Semantics with Applications: An Appetizer (Undergraduate Topics in Computer Science)

From the reviews:

"This book title, with its explicit reference to applications, quickly grabbed my attention due to the theoretical nature of formal semantics. ... In any case, this book certainly fits the bill for an undergraduate course on the topic. ... It also includes plenty of solved examples and exercises for students to help them grasp the key ideas and techniques behind the different mathematical models that can be used to describe the computations performed by a computer program." (Fernando Berzal, Computing Reviews, January, 2008)

"This book presents a rigorous introduction to the main three approaches: operational semantics, denotational semantics, and axiomatic semantics. This book investigates the relationship between the various methods, and describes some of the main ideas by using applications. ... Several exercises are provided. ... help the student to understand definitions, results, and techniques ... ." (G. Ciobanu, ACM Computing Reviews, May, 2009)