I''m taking a Java course at college, and we are starting to learn about vectors, lists, maps, trees, and all those special data structures. However, I''m more of a C++ programmer, so I was wondering what a good book was for learning the C++ versions of these. I have Accelerated C++, and it does a good job on vectors, and a decent job on lists and maps, but it leaves off there. I am also interested in learning the mechanics behind each of the data structures. For example, (at least in Java) the nodes of a list are stored in random spots in memory, not in one contiguous region, which is why searching lists is slow, but inserting/deleting elements is fast (and vice versa for vectors). I just learned this today in class, so yeah, I was pretty excited (pathetic, I know). These are the kinds of things I''m looking for. Descriptions, explanations, examples, the whole works. Anyway, good book suggestions are appreciated. Thanks.

Do you want dead tree or online information?

online:

The articles and resources section here on gamedev has a few articles on the basics of data structures.

SGI''s STL page provides a good reference on how to use the STL containers.
www.sgi.com/tech/stl

dead tree:

"The C++ Standard Library" by Nicolai M. Josuttis is a good reference. (Beware some of the sample code: it''s not exactly production quality)

"Introduction to Algorithms" by Cormen, Leiserson and Rivest explains what the data structures are, why they work and when to use them.

I found that Data Structures for Game Programmers by Ron Penton was a good book on (go on guess ) data structures. Cant say i''ve read it all yet (i tend to jump around books alot) but what i''ve read thus far has been good

http://www.brpreiss.com/books/opus4/html/book.html