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Shoeberto
02-09-2015, 04:43 PM
I'm trying to step my game up a bit, and am wondering what others have seen as the most beneficial books for them on software development. I guess this could also encompass online resources, though in general I'm looking for stuff that's more structured than your typical tutorial series or manuals.

Right now I'm reading through The Pragmatic Programmer (https://pragprog.com/the-pragmatic-programmer) which was recommended to me early in my career, but has really resonated with me now that I have a few years of experience under my belt. It's brief, but packed full of a lot of advice that would have reduced a lot of suffering in my life had I realized it sooner. I think my next target is Code Complete (http://www.amazon.com/Code-Complete-Practical-Handbook-Construction/dp/0735619670), which is a large-ish tome, but came highly recommended from a colleague.

Does anyone have any other books that really helped you at some point in your career? It can be for any focus area, really. Personally I do PHP and Postgres development for my day job, but I think it might be useful to get together some sort of broad reading list put together for the benefit of everyone.

Flying Mullet
03-04-2015, 06:37 PM
Design Patterns (http://www.amazon.com/Design-Patterns-Elements-Reusable-Object-Oriented/dp/0201633612/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1425494125&sr=8-1&keywords=design+patterns) - A classic book outlining concepts and designs, much like The Pragmatic Programmer, instead of specific details about a particular language or technology.

Dr Unne
03-06-2015, 01:55 AM
The thing that I feel helped me most is learning a variety of different programming languages / paradigms. In particular, moving away from mainstream imperative languages into functional programming has been big for me. These are some books I remember enjoying:

Lisps:
https://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/ free online; this is less a Scheme book and more of a fundamentals of thinking about programming book, highly recommended
https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/little-schemer, and sequels - fun little books
http://www.gigamonkeys.com/book/ - free online

Haskell:
http://book.realworldhaskell.org/ - free online

Clojure:
http://www.clojurebook.com/ *cough*
http://www.joyofclojure.com/

Javascript:
http://shop.oreilly.com/product/9780596517748.do - Javascript is ugly, this book is the good parts, as advertised..

C:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_C_Programming_Language - everyone should read this.

C++:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_C%2B%2B_Programming_Language - I really dislike C++ but I'm still glad I read this.

Lua:
http://www.lua.org/pil/ - Just read this yesterday actually. Lua is a weird little language. Popular in gamedev though.

AI:
http://norvig.com/paip.html - Ostensibly about AI but also just a fun book. Peter Norvig is a boss.

Motivation/inspiration:
http://www.codersatwork.com/ - Interviews with famous coders. Very entertaining.

Design Patterns is also more or less a must-read, I agree.