> doubt there are many self-taught programmers who've actually spent hours drawing out trees and solving recurrences and so on I am a self-taught programmer th

> doubt there are many self-taught programmers who've actually spent hours drawing out trees and solving recurrences and so on I am a self-taught programmer that has done exactly this. What good is reading the material if you don't pound some of that stuff into your brain? I never did homework in school, but I have done tons of it for myself.