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As a counterweight, the first few chapters of Patterns of Software (not the GoF book but Richard Gabriel's https://dreamsongs.com/Files/PatternsOfSoftware.pdf h
by akkartik 4y ago
As a counterweight, the first few chapters of Patterns of Software (not the GoF book but Richard Gabriel's https://dreamsongs.com/Files/PatternsOfSoftware.pdf https://dreamsongs.com/Files/PatternsOfSoftware.pdf) constitute the #3 most profound piece of writing on software I've ever read.
- nextos 4y agoWhat are the other top ones?
- akkartik 4y ago#1: Peter Naur, "Programming as Theory-Building", http://akkartik.name/naur.pdf http://akkartik.name/naur.pdf #2: Christopher Alexander, "Notes on the Synthesis of Form" which is also mentioned in OP, and which I read based on the mentions in Patterns of Software. So that's another thing to thank #3 for.
- 3452356346 4y agoI was going to post something similar. That book is phenomenal. It's also very frank about many matters. For example, despite Gabriel being a major Lisp proponent, he concedes that contrary to his expectations (and what PG suggests in http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html) that Common Lisp with CLOS would provide a factor of 4 or 5 of productivity over C++, that in practice, for his team, it was only more like 30% (which meshes with with Fred Brooks' "No Silver Bullet" thesis).