From my years of being a C ++ programmer, this is definitely the one of the best reference books I've ever used. This book cover all the aspects of C ++, one of the most complicated programming language, with a nice detail of everything, Including STL (Standard Template Library, the new C ++ standard library). HOWEVER, this book is, like all of the previous editions, NOT a language / Programming Tutorial. To read this book, you will need tons of C ++ and OOP knowledge, even if you are an ace programmer C (since C is quite different from C ++ in "The Way of Thinking"). Especially, if you are a novice, please read one or two "good" primer book before coming to this one, otherwise you will get lost easily. (Believe me, it's happened to me before when i tried to read the 2nd edition). More Over. In this edition, the author, Bjarne Stroustrup, added 2 more appendixes on "locales" and "Standard Library Exception safety," Which would make this book even more useful and more complete than any previous editions. And would make this become "A Bible" for C ++ Language Programmaing. If you are a "serious" C ++ programmer (or wannabe), you can not get anything better than this. This is a MUST!