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If you could go back in time and tell yourself to read a specific book at the beginning of your career as a developer, which book would it be?
I expect this list to be varied and to cover a wide range of things.
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inquestion:this "Code Complete"
Code Complete (2nd edition) by Steve McConnell
The Pragmatic Programmer
Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs
The C Programming Language by Kernighan and Ritchie
Introduction to Algorithms by Cormen, Leiserson, Rivest & Stein
Design Patterns by the Gang of Four
Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code
The Mythical Man Month
The Art of Computer Programming by Donald Knuth
Compilers: Principles, Techniques and Tools by Alfred V. Aho, Ravi Sethi and Jeffrey D. Ullman
Gödel, Escher, Bach by Douglas Hofstadter
Clean Code: A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship by Robert C. Martin
Effective C++
More Effective C++
CODE by Charles Petzold
Programming Pearls by Jon Bentley
Working Effectively with Legacy Code by Michael C. Feathers
Peopleware by Demarco and Lister
Coders at Work by Peter Seibel
Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!
Effective Java 2nd edition
Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture by Martin Fowler
The Little Schemer
The Seasoned Schemer
Why's (Poignant) Guide to Ruby
The Inmates Are Running The Asylum: Why High Tech Products Drive Us Crazy and How to Restore the Sanity
The Art of Unix Programming
Test-Driven Development: By Example by Kent Beck
Practices of an Agile Developer
Don't Make Me Think
Agile Software Development, Principles, Patterns, and Practices by Robert C. Martin
Domain Driven Designs by Eric Evans
The Design of Everyday Things by Donald Norman
Modern C++ Design by Andrei Alexandrescu
Best Software Writing I by Joel Spolsky
The Practice of Programming by Kernighan and Pike
Pragmatic Thinking and Learning: Refactor Your Wetware by Andy Hunt
Software Estimation: Demystifying the Black Art by Steve McConnel
The Passionate Programmer (My Job Went To India) by Chad Fowler
Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution
Algorithms + Data Structures = Programs
Writing Solid Code
JavaScript - The Good Parts
Getting Real by 37 Signals
Foundations of Programming by Karl Seguin
Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice in C (2nd Edition)
Thinking in Java by Bruce Eckel
The Elements of Computing Systems
Refactoring to Patterns by Joshua Kerievsky
Modern Operating Systems by Andrew S. Tanenbaum
The Annotated Turing
Things That Make Us Smart by Donald Norman
The Timeless Way of Building by Christopher Alexander
The Deadline: A Novel About Project Management by Tom DeMarco
The C++ Programming Language (3rd edition) by Stroustrup
Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture
Computer Systems - A Programmer's Perspective
Agile Principles, Patterns, and Practices in C# by Robert C. Martin
Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests
Framework Design Guidelines by Brad Abrams
Object Thinking by Dr. David West
Advanced Programming in the UNIX Environment by W. Richard Stevens
Hackers and Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age
The Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder
CLR via C# by Jeffrey Richter
The Timeless Way of Building by Christopher Alexander
Design Patterns in C# by Steve Metsker
Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carol
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig
About Face - The Essentials of Interaction Design
Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations by Clay Shirky
The Tao of Programming
Computational Beauty of Nature
Writing Solid Code by Steve Maguire
Philip and Alex's Guide to Web Publishing
Object-Oriented Analysis and Design with Applications by Grady Booch
Effective Java by Joshua Bloch
Computability by N. J. Cutland
Masterminds of Programming
The Tao Te Ching
The Productive Programmer
The Art of Deception by Kevin Mitnick
The Career Programmer: Guerilla Tactics for an Imperfect World by Christopher Duncan
Paradigms of Artificial Intelligence Programming: Case studies in Common Lisp
Masters of Doom
Pragmatic Unit Testing in C# with NUnit by Andy Hunt and Dave Thomas with Matt Hargett
How To Solve It by George Polya
The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
Smalltalk-80: The Language and its Implementation
Writing Secure Code (2nd Edition) by Michael Howard
Introduction to Functional Programming by Philip Wadler and Richard Bird
No Bugs! by David Thielen
Rework by Jason Freid and DHH
JUnit in Action
K&R
#Juan: I know Juan, I know - but there are some things that can only be learned by actually getting down to the task at hand. Speaking in abstract ideals all day simply makes you into an academic. It's in the application of the abstract that we truly grok the reason for their existence. :P
#Keith: Great mention of "The Inmates are Running the Asylum" by Alan Cooper - an eye opener for certain, any developer that has worked with me since I read that book has heard me mention the ideas it espouses. +1
Discrete Mathematics For Computer Scientists http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51HCJ5R42KL._SL500_BO2,204,203,200_AA219_PIsitb-sticker-dp-arrow,TopRight,-24,-23_SH20_OU02_.jpg
Discrete Mathematics For Computer Scientists by J.K. Truss.
While this doesn't teach you programming, it teaches you fundamental mathematics that every programmer should know. You may remember this stuff from university, but really, doing predicate logic will improve you programming skills, you need to learn Set Theory if you want to program using collections.
There really is a lot of interesting information in here that can get you thinking about problems in different ways. It's handy to have, just to pick up once in a while to learn something new.
Systemantics: How Systems Work and Especially How They Fail. Get it used cheap. But you might not get the humor until you've worked on a few failed projects.
The beauty of the book is the copyright year.
Probably the most profound takeaway "law" presented in the book:
The Fundamental Failure-Mode Theorem (F.F.T.): Complex systems usually operate in failure mode.
The idea being that there are failing parts in any given piece of software that are masked by failures in other parts or by validations in other parts. See a real-world example at the Therac-25 radiation machine, whose software flaws were masked by hardware failsafes. When the hardware failsafes were removed, the software race condition that had gone undetected all those years resulted in the machine killing 3 people.
