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Some I haven't seen mentioned here: 1. Coders at Work Peter Seibel does an amazing job of asking programmers questions that make them explain their methodolog

Some I haven't seen mentioned here: 1. Coders at Work Peter Seibel does an amazing job of asking programmers questions that make them explain their methodology. The interview with Donald Knuth is awesome; really enjoyed hearing him talk about literate programming. 2. The Soul of a New Machine Tracy Kidder's 1981 Pulitzer Prize winner I think is a brilliant case study on how engineers work together and the things that can go wrong and right with different personalities interacting with highly technical ideas. The project in this book starts without the consent of management, which to me shows the value of questioning the system to add business / engineering value. 3. Little Schemer Small book that will give your brain a serious workout and show you how to problem solve with Lisp like languages. Even if you never end up using a Lisp dialect, this book expands your brain. I have more here, all of which I recommend for software and other careers http://benbrostoff.github.io/books/ http://benbrostoff.github.io/books/

humbleMouse 8y ago
+1 to Coders at Work. That book does an excellent job of showing the human side of programming. I think too many people approach the industry thinking programmers are god-like deities who have an unlimited amount of time and brain power. Coders at Work does a great job breaking down the "imposter syndrome" plaguing new people coming into the industry.
bgutierrez 8y ago
+1 for Little Schemer. Before I read it, I could write recursive methods, but after I read it I could think about recursion naturally.
- nur0n 8y ago
  This! The primary benefit of this book is in learning to understand recursion. Lisp just happens to be a good environment for naturally expressing recursion.
mrweasel 8y ago
The Soul of a New Machine is a wonderful book. I don't think it helped me career-wise, but it's an absolute joy to read.

humbleMouse 8y ago

+1 to Coders at Work. That book does an excellent job of showing the human side of programming. I think too many people approach the industry thinking programmers are god-like deities who have an unlimited amount of time and brain power. Coders at Work does a great job breaking down the "imposter syndrome" plaguing new people coming into the industry.

bgutierrez 8y ago

+1 for Little Schemer. Before I read it, I could write recursive methods, but after I read it I could think about recursion naturally.

nur0n 8y ago
This! The primary benefit of this book is in learning to understand recursion. Lisp just happens to be a good environment for naturally expressing recursion.

mrweasel 8y ago

The Soul of a New Machine is a wonderful book. I don't think it helped me career-wise, but it's an absolute joy to read.