The Pragmatic Programmer (pdf) by Andy Hunt and Dave Thomas examines the increasing technicalities and specialization along with the best practices and major difficulties of various aspects of modern software development. Written as a series of self-contained topics, in the book, the authors aim to codify many of the truths they themselves stumbled upon during their respective careers as software designers and code writers.
Andy Hunt is a writer of software development books and one of the founders of Agile Alliance. Dave Thomas is a well-renowned computer programmer, author and editor. Besides, The Pragmatic Programmer, the authors have written many other books and articles. They teamed up and founded the Pragmatic Bookshelf publishing company which publishes series of books on software development.
The pdf version of The Pragmatic Programmer can be downloaded for free from the link below. You can also buy the book from Amazon following the referral link.
Buy from Amazon: The Pragmatic Programmer: From Journeyman to Master
Book Review:
- Title: The Pragmatic Programmer: From Journeyman to Master
- Author: Andy Hunt, Dave Thomas
- Edition: 1st
- Publisher: Addison-Wesley
- Pages: 361
- Format: pdf
- Size: 2.4MB
The Pragmatic Programmer comes straight from the programming trenches and illustrates the many aspects surrounding modern software development. Filled with thoughtful examples, engaging anecdotes, and interesting analogies, it examines the core process of configuring specifications and producing real world, practical, working code.
The book is targeted at all level of programmers – beginners, intermediate programmers and seasoned ones; it’s a great resource for keeping your programming technique fresh. The practical experience of the authors is clearly illustrated through the excellent analogies throughout the book – tracer bullets, broken windows, and the remarkable helicopter-based explanation of the need for orthogonality.
Covering a wide range of topics from career development and architectural process to personal responsibility, The Pragmatic Programmer shows the way to keep your code flexible and working. The book consists of 8 chapters along with the answers to the exercises in the end.
The chapters in the book are: A Pragmatic Philosophy, A Pragmatic Approach, The Basic Tools, Pragmatic Paranoia, Bend, or Break, While You Are Coding, Before the Objects, and Pragmatic Projects.
The elements of approach explore into aspects such as specification development, design practices, development tools and techniques, customer relations, team management, and testing process. It is presented with useful technical problems and anecdotes.
The Pragmatic Programmer will guide you to avoid the traps of duplicating knowledge and skills, avoid programming by coincidence, capture real requirements, write flexible, dynamic, and highly adaptable code that can be reused, and make your work more precise with automation.
Most modern books on software development fail to cover the basics of what makes a great software developer, instead spending their time on syntax or technology where in reality the greatest leverage possible for any software team is in having talented developers who really know their craft well. An excellent book.
— Pete McBreen, Independent Consultant
The cool thing about this book is that it’s great for keeping the programming process fresh. The book helps you to continue to grow and clearly comes from people who have been there.
— Kent Beck, author of Extreme Programming Explained: Embrace Change
Buy from Amazon: The Pragmatic Programmer: From Journeyman to Master
The Pragmatic Programmers has over the years stood out as an excellent resource filled with reliable information for novices, experienced programmers, and software managers. Use the lessons of this book daily and you’ll realize improvements in personal productivity as well as accuracy. Overall, you’ll develop the base for long-term career success. You’ll become a Pragmatic Programmer!
You can find more software development books/pdf here.