One of my personal favorites is Hacker's Delight, because it was as much fun to read as it was educational.
I hope the second edition will be released soon!
Concepts, Techniques, and Models of Computer Programming.
alt text http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51YZ50ZR13L._SL500_AA240_.jpg
Extreme Programming Explained: Embrace Change by Kent Beck. While I don't advocate a hardcore XP-or-the-highway take on software development, I wish I had been introduced to the principles in this book much earlier in my career. Unit testing, refactoring, simplicity, continuous integration, cost/time/quality/scope - these changed the way I looked at development. Before Agile, it was all about the debugger and fear of change requests. After Agile, those demons did not loom as large.
Types and Programming Languages by Benjamin C Pierce for a thorough understanding of the underpinnings of programming languages.
alt text http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51E0Ojkz8iL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_AA300_SH20_OU01_.jpg
Database System Concepts is one of the best books you can read on understanding good database design principles.
The practice of programming. By Brian W. Kernighan, Rob Pike.
The style shown here is excellent - the code just speaks for itself, and the whole book follows the KISS principle. Personally not my languages of choice, but still influential to me.
Programming from the ground up. It's free on the internet. This book taught me AT&T asm. It is very easy to read.
Paradigms of Artificial Intelligence Programming: Case Studies in Common Lisp by Peter Norvig
I started reading it because I wanted to learn Common Lisp. When I was halfway, I realized this was the greatest book about programming I had read so far.
Definitively Software Craftsmanship
alt text http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/5186JKTDVWL._SL500_AA240_.jpg
This book explains a lot of things about software engineering, system development. It's also extremly useful to understand the difference between different kind of product developement: web VS shrinkwrap VS IBM framework. What people had in mind when they conceived waterfall model? Read this and all we'll become clear (hopefully)
#Peter Coulton -- you don't read Knuth, you study it.
For me, and my work... Purely Functional Data Structures is great for thinking and developing with functional languages in mind.
"The World is Flat" by Thomas Friedman.
Excellence in programming demands an investment of mental energy and a dedication to continued learning comparable to the professions of medicine or law. It pays a fraction of what those professions pay, much less the wages paid to the mathematically savvy who head into the finance sector. And wages for constructing code are eroding because it's a profession that is relatively easy for the intelligent and self-disciplined in most economies to enter.
Programming has already eroded to the point of paying less than, say, plumbing. Plumbing can't be "offshored." You don't need to pay $2395 to attend the Professional Plumber's Conference every other year for the privilege of receiving an entirely new set of plumbing technologies that will take you a year to learn.
If you live in North America or Europe, are young, and are smart, programming is not a rational career choice. Businesses that involve programming, absolutely. Study business, know enough about programming to refine your BS detector: brilliant. But dedicating the lion's share of your mental energy to the mastery of libraries, data structures, and algorithms? That only makes sense if programming is something more to you than an economic choice.
If you love programming and for that reason intend to make it your career, then it behooves you to develop a cold-eyed understanding of the forces that are, and will continue, to make it a harder and harder profession in which to make a living. "The World is Flat" won't teach you what to name your variables, but it will immerse you for 6 or 8 hours in economic realities that have already arrived. If you can read it, and not get scared, then go out and buy "Code Complete."
This last year I took a number of classes. I read
The Innovator's Dilemma (disruptive tech)
The Mythical Man Month (managing software)
Crossing the Chasm (startup)
Database Management Systems, The COW Book
Programming C#, The OSTRICH Book
Beginning iPhone Developmen, The GRAPEFRUIT Book
Each book was amazing but the Innovator's Dilemma by Clayton Christensen (1997!!!) is really a fantastic book, and it got me really thinking about the modern software world. The challenge addressed is disruptive technology, and how disk drive companies and non-technical companies are always disrupted by new, game changing technology. It gives one a new perspective when thinking about Google, probably the biggest 'web' company. Why do they have their hands in EVERYTHING? It's because they don't want to have their position disrupted by something new. The preview on google is plenty to get the idea. Read it!
hackers, by Steven Levy.
The personality and way of life must come first. Everything else can be learned.
The Practice of Programming
and
How to solve it by computer
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The Python language was very influential to me, I wish I would have read these book years ago. The beauty and simplicity of the Python language really affected how I wrote code in other languages.
The New Turing Omnibus http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51HlYd-%2BRwL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_AA300_SH20_OU01_.jpg
Really good book. Has a high-level taste of the most important areas of computer science. Yes, CS != programming, but this is still useful to every programmer.
Object Oriented Analysis and Design with Applications by Brady Booch
The Mythical Man-Month by Fred Brooks
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mythical_Man-Month
I think that "The Art of Unix Programming" is an excellent book, by an excellent hacker/brilliant mind as Eric S. Raymond, who tries to make us understand a few principles of software design (simplicity mainly). This book is a must for every programming who is about to start a project under Unix platform.
While I agree that many of the books above are must-reads (Pragmatic Programmer, Mythical Man-Month, Art of Computer Programming, and SICP come to mind immediately), I'd like to go in a slightly different direction and recommend A Discipline of Programming by Edsger Dijkstra. Even though it's 32 years old, the emphasis on "design for verifiability" is highly relevant (even if "verifiability" means "proof" instead "unit tests").
Code Craft by Pete Goodliffe is a good read!
Code Craft http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51WZ9AEC3GL._SL500_BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-dp-500-arrow,TopRight,45,-64_OU01_AA240_SH20_.jpg
Martin Fowler's Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code has already been listed. But I will detail why it has impacted me.
The essence of the whole book is about structuring code so that it is simpler to read and understand by humans. It teaches me strongly that the code that I write is meant for my colleagues and successors to consume and possibly learn something good out of it. It inspires me to consciously program in a manner that leaves people praising my name, and not cursing me to damnation for all eternity.
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C++ How to Program It is good for beginner.This is excellent book that full complete with 1500 pages.
