<p>A good place to start is "Parameterized Complexity Theory" by Jörg Flum and Martin Grohe, published by Springer.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-05-22T17:05:31.907Z
2013-05-22T17:05:31.907Z
Adam Bouland
<p>Sorry for the self-advertisement, but this spring we have been developing a hybrid undergrad/grad course at Stanford on Parameterized Algorithms and Complexity. We've tried to "re-do" many of the proofs of the core theorems in the literature, in a way that's somewhat more accessible to undergraduates. The scribe notes are (mostly) <a href="http://cs266.stanford.edu/">online</a>. However we have not carefully edited all of them, so I would not take the notes as gospel yet.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-11-28T21:24:45.123Z
The scribe notes are not there anymore. Will you repost them?
Austin Buchanan
CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-05-22T21:27:16.357Z
2013-05-22T21:27:16.357Z
Ryan Williams
<p>Daniel Marx has several interesting talks on FPT and related topics on his website.
<a href="http://www.cs.bme.hu/~dmarx/" rel="noreferrer">http://www.cs.bme.hu/~dmarx/</a></p>

<p><a href="http://www.cs.bme.hu/~dmarx/talk.php" rel="noreferrer">http://www.cs.bme.hu/~dmarx/talk.php</a></p>

<p>See also the recent collection of essays/book on the occasion of the 60th birthday of Mike Fellows.
<a href="http://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-642-30891-8/page/1" rel="noreferrer">http://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-642-30891-8/page/1</a></p>

<p><strong>Update (Nov 2014):</strong> Marek Cygan et al (long list of authors) have a book titled "Parameterized Algorithms" that should be coming out soon (to be published by Springer). I have seen drafts and it is quite nice. More algorithmic than the Flum-Grohe book and also covers several recent developments.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-05-22T22:12:57.883Z
2014-11-27T16:16:24.627Z
2014-11-27T16:16:24.627Z
Chandra Chekuri
<p>See <a href="http://fpt.wikidot.com/books-and-survey-articles" rel="nofollow">http://fpt.wikidot.com/books-and-survey-articles</a>.
I also prefer Flum and Grohe, especially for the hardness part, whereas the book by Niedermeier is more focused on the algorithmic side. Note that there are some technical differences between the two, for instance the definition of a parameter as polynomial time computable function in the book of Flum and Grohe, which has to be altered if one likes to consider smaller parameterized space classes (see <a href="http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-33293-7_20" rel="nofollow">this article</a> by Elberfeld,
Stockhusen and Tantau).</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2013-05-22T19:39:09.123Z
2013-11-11T10:30:22.957Z
2013-11-11T10:30:22.957Z
frafl
<p>What about the 1999 classical (first?) book on the topic by Rod Downey and Mike Fellows?</p>

<p>Two years ago, I heard that Rod and Mike were going to bring out a second edition of their book -- may be it is out now.  Mike's website <a href="http://www.mrfellows.net" rel="nofollow">http://www.mrfellows.net</a> should have more info.  You can sign up for his mailing list (newsletter) which comes out every 2-3 months.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-07-27T14:49:32.777Z
The 2nd edition is out (in 2015). The name of the book is *Fundamentals of Parameterized Complexity* . I feel that this book covers the basics in more detail than the famous book by Flum and Grohe.
Cyriac Antony
CC BY-SA 3.0
2014-11-27T21:45:23.167Z
2014-11-27T21:45:23.167Z
Sameer Gupta
<p>A relatively new textbook is by Marek Cygan, Fedor V. Fomin, Łukasz Kowalik, Daniel Lokshtanov, Dániel Marx, Marcin Pilipczuk, Michał Pilipczuk, and Saket Saurabh <a href="https://www.springer.com/in/book/9783319212746" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://www.springer.com/in/book/9783319212746</a></p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-12-23T06:55:14.067Z
2018-12-23T06:55:14.067Z
kauray
<p><em>Parameterized Algorithms</em> by Cygan et. al. is a nice textbook. </p>

