book. For some of the problems in the book, the examples from the chapter don’t really help me complete the problem. I am usually just using my notes from class and also searching the internet to do the problems. For some of the answers that are in the back of the book, it does not give you the full answer. It just says which theorem should be used which is still helpful but not when you are trying to study for a test. I have rented the eTextbook version and there is one problem with it. That is some of the problems/examples are covered up by a grey box that states “Text not available due to copyright restrictions.” Luckily for me, my professor posts the full problem that is for homework. I spent $40 for no reason.

The book has funny quotes and thorough explanations.