Here's an excellent book that is not as widely applauded, but is full of deep insight: Agile Software Development: The Cooperative Game, by Alistair Cockburn.
What's so special about it? Well, clearly everyone has heard the term "Agile", and it seems most are believers these days. Whether you believe or not, though, there are some deep principles behind why the Agile movement exists. This book uncovers and articulates these principles in a precise, scientific way. Some of the principles are (btw, these are my words, not Alistair's):
The hardest thing about team software development is getting everyone's brains to have the same understanding. We are building huge, elaborate, complex systems which are invisible in the tangible world. The better you are at getting more peoples' brains to share deeper understanding, the more effective your team will be at software development. This is the underlying reason that pair programming makes sense. Most people dismiss it (and I did too initially), but with this principle in mind I highly recommend that you give it another shot. You wind up with TWO people who deeply understand the subsystem you just built ... there aren't many other ways to get such a deep information transfer so quickly. It is like a Vulcan mind meld.
You don't always need words to communicate deep understanding quickly. And a corollary: too many words, and you exceed the listener/reader's capacity, meaning the understanding transfer you're attempting does not happen. Consider that children learn how to speak language by being "immersed" and "absorbing". Not just language either ... he gives the example of some kids playing with trains on the floor. Along comes another kid who has never even SEEN a train before ... but by watching the other kids, he picks up the gist of the game and plays right along. This happens all the time between humans. This along with the corollary about too many words helps you see how misguided it was in the old "waterfall" days to try to write 700 page detailed requirements specifications.
There is so much more in there too. I'll shut up now, but I HIGHLY recommend this book!
Masters of doom. As far as motivation and love for your profession go: it won't get any better than what's been described in this book, truthfully inspiring story!
Related
I am currently taking a year off between high school and college (computer science).
I'm pretty good with Visual basic (unfortunately, this is the only language my school offered in High School). I've dabbled in some PHP, and have pretty good knowledge of broad programming principals and concepts.
I'm more interested in web programming then conventional, but I'd like to do both.
What are some good languages I should pick up over this next eight months, and what are some good, (tough but attainable) goals I should set for myself in this time frame?
Thanks!
If it's web programming you're after, you have three top contenders at the moment for web development (in no particular order):
ASP.Net
Ruby on Rails
PHP
If you've been schooled on VB, the ASP.Net might offer the most familiar development environment, but all three are very marketable.
As far as personal development and goal-setting is concerned and given you only have 8 months to work with, I'd say you want to get intimate with the following concepts and how the work in practice:
unit testing
CSS
JavaScript
See if you can write your first practical application. This will set you up incredibly well for future employment if you can say you actually delivered something (grades are good, but delivery and experience is better).
If you really want to aim high, see if you can secure a casual part-time job at a software shop.
Ruby on Rails is pretty cool and easy to learn esp. if you are after web development.
AJAX can help you with giving your web page some cool features.
I would suggest you to get the book : Agile Development with Ruby on Rails. It will help you get started.
You may want to focus on the language that the college you will be attending will be teaching their low-level classes in. this way, you can have a bit of a head start on the class, giving you more time for your other classes.
I think most colleges currently start off in Java. You should be able to find that out with a bit of research.
If it is good grades and ease of programming in college you seek, learn the language of choice of the school you plan on attending. Most schools stick with one primary language for the introductory classes as many universities teach conceptual programming. I think the most common languages right now for universities to teach are Java and C++ as both offer good, cross-platform introductions into object-oriented concepts such as polymorphism and aggregation.
If you are attending a technical college or community college for an associates degree, those are normally more applied and teach "how to program a website with PHP" or similar. In that case, you may focus on the fundamentals of the class such as how do web application work, learn about compilers and how they work, etc. Things they won't teach you but are valuable to know in the real world.
If you want to parlay this knowledge into a job writing web applications, you must consider where you may work. Different industries have accepted different languages. Many young businesses and industries accept newer languages such as PHP, Ruby, etc. Some shops are purely Windows (there are a lot) and do much of their web apps in .NET. Then there are still a number of middleware-based solutions such as WebSphere, WebLogic, JBoss, etc. There are also some in-between things that are still web focused such as PeopleTools programming. You may also consider learning about web application scaling.
If I were you, I would focus on a primary skill you already posess, and nurture that so that you become highly skilled. You can't master everything, but being an expert in something makes you desirable.
Hope this helps.
Read some books.
The Pragmatic Programmer. From Journeyman to Master, Thomas, Hunt - to make your brain think in a pragmatic way, not PHP or other technology way. PHP or Ruby will die, the knowledge from this book won't as it's universal.
Apprenticeship Patterns, Hoover, Oshineye - to plan your career, get to know what's important, what to avoid and what to do to make yourself better.
Personally, I'd start looking at data structures and algorithms, they are the building blocks of good computer science knowledge, as most of them will make use of the majority of features of any given programming language, and as you learn to implement these in the chosen language, you'll get to grips with the programming language.
I heartily agree with Muad'Dib. Look at what language the course is using, and start using that language. If it's C++, then you can get utilities like Cygwin for Windows where you can develop in a virtual linux box without having to re-wipe your computer.
If it's Visual Studio stuff, then there's the MSDN Express stuff that's free from Microsoft, although it's a bit of a download.
Also, the Pragmatic Programmer is a MUST READ! It's full of great advice, and you're at the very best stage to start picking up good habits, start doing that now, and you'll go far in the programming world.
Hope that helps.
Are there any good reason to learn languages such as Ada and COBOL? Are there any future in programming in those languages? I'm interested in those languages and i'm currently learning them just for fun.
Its always worthwhile learning new languages. Even if they're never useful to you professionally chances are they'll teach you something about programming you didn't know before or at very least broaden your outlook.
