Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?

#211

Post by wink » Mon, Mar 28, 2022, 8:10 AM UTC

yourdeadneopet wrote: post #204

The Phoenix Project is a fiction novel about an IT department for a large car company that experiences management dysfunction and battles frequent technical debt, but ultimately overcomes it by adopting the best practices of DevOps. I first read its non-fiction companion book, the DevOps Handbook, which got me drinking the Kool-Aid, but this is also a wonderful, breezy read (no small feat for such a technical topic)…

I am a little torn on The Phoenix Project. My first (and later) impression was that it was in some way really cheesy and 'show by example', but in the end it's a quick read and I actually liked it.

I think I wouldn't unequivocally recommend it because it could be hit or miss, so a bad choice for "one book only", but overall: yes, worth reading.

Re: Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?

#212

Post by mdp2021 » Mon, Mar 28, 2022, 8:13 AM UTC

crossroadsguy wrote: post #158

After spending more than a decade and a half in the field of software development/computer science I’ve come to realise some fields simply are not attractive to many/most people of other fields. Not at all. Hell, CS is not attractive to a lot of people working in the field. They work because it pays the bills. So no, at the risk of sounding like I’m full of myself, I’d say there’s simply ZERO such books at least for…

Read at least Algorithms to Live By and think again.

> I’d say there’s simply ZERO such books

Sorry but that's plainly illogical. "Read them, come back and report." (Can you notice that the form of that very sentence shows a clash against the mentality that could align with a passion for CS? A CS specialist that formed such expressions would signal to be forcing against inclination.)

Re: Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?

#213

Post by wink » Mon, Mar 28, 2022, 8:14 AM UTC

reducesuffering wrote: post #184

debanjan16 wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aha! GEB! Do you think a complete beginner with no knowledge in higher math should read GEB?

GEB really doesn't have much complicated math. If you're willing to spend a bit of time thinking about the (logical) concepts presented, you should read it just fine.

I actually thought of GEB and did a search over all comments because I thought it might be mentioned.

I'd love to hear a non-programmer/non-mathematician's take on it because I kinda didn't like it at all. I found it very elaborate and slow-developing with no real insight (maybe because the concepts weren't new or maybe because I'm more someone who prefers reading an encyclopaedia over watching a historically correct movie about something).

Re: Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?

#214

Post by billfruit » Mon, Mar 28, 2022, 8:38 AM UTC

cercatrova wrote: post #116

Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata It teaches Latin in a very cool way, where the entire book is written in Latin but it starts off with simple sentences anyone with a Romance language background can understand, before diving into deeper sentences, all while being illustrated so one can still follow the plot if they're stuck. It contrasts with very dense Latin books that focus on grammar and spelling, which often bore s…

This seems widely recommended here, but there exists more traditional textbooks treatments too, which some people may be more comfortable with:

- Benjamin Kennedy's Revised Latin Primer

- Wheelock also remains a standard treatment.

Re: Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?

#215

Post by DarkCrusader2 » Mon, Mar 28, 2022, 8:40 AM UTC

The Idea Factory: Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation by Jon Gertner.

Gives a great and accessible overview of the incredible work that happened at Bell Labs from it's inception till it demise. Bell Labs is what happens when you bring the greatest minds of your time under one roof and give them creative freedom. It's was fascinating to read how much engineering discipline progressed due to direct result of the inventions made there and how they influence pretty much every aspect of our modern lives.

Re: Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?

#216

Post by TrackerFF » Mon, Mar 28, 2022, 8:44 AM UTC

crossroadsguy wrote: post #158

After spending more than a decade and a half in the field of software development/computer science I’ve come to realise some fields simply are not attractive to many/most people of other fields. Not at all. Hell, CS is not attractive to a lot of people working in the field. They work because it pays the bills. So no, at the risk of sounding like I’m full of myself, I’d say there’s simply ZERO such books at least for…

Seems like you're getting downvoted, but I think it's a fair point.

If you, as the reader, are at the point where you can dive into a technical textbook and keep focus enough to read it - chances are you're already somewhat interested in the field, or have some exposure to related field.

I don't think there's any book that can attract ANYONE to the field. Had the question instead been "Which lecture / article / video", then I'd say that there's tons of good bite sized pieces that can light a fire for most people...but whole / complete books? That's gonna be a particular type of audience.

Even undergrad 101 books are made for people with a certain level of interest.

Re: Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?

#217

Post by lngnmn2 » Mon, Mar 28, 2022, 8:44 AM UTC

https://cs3110.github.io/textbook/cover.html

This just emerged right in front of our eyes. Highest quality. Way better than Real World Ocaml.

Graham Hutton's Programming in Haskell 2ed (plus his video courses).

Programming in Scala Fourth Edition.

Re: Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?

#218

Post by billfruit » Mon, Mar 28, 2022, 8:45 AM UTC

Some books from a few different domains which may be of the type OP is asking for:

1. The Trivium: The Liberal Arts of Logic, Grammar, and Rhetoric : Understanding the Nature and Function of Language by Sister Miriam Joseph.

2. Introduction to Logic by Irving Copi.

3. Computer Systems: A Programmer's Perspective by Randall Bryant and others.

5. Prolog Programming by Ivan Bratko.

6. Information Theory, Inference and Learning Algorithms by David MacKay

7. Geometry by Brennan.

8. Understanding Poetry by Robert Penn Warren and Cleanth Brookes

Re: Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?

#219

Post by szajbus » Mon, Mar 28, 2022, 8:52 AM UTC

amelius wrote: post #86

artemonster wrote: post #64

The art of electronics for electrical engineers. It is dated, but it has everything

Except a good scientific explanation of how transistors work, how to build an amplifier given a number of constraints (power, bandwidth), how to design an antenna ... It's a nice book for hobbyists, though.

Do you recommend any alternative or perhaps complementary book?

Re: Ask HN: Which book can attract anyone towards your field of study?

#220

Post by sinbadpalomar » Mon, Mar 28, 2022, 8:52 AM UTC

marttt wrote: post #191

(I'm in my late 30s, but I always try to look for "time-tested" books first. Books that seem to hold their value after decades; see also: Lindy effect.) Language and linguistics: "Metaphors We Live By" by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson (1980): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metaphors_We_Live_By Systems thinking: "An Introduction to General Systems Thinking" by Gerald M. Weinberg (1975): https://geraldmweinberg.com/Sit…

I would add The Embodied Mind - Francisco Varela and Evan Thompson (1991) https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/embodied-mind-revised-edition

A great accomponiment to the first two, and a great read for those in AI related fields to start thinking about cognition more holistically and less computationally.