SICP and The Selfish Gene (R. Dawkins).
Ask HN: What are you reading right now?
291–300 of 307 posts
Re: Ask HN: What are you reading right now?
#292I'm reading Java persistence with Hibernate. Just don't realize ORM is like VietNam war.
Re: Ask HN: What are you reading right now?
#293Discworld! I just finished the second one, The Light Fantastic, and loved it. Terry Pratchett is a brilliant and very funny author. I find after long days of technical thinking I really enjoy a lighthearted funny piece of fiction to help me unwind and get to sleep. At this point I don't think I could handle much more math or computer science and stay sane.
I'm a huge Pratchett fan. I especially like the Watch novels, but every one of them has its merits. You might find this useful: http://www.lspace.org/books/reading-order-guides/the-discwor...
I found that to be very useful! Thank you!
Re: Ask HN: What are you reading right now?
#294"Pattern Recognition" by William Gibson
"The Algorithm Design Manual" by Steve Skiena
Re: Ask HN: What are you reading right now?
#295The Grapes of Wrath by Steinbeck. Long past due.
Edit: I'm also reading this book called "Hold Nothing Back" by Mike Jones, it was gift from a good friend of mine.
btw kudos on an awesome question
Re: Ask HN: What are you reading right now?
#296The Language Instinct - Steven Pinker
Interesting Times - Eric Hobsbawm
The Great Crash, 1929 - John Galbraith
Re: Ask HN: What are you reading right now?
#297Just finished reading Carl Sagan's Dragons of Eden , a fascinating tale of evolution and intelligence. Now I'm trying to tackle Infinite Jest on my iPad. I've never been much of a reader but I'm trying my damndest to break that non-habit. I have no idea what's going on in this book but I feel I'd be totally screwed with out the built-in dictionary function of iBooks. I'm certainly expanding my vocabulary if nothing e…
Before trying to read Infinite Jest, try to read all his other essays (and short stories). This is really helpful. Be OK with the fact that you really aren't going to understand what happens the first time though, like at all. The book -must- be read twice, the first time in a bit of a haze, since even basic acronyms aren't expanded till 200 pages after they are first used. Its enjoyable the second time because there…
Reading IJ on the iPad is the right move. My advice: make sure you look up words that you don't get, instead of following your normal reading instinct to pick up meanings from context. You have a dictionary a touch away.
I agree, read (at least some) of his essays first; not because the story will make more sense to you, but because you'll appreciate the writing more after seeing it deployed in a comprehensible linear narrative. Strongly, strongly recommend _A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again_.
Once you've done that, even at its gnarliest, you can look at IJ like a collection of essays that just happen to be unmoored from reality, and kind of surf the text until it starts making sense again.
Someone reduced IJ to a diagram a few weeks ago, which I translated to Graphviz and re-rendered; this has "spoilers", though:
Re: Ask HN: What are you reading right now?
#298Earlier quoted context omitted.
Before trying to read Infinite Jest, try to read all his other essays (and short stories). This is really helpful. Be OK with the fact that you really aren't going to understand what happens the first time though, like at all. The book -must- be read twice, the first time in a bit of a haze, since even basic acronyms aren't expanded till 200 pages after they are first used. Its enjoyable the second time because there…
This is assuring to hear. Any particular essays of his you recommend?
_Consider the Lobster_ has him subverting a Gourmet magazine writing assignment about the Maine lobster festival.
_A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again_ is perhaps his most famous, about the Illinois state fair.
_Host_ explores a conservative radio talk show; the original Atlantic article had an interesting layout to accomodate his footnotes.
_Big Red Son_ has him at the Adult Video Awards in Vegas. A bit TMI for me, but still well written.
The "This is Water" commencement speech is online at: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122178211966454607.html
Re: Ask HN: What are you reading right now?
#299Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed The Art of War
One-paragraph pitch:
In order to win, we should operate at a faster tempo or rhythm than our adversaries--or, better yet, get inside the adversary's Observation-Orientation-Decision-Action time cycle or loop. ... Such activity will make us appear unpredictable thereby generate confusion and disorder among our adversaries--since our adversaries will be unable to generate mental images or pictures that agree with the menacing as well as faster transient rhythm or patterns they are competing against.
Re: Ask HN: What are you reading right now?
#300I'm currently reading multiple books. Some are technical, some are small enough to read in the subway, some are far too big, and are read before going to sleep ;)
- La Zone du dehors by Alain Damasio, a french author. I must admit I liked his more recent book, La Horde du Contrevent, a lot more. Sadly, it is not available in English. Read it if you understand French and like SF.
- Chronicles of Amber by Roger Zelazny (finishing the 9th book). It's a good story, but not a must-read.
- The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand. Liked the first 150 pages I read.
- Cryptography Engineering by Niels Ferguson, Bruce Schneier, and Tadayoshi Kohno. I'm learning tons about cryptography.
- The Non-Designer's Design Book (3rd edition) by Robin Williams. Only read a few chapters, but I'm learning a lot about design. Very simple principles that change everything.
- Growing Object-Oriented Software, Guided by Tests by Steve Freeman & Nat Pryce. I decided to go with this book instead of reading Beck's book on TDD. I'm learning / revisiting a lot of best practices from TDD masters. I recommend it to Java Developers (once they have read Effective Java, of course).
I still have a lot to read ( http://i.imgur.com/lgpjf.jpg and http://www.google.com/buzz/neveue/Kc4GhaSSoLE/Un-weekend-pro... ), and am looking forward to it :)
I anyone is interested, I've spent some time researching (on HN, StackOverflow, and other communities) about design & UX, Linux & System administration, and programming. Here's the list I ended up with: http://www.google.com/buzz/neveue/NBBSEryBonS/Woot-ordering-...