As for prospects from a quick bit of reading around it seems ada is still somewhat in favour for critical systems in the aviation industry and Cobol still has its place in business. I know an engineer in his mid 20's who writes all his code in fortran77 as that's what industry wants!
While the number of employers looking for these languages might be low, because there are a limited number of people who know them the salary for developers who specialise in them can be quite high. When mission critical apps developed in them could cost millions to replace having to pay more than usual for a coder to maintain the existing system is easily accepted.
Ada is used in the aerospace/defense industry. COBOL is used in the financial industry. Fortran is used in engineering. The question "is there any future" is borderline subjective/argumentative since all of those languages are still in active use.
Fortran is old, but is used in scientific programming. Ada is the basis for VHDL, a very important language in electrical engineering. You could also say that C is "old", and it's used pretty much everywhere.
Cobol and Algol are both still in widespread use. You won't find them running on your latest and greatest tech firms, but you can bet your car insurance company process' claims on it. Your health insurance company most certainly uses it. Reports of Cobol's death have been highly exaggerated.
You will find difficulty in colleges and places that will actually teach you Cobol or Algol. So finding developers for these so-called dead languages is getting harder and harder. Very tough to tell a kid coming out of high school that has been programming in Java, iOS, and Perl for half his life that Cobol is where the money is at.
Cobol/Algol developers are becoming harder and harder to come by, so if you have that language in your back pocket, it is only going to help you out. Algol is a lot harder of a language in my opinion to get good at. You can teach anyone with half a brain how to program in Cobol.
These languages are not going away any time soon at all. As long as companies like IBM and Unisys provide compilers for them on the mainframes, they will continue to thrive. So grab a book and an open source compiler and brush up. Plenty of people out there looking for Cobol/Algol developers.
Many of these 'old' languages are actively in use today. Lisp for instance is gaining popularity again in the form Clojure. Smalltalk is becoming popular again with the Seaside MVC framework.
In addition many of the hottest development lanaguages borrow heavily from Lisp and Smalltalk, both of which pioneered Object Oriented methodologies long before C++ came along. Javascript, Ruby, Perl 6 and Perl 5 Moose (Object System) all use mixins which were first used in Lisp and Smalltalk. Metaclasses, first used in Common Lisp and Smalltalk-80, are making a resurgence in Perl 5 Moose, Objective-C (iPhone development), Python and Groovy.
Much like learning Latin, it can be intriguing to understand where and how many English and other current languages' words had their roots. Also, if you know Latin and valuable new books/papers/scrolls are found that need translation, you suddenly become valuable too.
Honestly, I'd say learning them is great for a historical perspective, especially if you're a language designer, but not very much else.
There are roles out there for COBOL programmers, but in general they are looking for experienced developers. From what I have seen you are unlikely to get a first programming role in COBOL - in general, they are looking for people experienced with similar application domains and who are familiar with building an understanding of legacy systems. Knowing the limitations of the language can be useful for understanding why certain things you are asking for when connecting to mainframes are either considered difficult or problematic.
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What are the myths or misconceptions related to Agile?
There are lot of misconceptions related to Agile that an average new comer may fall into. What are the misconceptions in the Agile world and how do you justify that it is truly a misconception?
Update: Summary of Agile Myths
Agile doesn't allow documentation
Agile methods do not scale
Agile means no plan
TDD covers all the unit testing needs
Pair programming always results in better code
Agile is a silver bullet solution to software engineering problems (There is a silver bullet solution)
Agile doesn't need up front design
We're doing scrum so we don't need to do TDD, Refactoring Pair Programming, etc.
One can learn Agile from a book
Agile only works for trivial projects
Agile always uses "User Stories"
Read the following answers for more information about above myths and for more myths.
"Working software over comprehensive documentation" means you do not need a functional spec...
Wrong!!! It just means that you can iron out the wrinkles iteratively with the users - speaking as a vendor, you still need good documentation to assist with the QA and sign-off phases...
"We're doing Scrum - so we don't need to (pair | refactor | do TDD | ...)" Actually the Scrum founders - Ken and Jeff have been saying that all the high-productivity scrum teams implement the full range of Extreme Programming practices.
Test-driven development won't find all the bugs / isn't easy to apply to everything - so we're not going to try! - Learning TDD isn't an "all or nothing deal" and you get better at judging what to test and how to do it efficiently. I've been doing it for ten years now and I'm still finding better ways to do it and new things to consider.
I can learn all I need to apply agile methods from a book. - You need to learn by doing and that often means coaching and meeting other people that can help. Lots of things go wrong when people just try to learn it from a book.
Hysterical (and quite real) "The candidate must take direction from, and support the scrum master" (From a job spec I was sent last week...) - The scrum master isn't supposed to tell people what to do. He/She is there to facilitate - i.e. to help the team learn to sort things out themselves. It's a massive failure mode - having a scrum master that "commands" people!
Talking about "the agile methodology" - big cluelessness indicator. Firstly, talking about "agile" like it's a specific thing whereas it's a very vague umbrella terms for many different things. Secondly, use of "the" agile methodology - there are loads of them, and loads of different ways of doing many of them! Thirdly, a lot of people in the agile community got here in the backlash against the big, heavy UML-laden methods of the nineties. These people don't tend to use the word "methodology"...
You need especially talented people to develop software the agile way. Jeff Sutherland says that they considered using the "chief programmer team" model for managing teams in banks - but found they didn't have anything like enough "chiefs". Scrum is designed to get best productivity out of a lot of moderately able programmers. In fact removing one, disproportionately productive team member that doesn't want to help the others can "unblock" the mediocre team members and bring their combined productivity up to more than compensate for the super-productive former team member... That's what Jeff says anyway...
There are quite a few other XP-related ones that we came up with in an open space workshop that I led recently: http://xpday-london.editme.com/WhereHasXpGone
Myth: using Agile development practices is a silver bullet solution to software engineering problems.
