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Ask HN: Examples of good technical writing?

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Re: Ask HN: Examples of good technical writing?

#71

Post by john-tells-all »

jonahbenton wrote: post #49

Some mention of his works here, but not his name Michael Kerrisk Author of the Linux Programming Interface, innumerable man pages, and many other projects. Absolutely, without question, the best longform technical writer. Reading his books, where he gets to exercise all of the skills in terms of sequencing, layering, explanation, repetition, etc is like receiving an architectural download from the universe. Will also…

Seconded. I skimmed through the doorstop Linux Programming Interface book, and found it surprisingly easy to read and absorb the information. Very clearly written, with lots of examples and cross-references. Wonderful stuff!

Re: Ask HN: Examples of good technical writing?

#72

Post by bornfreddy »

ImageXav wrote: post #69

Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software by Charles Petzold is an excellent work that very clearly guides the reader through the components and steps that lead to the sophisticated computer systems we have nowadays. Each step is explained with no logical leaps and could be followed by a young child. Improving almost anything by George Box blew my mind. As children and even as university students we…

Also by Charles Petzold: Programming Windows. Not sure how the new editions fare, but the first (second maybe?) was great.

Re: Ask HN: Examples of good technical writing?

#74

Post by shireboy »

A bit dated, but .NET Framework Design Guidelines is one that came to mind. I read it ages ago, and its content has since been baked into static analysis tools and ides, but at the time as a younger dev I greatly appreciated the prescriptive simple style. “Do, Don’t, Consider” plain English rules, just enough explanation to help understand the rule, and a simple code example. Maybe I’m just weird, but I often think that this style is a good fit for a number of technical areas. I could see for cooking for example, providing similar might help people unsure about the “rules”.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2700831-framework-design...

Re: Ask HN: Examples of good technical writing?

#76

Post by theodpHN »

throwaway787544 wrote: post #58

La Technique , Jacques Pepin Mastering The Art Of French Cooking , Julia Child These books are a combination of background information, recipe, and step by step instruction. So these are more a reference of how to write an implementation guide or Runbook, rather than how to describe an API or present architectural documents. I also really liked Mastering Algorithms With Perl , and any of the For Dummies books on tech…

Agreed on the For Dummies books - the ones I've seen have all been surprisingly good intros to their subjects. Approachable and informative.

Re: Ask HN: Examples of good technical writing?

#77

Post by spaetzleesser »

Stroustrup's C++ books are great. You can read them like a regular book. Scott Meyer's books read well. Kernighan & Ritchie's C book is very good. Mac OS documentation in the 1990's was excellent.

I feel there has been a decline in the quality of tech writing since the internet became popular. Today's books are often extremely verbose while not conveying content well.

Re: Ask HN: Examples of good technical writing?

#78

Post by randcraw »

mikewarot wrote: post #60

I think the Turbo Pascal 3.0 manual[1] was one of the best printed manuals I ever owned. It alone was worth the price of the compiler. One of the most complete (and useful!) books about an area of study I've found is The Art of Electronics[2] by Horowitz and Hill. They point out all the traps that are likely to be encountered by an engineer working with the components as they describe them, along with the various tra…

Jeff Dunteman's book on Turbo Pascal was the best written book I've read on computing. His other books are likewise outstanding.

Re: Ask HN: Examples of good technical writing?

#79

Post by noufalibrahim »

donquichotte wrote: post #32
noufalibrahim wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seconded. However, I would add that most books which have Brian Kernighan as an author are of comparable quality. I'm yet to find a book that hasn't taught me something useful written by the man. I can quite confidently say that if he wrote a cook book, I'd go and buy it. Other books by him. 1. The UNIX programming environment 2. The Practice of Programming 3. The Go Programming Language

Came here wanting to mention The Practice of Programming. It seems to be out of print, but I got my hands onto a copy of it some years ago and really enjoyed the clarity, humility and technical depth (mainly in the later parts) of the piece. I enjoy clowning around and joking in personal interactions (if appropriate) and used to do it in my writing, but have come to believe that the humble, dry, concise style of the…

I think so too. I remember reading Larry Wall's Perl book. I found it rambling and incoherent. Didn't hold my interest for too long. Kernighan's books are quite different.

Re: Ask HN: Examples of good technical writing?

#80

Post by noufalibrahim »

bewuethr wrote: post #26
noufalibrahim wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seconded. However, I would add that most books which have Brian Kernighan as an author are of comparable quality. I'm yet to find a book that hasn't taught me something useful written by the man. I can quite confidently say that if he wrote a cook book, I'd go and buy it. Other books by him. 1. The UNIX programming environment 2. The Practice of Programming 3. The Go Programming Language

Two older ones: The Elements of Programming Style Software Tools / Software Tools in Pascal I have read Elements and Software Tools in Pascal, and while partially definitely outdated ("avoid FORTRAN's three-way if"), excellent writing. Especially Software Tools in Pascal, which in large parts describes and explains source code; I was very impressed by the way the descriptions added lots of insights on top of just the…

I believe TPoP is an updated version of Elements.
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