Style The book is a collection of papers written by several authors and therefore not intended as a textbook . As a consequence, the style of the chapters varies from elementary (for instance, chapter 1) to advanced (for instance, chapter 6) . Nonetheless, the contributions are coherent and built u p in such a way that there is not too much overlapping . To understand chapter 1 one does not need any knowledge of the subject at all . For chapter 2- 5 and 8, one just needs some basic knowledge in elementary number theory and linear algebra . In these chapters, the authors make every effort to keep the style as elementary as possible . Chapter 6 and 7 can be recommended to the advanced reader . This is mainly due to the intrinsic formalis m involved with the complexity theoretic definitions . 4 Opinion The book is an excellent introduction to the specified area and serves as well to freshen up th e knowledge of the advanced reader . It was certainly the state of the art at the time it appeared . I strongly recommend it as an introduction to cryptology and computational number theory
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