Myth: Test-first development forces your project to have adequate unit testing.
Fact: Many developers get lazy, and the unit tests they write before their code are often weak and inadequate.
Myth: Pair programming always results in better code.
Fact: Programmers tend to be slightly anti-social and to have significantly different thought processes from one another. Having someone breathing down your neck as you code is very unpleasant, and the result is often a tense work atmosphere with a reduction in both code quality and quantity.
Myth: Agile means no documentation
Fact: Agile value working software more than comprehensive documentation but this doesn't mean no documentation at all. Documentation should be written just in time, and just enough. And no, Agile doesn't say one should always using user stories. Use them if, and only, if they are appropriate!
Myth: Agile means no plan
Fact: Agile does not support development without planning. Agile uses continuous planning and estimating to maximize the ROI. Actually, Agile is about scope management.
Myth: Agile means no discipline
Fact: Agile developers must be more disciplined for success.
Myth: Agile only works for trivial projects
Fact: Agile (actually Scrum here) has been used for
FDA-approved, life-critical software for x-rays and MRIs,
Financial payment applications,
24x7 with 99.99999% uptime requirements,
Multi-terabyte database applications,
etc
Myth: Agile doesn't scale
Fact: Sutherland used Scrum in groups of 500+, Cohn used Scrum in groups of 100+
Myth: "No Big Design Up Front" means no design.
Myth: Waterfall always fails.
Reality: Most of the software you're using on your agile project was developed with waterfall. Even BDUF waterfall, in many cases.
There's no real myths - but anything taken to an extreme will be wrong. An Agile project that does zero design in the hopes of "designing as it goes" will likely fail. A Waterfall project that designs everything down to the last semicolon will likely fail due to budget, time or changed user requirements.
It has been repeatedly said "Agile design methods do not scale" whereas Agile development will effectively scale to any size if implemented and thought out properly.
Myth: You need to carefully plan and schedule each sprint.
This leads you to do lots and lots of up-front planning so that you can fully plan each sprint.
This leads you to defeat agility and create a waterfall called "Agile".
The biggest myth I have seen is that people think it is better than other development processes.
It is the usual silver-bullet snake-oil that we have been seeing in this industry for years.
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/301993/is-agile-development-dead/302060#302060
Myth: Agile is always a better option when compared to other alternatives.
Fact: depending on project size, requirements (particularly flexibility of such), external schedule, and customer attitude, it may not always be more productive compared to orthodox methodology.
Myth: Agile means XP and Scrum
Fact: There are other practices like OpenUP, AMDD, etc.
It's easy to know what to charge your customer. This is alway the biggest problems for us, because we don't know the scope of the project we can't give the customer a fixed price, and most customers demands a fixed price.
Great thread. While I offer nothing new in my related blog post, I do illustrate the top two reasons why Agile fails when it does fail. 1) Lack of upfront requirements (taking the 'begin coding with incomplete requirements' to an extreme) and
2) Lack of adequate unit tests (because CHANGE will happen - and unit tests are the quickest way of catching all the breaking points resulting from the CHANGE).
http://www.anujvarma.com/BlogEngine.net/post/2010/11/03/Agile-versus-Flat-Footed-development.aspx
You're completely right that there are a lot of myths around Agile, some coming from outside, and others from inside. Here are a few more I thought of to add to the list:
"You don't need project managers or business analysts any more"
Although we're not doing BDUF and teams are self-directing, as things scale up there is still a need for people whose job is coordinating what's going on. And if you have a very complex business scenario, you may well need someone to help you make sense of it. IME, a lot of the projects that really needed PMs and BAs still need them (and those that don't need them now, probably never needed them!). But, of course, the roles of the PMs and BAs tend to be different in the Agile world, and that can make people uneasy.
"Agile can't be used for fixed price projects"
It can, but it is quite a bit harder. Especially since we all know that "fixed price" really means "fixed price, scope and time"...
"We don't do BDUF, we do it all as we go along"
The only way to work is JEDUF (Just Enough Design Up Front). Sometimes you need more, sometimes you can get by with less, but you don't do more than you need at that point.
Myth: Agile is anti-thetical to security.
Fact: This is only true, if you try to force a full-blown waterfall-style SDL (security development lifecycle) onto supposedly Agile teams. In fact, I have designed and implemented Agile-SDL variants in numerous organizations, and I can say that putting the Agile into the Security, can actually afford a higher, more robust level of security. it just takes a change of security mindset - from control to visibility and guidance.
If you don't show real value with agile, it will fail. And fail miserably as in bankrupt a company miserably. Going to agile just because it is 'agile' makes you look as silly as the CIO in this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvks70PD0Rs
John
I've found out about IDEF just yesterday and wondered immediately why it's not more popular than UML. Judging from documents, IDEF is at least as suitable for software modeling as UML is, but is mature and stable for about 30 years now, as opposed to UML.
Is this one more case of "popular vs. powerful" like all the discussions about "$language vs. Lisp"?
UML is promoted by IBM who bought Rational Rose the Founders Company
UML is specifically an object-oriented modelling approach, whereas IDEF is more of a an all round modelling approach which supports both business-driven and data-driven approaches. The two can be complimentary. See blog post - http://enablealignment.blogspot.com/2010/01/modelling-its-all-about-communication.html
Why isn't lisp popular? It's more technologically advanced than any language? Really, IDEF isn't popular because it isn't. COBOL was popular because it was. It was good about as much as lisp was bad. Or IDEF.
Popularity is a social circumstance. As a programmer, I thus suppose I have no authority whatsoever to judge what should be popular.
Tool support or rather lack thereof.
What does an architect today do as the first thing when he wants to create an architecture? He selects a tool.
UML published by OMG with all tool vendors on their side. IDEF0 published by NIST with... well, none on their side.
I really like DEFO0. Cant find a tool that properly support it though. I will use UML.
