How to be a Programmer by Robert L Read
This is a pretty good eBook available for free. I started reading through some of this and have yet to complete the entire book but from my initial scans through the content I am impressed. This truly is the stuff that you don’t learn in college and I would guess that most people don’t get all this until their third or fourth job in the industry.
So newbie’s look close and careful, don’t be scared! Be prepared!
Some sample topics include:
How to Debug by Splitting the Problem Space
How to Estimate Programming Time
How to Utilize People as Information Sources
How to Document Wisely
How to Work with Poor Code
Take Breaks when Stumped
How to Deal with Difficult People
How to Tradeoff Quality Against Development Time
How to Evaluate Interviewees
How to Know When to Apply Fancy Computer Science
How to Talk to Non-Engineers
How to Handle Boring Tasks
How to Gather Support for a Project
How to Communicate Well
“To be a good programmer is difficult and noble. The hardest part of making real a collective vision of a software project is dealing with one’s coworkers and customers. Writing computer programs is important and takes great intelligence and skill. But it is really child’s play compared to everything else that a good programmer must do to make a software system that succeeds for both the customer and myriad colleagues for whom she is partially responsible. In this essay I attempt to summarize as concisely as possible those things that I wish someone had explained to me when I was twenty-one.”
Check out the online version of the book here:
2 Comments so far
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Really good, the excerpt really drew me in as I am 21 and am constantly running into things I wish someone could have just told me.
Thanks, it will be really helpful!!