6 ms·

Books of a Highly Effective Programmer (2009)

171 points by krat0sprakhar 14y ago

tinco 14y ago
Hi, could anyone help me with understanding why the lambda papers deserve a whole book? What I understand from the history is that they are a set of papers that define and explain the Scheme programming language. If so, shouldn't the book be broader by including more of literature on LISP or even AI programming in general?
- cchooper 14y ago
  Although the lambda papers talk about Scheme, that's not what they're really about. They're really about... lambda. The takeaway is that many common features of languages can be thought of as disguised uses of the lambda operator. So lambda is actually the unifying abstraction behind many languages, even if they don't know it. The original 'Lambda the Ultimate X' papers are very short, so no reason not to give them a try.
- Evbn 14y ago
  Scheme is just the language used to give concrete examples for a set of papers about Lambda. Guy Steele is one of the greatest communicators in computer science. Brilliant and charming. Check out as much of his stuff as you can, like Growing a Language (on YouTube and in print).
econner 14y ago
If the first link under Core to the 10 papers is not up for you: http://web.archive.org/web/20100819054526/http://blog.objectmentor.com/articles/2009/02/26/10-papers-every-programmer-should-read-at-least-twice http://web.archive.org/web/20100819054526/http://blog.object...
phillmv 14y ago
1. Couldn't he have linked to some of this stuff? 2. Some of this stuff is absurdly broad and weirdly pandering. 3. "I have no idea what the copyright implications of this are, so I will be printing out only my own private copy and not making them available publically;" is a totally inadmissible position for a professional programmer to have. The answer is, no, of course you can't make a printed compilation of other people's work and put it up for sale.
- krat0sprakhar 14y ago
  Give the guy a break, I guess its okay to not know about the copyright implications of sharing someone else's work. As it is, he never mentioned that he intends to put the complication up for sale.
- Evbn 14y ago
  He didn't put them up for sale. And most of those papers are old, and some are freely licensed.
- fogus 14y ago
  > 1. Couldn't he have linked to some of this stuff? Probably, but as far as I can tell it's all a Google search away. > 2. ... weirdly pandering. Pandering to whom? > 3. ... is a totally inadmissible position This one has me flummoxed. Should I, as a professional programmer, have a complete working knowledge of copyright law? As it turns out, I do not, so I erred on the side of safety and never offered any of the articles up for sale. Or did you miss that minor fact?
dschiptsov 14y ago
Books? http://karma-engineering.com/lab/wiki/Books http://karma-engineering.com/lab/wiki/Books
meaty 14y ago
I think this should be: 7 books of a highly academic programmer. A highly effective programmer probably should be reading other topics as to be honest, most of programming is laborious non comp Sci stuff.
- Toshio 14y ago
  And what books would you recommend instead?
  - meaty 14y ago
    None at all. Id recommend reading other people's code and thinking about it for a while.
    - minikomi 14y ago
      Just out of curiosity: if you (or anyone else!) had to make a "must read code" list, what would be on it?
      - meaty 14y ago
        Gcc,gnome,openoffice - how not to do something. FreeBSD,llvm,trac,vim - how to use sound engineering.
      - dragonquest 14y ago
        Anything written by Peter Norvig or D Richard Hipp.
    - fogus 14y ago
      Reading code is a great exercise and I've nursed a half-baked post on the topic for years now. However, I'm not sure that code reading is all that's needed.
      - deleted 14y ago
        [deleted]
keefe 14y ago
If I'm going to diverge from read code, write code long enough to do this much reading... I'd rather start with the papers and books recommended for the phd qualifying exam at the top 10 universities.
- Evbn 14y ago
  Why? Looking for a PhD?
  - keefe 14y ago
    the qualifying exam is supposed to represent up-to-date, overall understanding of the field as a whole, note that I deliberately made the distinction about time away from reading/writing code...
- quentusrex 14y ago
  Links to any of those recommended reading lists? The closest I see to such a list is: http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/GradAffairs/CS/Prelims/ http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/GradAffairs/CS/Prelims/
  - keefe 14y ago
    stanford's is pretty sparse http://www-cs.stanford.edu/content/qualifying-exams http://www-cs.stanford.edu/content/qualifying-exams http://www.cs.purdue.edu/academic_programs/graduate/curriculum/doctoral.sxhtml#top http://www.cs.purdue.edu/academic_programs/graduate/curricul... Purdue's is a little more interesting but still will have to dig into the courses that's like 10 years ago for me, it used to be easier to find lists of papers on this : ]
darkxanthos 14y ago
And they're all comp sci books. Someone has a very narrow view of what it means to be a programmer.
- fogus 14y ago
  I would be interested to know how you would change the list to facilitate a broader view.
  - darkxanthos 14y ago
    Here's a couple to give an idea of where I'm going. The main thing I would add to the OP's list are books on the squishier topics of emotional intelligence and working as a team. A book on communicating designs (this helped me a ton even though I only use it where necessary which isn't too often) http://www.amazon.com/Applying-UML-Patterns-Introduction-Object-Oriented/dp/0131489062/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1354546879&sr=8-1&keywords=uml+patterns http://www.amazon.com/Applying-UML-Patterns-Introduction-Obj... Also this was transformative for how I approach leadership: http://sivers.org/ff http://sivers.org/ff Also the Lean Start Up was big in spite of the hype just for articulating how thinking strategically about what you're building and for who can lead you to success. Hopefully that paints a picture of how I think this list could be better balanced.
    - fogus 14y ago
      Thank you for the reply. I think some (most?) of the issues that you raise could fall into the purview of book #6 "Software Development Management" -- although what you mention would require a better word on my part than "Management".
fnaticshank 14y ago
yoness! moti nice post. :D