Marketing, meaning money invested.
None of these answers quite hit the mark. IDEF was initially funded by – and created for – the military (mostly USAF), and that is where almost all of its use is.
Furthermore, while the military is one huge customer, it is but one, whereas UML is widely accepted everywhere else. When people hear about IDEF and how it's largely a "military thing" vs UML, which is more of a common overall standard, they naturally gravitate to UML, regardless of which one actually better suits their needs.
Locked. This question and its answers are locked because the question is off-topic but has historical significance. It is not currently accepting new answers or interactions.
It wasn't that long ago that I was a beginning coder, trying to find good books/tutorials on languages I wanted to learn. Even still, there are times I need to pick up a language relatively quickly for a new project I am working on. The point of this post is to document some of the best tutorials and books for these languages. I will start the list with the best I can find, but hope you guys out there can help with better suggestions/new languages. Here is what I found:
Since this is now wiki editable, I am giving control up to the community. If you have a suggestion, please put it in this section. I decided to also add a section for general be a better programmer books and online references as well. Once again, all recommendations are welcome.
General Programming
Online Tutorials
Foundations of Programming By Karl Seguin - From Codebetter, its C# based but the ideas ring true across the board, can't believe no-one's posted this yet actually.
How to Write Unmaintainable Code - An anti manual that teaches you how to write code in the most unmaintable way possible. It would be funny if a lot of these suggestions didn't ring so true.
The Programming Section of Wiki Books - suggested by Jim Robert as having a large amount of books/tutorials on multiple languages in various stages of completion
Just the Basics To get a feel for a language.
Books
Code Complete - This book goes without saying, it is truely brilliant in too many ways to mention.
The Pragmatic Programmer - The next best thing to working with a master coder, teaching you everything they know.
Mastering Regular Expressions - Regular Expressions are an essential tool in every programmer's toolbox. This book, recommended by Patrick Lozzi is a great way to learn what they are capable of.
Algorithms in C, C++, and Java - A great way to learn all the classic algorithms if you find Knuth's books a bit too in depth.
C
Online Tutorials
This tutorial seems to pretty consise and thourough, looked over the material and seems to be pretty good. Not sure how friendly it would be to new programmers though.
Books
K&R C - a classic for sure. It might be argued that all programmers should read it.
C Primer Plus - Suggested by Imran as being the ultimate C book for beginning programmers.
C: A Reference Manual - A great reference recommended by Patrick Lozzi.
C++
Online Tutorials
The tutorial on cplusplus.com seems to be the most complete. I found another tutorial here but it doesn't include topics like polymorphism, which I believe is essential. If you are coming from C, this tutorial might be the best for you.
Another useful tutorial, C++ Annotation. In Ubuntu family you can get the ebook on multiple format(pdf, txt, Postscript, and LaTex) by installing c++-annotation package from Synaptic(installed package can be found in /usr/share/doc/c++-annotation/.
Books
The C++ Programming Language - crucial for any C++ programmer.
C++ Primer Plus - Orginally added as a typo, but the amazon reviews are so good, I am going to keep it here until someone says it is a dud.
Effective C++ - Ways to improve your C++ programs.
More Effective C++ - Continuation of Effective C++.
Effective STL - Ways to improve your use of the STL.
Thinking in C++ - Great book, both volumes. Written by Bruce Eckel and Chuck Ellison.
Programming: Principles and Practice Using C++ - Stroustrup's introduction to C++.
Accelerated C++ - Andy Koenig and Barbara Moo - An excellent introduction to C++ that doesn't treat C++ as "C with extra bits bolted on", in fact you dive straight in and start using STL early on.
Forth
Books
FORTH, a text and reference. Mahlon G. Kelly and Nicholas
Spies. ISBN 0-13-326349-5 / ISBN 0-13-326331-2. 1986
Prentice-Hall. Leo Brodie's books are good but this book
is even better. For instance it covers defining words and
the interpreter in depth.
Java
Online Tutorials
Sun's Java Tutorials - An official tutorial that seems thourough, but I am not a java expert. You guys know of any better ones?
Books
Head First Java - Recommended as a great introductory text by Patrick Lozzi.
Effective Java - Recommended by pek as a great intermediate text.
Core Java Volume 1 and Core Java Volume 2 - Suggested by FreeMemory as some of the best java references available.
Java Concurrency in Practice - Recommended by MDC as great resource for concurrent programming in Java.
The Java Programing Language
Python
Online Tutorials
Python.org - The online documentation for this language is pretty good. If you know of any better let me know.
Dive Into Python - Suggested by Nickola. Seems to be a python book online.
Perl
Online Tutorials
perldoc perl - This is how I personally got started with the language, and I don't think you will be able to beat it.
Books
Learning Perl - a great way to introduce yourself to the language.
Programming Perl - greatly referred to as the Perl Bible. Essential reference for any serious perl programmer.
Perl Cookbook - A great book that has solutions to many common problems.
Modern Perl Programming - newly released, contains the latest wisdom on modern techniques and tools, including Moose and DBIx::Class.
Ruby
Online Tutorials
Adam Mika suggested Why's (Poignant) Guide to Ruby but after taking a look at it, I don't know if it is for everyone.
Found this site which seems to offer several tutorials for Ruby on Rails.
Books
Programming Ruby - suggested as a great reference for all things ruby.
Visual Basic
Online Tutorials
Found this site which seems to devote itself to visual basic tutorials. Not sure how good they are though.
PHP
Online Tutorials
The main PHP site - A simple tutorial that allows user comments for each page, which I really like.
PHPFreaks Tutorials - Various tutorials of different difficulty lengths.
Quakenet/PHP tutorials - PHP tutorial that will guide you from ground up.
JavaScript
Online Tutorials
Found a decent tutorial here geared toward non-programmers. Found another more advanced one here. Nickolay suggested A reintroduction to javascript as a good read here.