<p><a href="https://www.mimuw.edu.pl/~malcin/book/parameterized-algorithms.pdf" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://www.mimuw.edu.pl/~malcin/book/parameterized-algorithms.pdf</a></p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-07-27T15:51:47.570Z
this book is already included in kauray's answer: https://cstheory.stackexchange.com/a/42088/47855
Cyriac Antony
CC BY-SA 4.0
2019-07-27T15:56:34.417Z
also given as update in Chandra Chekuri's answer: https://cstheory.stackexchange.com/a/17749/47855
Cyriac Antony
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-12-23T18:51:30.880Z
2018-12-23T18:51:30.880Z
Ativ Joshi
<p>I would like to learn about Parametrized Complexity (both on the algorithmic side and on the hardness side). What books/lecture notes can I read on this subject?</p>

<reference-request><parameterized-complexity><fixed-parameter-tractable>
Books/Lecture Notes on Parametrized Complexity
Igor Shinkar
# Books/Lecture Notes on Parametrized Complexity

(Asked by: username_0 on 2013-05-22)

I would like to learn about Parametrized Complexity (both on the algorithmic side and on the hardness side). What books/lecture notes can I read on this subject?

**Tags:** reference-request, parameterized-complexity, fixed-parameter-tractable


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## 7 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2013-05-22. Score: 24

A good place to start is "Parameterized Complexity Theory" by Jörg Flum and Martin Grohe, published by Springer.


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### Answer by username_2 on 2013-05-22. Score: 17

Sorry for the self-advertisement, but this spring we have been developing a hybrid undergrad/grad course at Stanford on Parameterized Algorithms and Complexity. We've tried to "re-do" many of the proofs of the core theorems in the literature, in a way that's somewhat more accessible to undergraduates. The scribe notes are (mostly) [online](http://cs266.stanford.edu/). However we have not carefully edited all of them, so I would not take the notes as gospel yet.

> **Comments:**
> **username_3**: The scribe notes are not there anymore. Will you repost them?  

---

### Answer by username_4 on 2013-05-22. Score: 14

Daniel Marx has several interesting talks on FPT and related topics on his website.
<http://www.cs.bme.hu/~dmarx/>

<http://www.cs.bme.hu/~dmarx/talk.php>

See also the recent collection of essays/book on the occasion of the 60th birthday of Mike Fellows.
<http://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-642-30891-8/page/1>

**Update (Nov 2014):** Marek Cygan et al (long list of authors) have a book titled "Parameterized Algorithms" that should be coming out soon (to be published by Springer). I have seen drafts and it is quite nice. More algorithmic than the Flum-Grohe book and also covers several recent developments.


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### Answer by username_5 on 2013-05-22. Score: 7

See <http://fpt.wikidot.com/books-and-survey-articles>.
I also prefer Flum and Grohe, especially for the hardness part, whereas the book by Niedermeier is more focused on the algorithmic side. Note that there are some technical differences between the two, for instance the definition of a parameter as polynomial time computable function in the book of Flum and Grohe, which has to be altered if one likes to consider smaller parameterized space classes (see [this article](http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-642-33293-7_20) by Elberfeld,
Stockhusen and Tantau).


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### Answer by username_6 on 2014-11-27. Score: 4

What about the 1999 classical (first?) book on the topic by Rod Downey and Mike Fellows?

Two years ago, I heard that Rod and Mike were going to bring out a second edition of their book -- may be it is out now. Mike's website <http://www.mrfellows.net> should have more info. You can sign up for his mailing list (newsletter) which comes out every 2-3 months.

> **Comments:**
> **username_7**: The 2nd edition is out (in 2015). The name of the book is *Fundamentals of Parameterized Complexity* . I feel that this book covers the basics in more detail than the famous book by Flum and Grohe.  

---

### Answer by username_8 on 2018-12-23. Score: 2

A relatively new textbook is by Marek Cygan, Fedor V. Fomin, Łukasz Kowalik, Daniel Lokshtanov, Dániel Marx, Marcin Pilipczuk, Michał Pilipczuk, and Saket Saurabh <https://www.springer.com/in/book/9783319212746>


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### Answer by username_9 on 2018-12-23. Score: 1

*Parameterized Algorithms* by Cygan et. al. is a nice textbook.

<https://www.mimuw.edu.pl/~malcin/book/parameterized-algorithms.pdf>

> **Comments:**
> **username_7**: this book is already included in username_8's answer: https://cstheory.stackexchange.com/a/42088/47855  
> **username_7**: also given as update in username_4's answer: https://cstheory.stackexchange.com/a/17749/47855  

---