171 points by krat0sprakhar 14y ago

tinco 14y ago

Hi, could anyone help me with understanding why the lambda papers deserve a whole book? What I understand from the history is that they are a set of papers that define and explain the Scheme programming language. If so, shouldn't the book be broader by including more of literature on LISP or even AI programming in general?

cchooper 14y ago
Although the lambda papers talk about Scheme, that's not what they're really about. They're really about... lambda. The takeaway is that many common features of languages can be thought of as disguised uses of the lambda operator. So lambda is actually the unifying abstraction behind many languages, even if they don't know it. The original 'Lambda the Ultimate X' papers are very short, so no reason not to give them a try.
Evbn 14y ago
Scheme is just the language used to give concrete examples for a set of papers about Lambda. Guy Steele is one of the greatest communicators in computer science. Brilliant and charming. Check out as much of his stuff as you can, like Growing a Language (on YouTube and in print).

econner 14y ago

If the first link under Core to the 10 papers is not up for you: http://web.archive.org/web/20100819054526/http://blog.objectmentor.com/articles/2009/02/26/10-papers-every-programmer-should-read-at-least-twice http://web.archive.org/web/20100819054526/http://blog.object...

phillmv 14y ago

1. Couldn't he have linked to some of this stuff? 2. Some of this stuff is absurdly broad and weirdly pandering. 3. "I have no idea what the copyright implications of this are, so I will be printing out only my own private copy and not making them available publically;" is a totally inadmissible position for a professional programmer to have. The answer is, no, of course you can't make a printed compilation of other people's work and put it up for sale.

krat0sprakhar 14y ago
Give the guy a break, I guess its okay to not know about the copyright implications of sharing someone else's work. As it is, he never mentioned that he intends to put the complication up for sale.
Evbn 14y ago
He didn't put them up for sale. And most of those papers are old, and some are freely licensed.
fogus 14y ago
> 1. Couldn't he have linked to some of this stuff? Probably, but as far as I can tell it's all a Google search away. > 2. ... weirdly pandering. Pandering to whom? > 3. ... is a totally inadmissible position This one has me flummoxed. Should I, as a professional programmer, have a complete working knowledge of copyright law? As it turns out, I do not, so I erred on the side of safety and never offered any of the articles up for sale. Or did you miss that minor fact?

dschiptsov 14y ago

Books? http://karma-engineering.com/lab/wiki/Books http://karma-engineering.com/lab/wiki/Books

meaty 14y ago

I think this should be: 7 books of a highly academic programmer. A highly effective programmer probably should be reading other topics as to be honest, most of programming is laborious non comp Sci stuff.

Toshio 14y ago
And what books would you recommend instead?
- meaty 14y ago
  None at all. Id recommend reading other people's code and thinking about it for a while.
  - minikomi 14y ago
    Just out of curiosity: if you (or anyone else!) had to make a "must read code" list, what would be on it?
    - meaty 14y ago
      Gcc,gnome,openoffice - how not to do something. FreeBSD,llvm,trac,vim - how to use sound engineering.
    - dragonquest 14y ago
      Anything written by Peter Norvig or D Richard Hipp.
  - fogus 14y ago
    Reading code is a great exercise and I've nursed a half-baked post on the topic for years now. However, I'm not sure that code reading is all that's needed.
    - deleted 14y ago
      [deleted]

keefe 14y ago

If I'm going to diverge from read code, write code long enough to do this much reading... I'd rather start with the papers and books recommended for the phd qualifying exam at the top 10 universities.

Evbn 14y ago
Why? Looking for a PhD?
- keefe 14y ago
  the qualifying exam is supposed to represent up-to-date, overall understanding of the field as a whole, note that I deliberately made the distinction about time away from reading/writing code...
quentusrex 14y ago
Links to any of those recommended reading lists? The closest I see to such a list is: http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/GradAffairs/CS/Prelims/ http://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/GradAffairs/CS/Prelims/
- keefe 14y ago
  stanford's is pretty sparse http://www-cs.stanford.edu/content/qualifying-exams http://www-cs.stanford.edu/content/qualifying-exams http://www.cs.purdue.edu/academic_programs/graduate/curriculum/doctoral.sxhtml#top http://www.cs.purdue.edu/academic_programs/graduate/curricul... Purdue's is a little more interesting but still will have to dig into the courses that's like 10 years ago for me, it used to be easier to find lists of papers on this : ]

darkxanthos 14y ago

And they're all comp sci books. Someone has a very narrow view of what it means to be a programmer.

fogus 14y ago
I would be interested to know how you would change the list to facilitate a broader view.
- darkxanthos 14y ago
  Here's a couple to give an idea of where I'm going. The main thing I would add to the OP's list are books on the squishier topics of emotional intelligence and working as a team. A book on communicating designs (this helped me a ton even though I only use it where necessary which isn't too often) http://www.amazon.com/Applying-UML-Patterns-Introduction-Object-Oriented/dp/0131489062/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1354546879&sr=8-1&keywords=uml+patterns http://www.amazon.com/Applying-UML-Patterns-Introduction-Obj... Also this was transformative for how I approach leadership: http://sivers.org/ff http://sivers.org/ff Also the Lean Start Up was big in spite of the hype just for articulating how thinking strategically about what you're building and for who can lead you to success. Hopefully that paints a picture of how I think this list could be better balanced.
  - fogus 14y ago
    Thank you for the reply. I think some (most?) of the issues that you raise could fall into the purview of book #6 "Software Development Management" -- although what you mention would require a better word on my part than "Management".

fnaticshank 14y ago

yoness! moti nice post. :D