Books
Head first JavaScript
JavaScript: The Good Parts (with a Google Tech Talk video by the author)
C#
Online Tutorials
C# Station Tutorial - Seems to be a decent tutorial that I dug up, but I am not a C# guy.
C# Language Specification - Suggested by tamberg. Not really a tutorial, but a great reference on all the elements of C#
Books
C# to the point - suggested by tamberg as a short text that explains the language in amazing depth
ocaml
Books
nlucaroni suggested the following:
OCaml for Scientists
Introduction to ocaml
Using Understand and unraveling ocaml: practice to theory and vice versa
Developing Applications using Ocaml - O'Reilly
The Objective Caml System - Official Manua
Haskell
Online Tutorials
nlucaroni suggested the following:
Explore functional programming with Haskell
Books
Real World Haskell
Total Functional Programming
LISP/Scheme
Books
wfarr suggested the following:
The Little Schemer - Introduction to Scheme and functional programming in general
The Seasoned Schemer - Followup to Little Schemer.
Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs - The definitive book on Lisp (also available online).
Practical Common Lisp - A good introduction to Lisp with several examples of practical use.
On Lisp - Advanced Topics in Lisp
How to Design Programs - An Introduction to Computing and Programming
Paradigms of Artificial Intelligence Programming: Case Studies in Common Lisp - an approach to high quality Lisp programming
What about you guys? Am I totally off on some of there? Did I leave out your favorite language? I will take the best comments and modify the question with the suggestions.
I know this is going to seem old-fashioned, but I don't think much of using online tutorials to learn programming languages or platforms. These generally give you no more than a little taste of the language. To really learn a language, you need the equivalent of a "book", and in many cases, this means a real dead-tree book.
If you want to learn C, read K&R. If you want to learn C++, read Stroustrup. If you want to learn Lisp/Scheme, read SICP. Etc.
If you're not willing to spend more than $30 and a few hours to learn a language, you probably aren't going to learn it.
These are all really good, written by academia and (some) are books (an unpublished oreilly book --translated from French, but no issues I've found), for example). I've *'d my favorite ones that helped me the most.
ocaml :
*Introduction to ocaml
Using Understand and unraveling ocaml: practice to theory and vice versa
*Developing Applications using Ocaml - O'Reilly
The Objective Caml System - Official Manual
A Concise Introduction to Objective Caml
Practical Ocaml
Haskell :
Explore functional programming with Haskell
*Real World Haskell
*Total Functional Programming
For C#:
CLR via C#
C# in Depth
For C++, I suggest Accelerated C++ by Koenig and Moo as a beginning text, though I don't know how it would be for an absolute novice. It focuses on using the STL right away, which makes getting things done much easier.
Haskell:
O'Reilly Book:
Real World Haskell, a great tutorial-oriented book on Haskell, available online and in print.
My favorite general, less academic online tutorials:
The Haskell wikibook which contains all of the excellent Yet Another Haskell Tutorial. (This tutorial helps with specifics of setting up a Haskell distro and running example programs, for example.)
Learn you a Haskell for Great Good, in the spirit of Why's Poignant Guide to Ruby but more to the point.
Write yourself a Scheme in 48 hours. Get your hands dirty learning Haskell with a real project.
Books on Functional Programming with Haskell:
Lambda calculus, combinators, more theoretical, but in a very down to earth manner: Davie's Introduction to Functional Programming Systems Using Haskell
Laziness and program correctness, thinking functionally: Bird's Introduction to Functional Programming Using Haskell
Effective Java is a must but I recommend being comfortable with Java first to fully understand the examples.
Ruby
The Free Ruby on Rails Training Online Course by Sang Shin Isn't too bad. It also has a decent amount of further reading links on each subject in the course
I'd add Bruce Eckel's programming books:
Thinking in Java (print version: 4th edition; 3rd. ed. is online: http://www.mindview.net/Books/TIJ/)
Thinking in C++ (2nd ed, freely available online: http://mindview.net/Books/TICPP/ThinkingInCPP2e.html
In general, his "Books" page (http://mindview.net/Books/) is a good resource. The freely availabe books can also be found at http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/eckel/
Can't believe nobody has mentioned the Perl Best Practices. There's also a Twitter feed that delivers one PBP per day.
I learned Perl from Robert's Perl Tutorial, which I recommend, but it hasn't been updated since 1999. A newer recommended tutorial is Steve's Perl Tutorial.
For web development with Perl, the clear winner is Catalyst, and the Catalyst wiki is the starting point for learning.
For Lisp and Scheme (hell, functional programming in general), there are few things that provide a more solid foundation than The Little Schemer and The Seasoned Schemer. Both provide a very simple and intuitive introduction to both Scheme and functional programming that proves far simpler for new students or hobbyists than any of the typical volumes that rub off like a nonfiction rendition of War & Peace.
Once they've moved beyond the Schemer series, SICP and On Lisp are both fantastic choices.
check out the programming section of wikibooks
Many of them are fully formed, and quite a few have more advanced sections (which are in varying states of completion) on specific functionality.
also, w3 schools has a great php tutorial and reference section
their html and css sections are good for reference too.
C++
Thinking in C++ by Bruce Eckel
C++ Coding Standards by Herb Sutter & Andrei Alexandrescu
The first one is good for beginners and the second one requires more advanced level in C++.
C - The C Programming Language - Obviously I had to reference K&R, one of the best programming books out there full stop.
C++ - Accelerated C++ - This clear, well written introduction to C++ goes straight to using the STL and gives nice, clear, practical examples. Lives up to its name.
C# - Pro C# 2008 and the .NET 3.5 Platform - Bit of a mouthful but wonderfully written and huge depth.
F# - Expert F# - Designed to take experienced programmers from zero to expert in F#. Very well written, one of the author's invented F# so you can't go far wrong!
