There are enough answers about why these kinds of books are not directly relevant to modern software engineering, but are good for putting said discipline in th

There are enough answers about why these kinds of books are not directly relevant to modern software engineering, but are good for putting said discipline in the context of computer science. That being said, I think you CAN put all that you learn in those books into practice, even if it won't be in your job - try out competitive programming. Try TopCoder or CodeForces, or Google's Code Jam. I think Hackerrank is similar and heavily used for weeding out programmers during the early stages of interviews. As this article states: https://glenmccallum.com/2019/05/14/senior-developers-rejected-jobs https://glenmccallum.com/2019/05/14/senior-developers-reject... this sort of "testing" could actually become even more common place for job applications because of how handy it is for recruiters. But yeah, if you enjoy being competitive in general, consuming books like CLRS or TAOCP and then joining competitions will actually give you a good feel for a programming world very different from the usual, day to day development you'll do at your job.