Scheme - The Little Schemer - Really unique approach to teaching a programming language done really well.
Ruby - Programming Ruby - Affectionately known as the 'pick axe' book, this is THE defacto introduction to Ruby. Very well written, clear and detailed.
For Javascript:
Javascript: The Definitive Guide
Pro Javascript Techniques
For PHP:
PHP Objects, Patterns, and Practice
For OO design & programming, patterns:
Object-Oriented Software Construction (a bible, maybe the Head First OO would be nice, I don't know it)
Head First Design Patterns (I so love this book)
Design Patterns
For Refactoring:
Refactoring: Improving the Design of Existing Code
Working Effectively with Legacy Code
For SQL/MySQL:
Joe Celko: Tree and Hierarchies in SQL (only on a specific subject, but I found it interesting)
Pro MySQL
C Primer Plus, 5th Edition - The C book to get if you're learning C without any prior programming experience. It's a personal favorite of mine as I learned to program from this book. It has all the qualities a beginner friendly book should have:
Doesn't assume any prior exposure to programming
Enjoyable to read (without becoming annoying like For Dummies /
Doesn't oversimplify
Let's not forget Head First Java, which could be considered the essential first step in this language or maybe the step after the online tutorials by Sun. It's great for the purpose of grasping the language concisely, while adding a bit of fun, serving as a stepping stone for the more in-depth books already mentioned.
Sedgewick offers great series on Algorithms which are a must-have if you find Knuth's books to be too in-depth. Knuth aside, Sedgewick brings a solid approach to the field and he offers his books in C, C++ and Java. The C++ books could be used backwardly on C since he doesn't make a very large distinction between the two languages in his presentation.
Whenever I'm working on C, C:A Reference Manual, by Harbison and Steele, goes with me everywhere. It's concise and efficient while being extremely thorough making it priceless(to me anyways).
Languages aside, and if this thread is to become a go-to for references in which I think it's heading that way due to the number of solid contributions, please include Mastering Regular Expressions, for reasons I think most of us are aware of... some would also say that regex can be considered a language in its own right. Further, its usefulness in a wide array of languages makes it invaluable.
Common Lisp
For a good reference of CL check out Common Lisp the Language, 2nd Edition
For Objective C:
Cocoa Programming for Mac OSX - Third Edition
Aaron Hillegass
Published by Addison Wesley
Programming in Objective C,
Stephen G Kochan,
Head First Javascript is a good intro to JS for beginning programmers - it creatively explains basic programming concepts using JS syntax. The Head First series is based on researched techniques for helping you learn and remember new information. They have you do a lot of exercises and puzzles which might seem juvenile, but really help cement the knowledge in your brain.
One exercise I really liked was after they explained data types, they show a picture of a city street and say "label all the data types you can find in this picture." So the blinker on a car is a boolean, the sign on the store is a string, and the address is a number. That helped me get the idea of how to translate real information into a program.
Based only on this book, I'd say the Head First series is a great way to learn something the first time, but the story-like format they have would make them difficult to use as references.
The Ruby Way by Hal Fulton
The Ruby Way cover http://rubyhacker.com/trw2cover.gif
Python: http://diveintopython.net/
JS: a re-introduction to JavaScript is the introduction to the language (not the browser specifics) for programmers. Don't know a good tutorial on JS in browser.
Great idea by the way!
Given recent developments I think it's important to include the recent explosion of free online course offerings from universities and private companies. The new boston is a tutorial site i've always used for numerous languages for years, great beginner point.
http://www.udacity.com/
https://www.coursera.org/
http://www.coursehero.org/
http://www.codecademy.com/
http://mitx.mit.edu/
http://www.khanacademy.org/
http://thenewboston.org/
I second Kristopher's recommendation of K&R for C.
I've found the "Essential Actionscript 2.0" book quite useful for AS coding (there's an AS3 version out now I believe).
I've found that having real books to thumb through is more helpful than an online reference in some cases. Not really sure why though.
hmm, I don't know if I would say that online materials are useless, but I do agree that there is something about books. Maybe they are better written, or maybe it is the act of forking over $50 that makes you more inclined to study the material.
Either way, I agree that books should be part of this question. If anyone has any suggestions for books for languages I will edit the post with the best suggestions.
The reference you have listed for Ruby is for Ruby on Rails. While still ruby deep down, it is definitely not a place to start for people wanting to learn Ruby.
For Ruby tutorials, I would suggest Why's (Poignant) Guide to Ruby as a great starting point for anyone interested in the language.
If you would want to get into more detail, I would recommend the book Programming Ruby, which has become the standard for all things Ruby. The third edition is currently being written, highlighting Ruby 1.9 features, so I would hold off for a while if anyone is considering buying this book.
For J2EE you have a very comprehensive tutorial at:
http://java.sun.com/javaee/5/docs/tutorial/doc/
For Java, I highly recommend Core Java. It's a large tome (or two large tomes), but I've found it to be one of the best references on Java I've read.
I know this is a cross post from here... but, I think one of the best Java books is Java Concurrency in Practice by Brian Goetz. A rather advanced book - but, it will wear well on your concurrent code and Java development in general.
The defacto standard for learning Grails is the excellent Getting Started with Grails by Jason Rudolph. You can debate whether it is an online tutorial or a book since it can be purchased but is available as a free download. There are more "real" books being published and I recommend Beginning Groovy and Grails.
C#
C# to the Point by Hanspeter Mössenböck. On a mere 200 pages he explains C# in astonishing depth, focusing on underlying concepts and concise examples rather than hand waving and Visual Studio screenshots.
For additional information on specific language features, check the C# language specification ECMA-334.
Framework Design Guidelines, a book by Krzysztof Cwalina and Brad Abrams from Microsoft, provides further insight into the main design decisions behind the .NET library.