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The Imposter's Handbook

impostershandbook.com

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Re: The Imposter's Handbook

#21

Post by dante9999 »

MehdiHK wrote: post #19
Cozumel wrote: post #3

Can anyone personally recommend it? It looks like a good investment!

Bought it. Pretty basic stuffs: - Didn't learn anything new from Linux chapter. - Data Structures and Algorithms chapter is too basic. There is not even any implementation provided. I thought it didn't offer anything more than you could find on Wikipedia if you add some illustration done with Paper by 53 app. I'd recommend "Grokking Algorithms" by Aditya Bhargava for this topic if you want illustrated explanations wi…

sounds like you should ask for your money back, remember OP stands by everything he creates and if you dont like it he promises money back no questions asked

Re: The Imposter's Handbook

#22

Post by 6DM »

anexprogrammer wrote: post #18

The main thing people miss out on not having a degree is not getting past silly HR "must have degree" filtration. Never once found a CS degree a worthwhile indicator of ability. It may be a superb book, but not even giving a sample chapter out to judge writing style, quality of explanations, depth and so on?

Even funnier, coming across companies that don't accept anyone who doesn't have a degree from xyz university.

Re: The Imposter's Handbook

#23

Post by LeonM »

gagagababa wrote: post #12
LeonM wrote: post #9

Anyone knows if there will be a hardcopy available? I live a paper free live, except for books, I just hate reading from a screen...

From the "Questions" section: Will there be a print version? That's my goal, yes. I want to be sure all the edits are made and, technically-speaking, the book is completed. If I do end up with a paper edition, I'll send out a note to the mailing list in late September, early October. edit: Formatting.

Thanks, I missed that because apparently the site only loaded half on my browser, it's probably being hugged to death right now...

Re: The Imposter's Handbook

#25

Post by Unbeliever69 »

MehdiHK wrote: post #19
Cozumel wrote: post #3

Can anyone personally recommend it? It looks like a good investment!

Bought it. Pretty basic stuffs: - Didn't learn anything new from Linux chapter. - Data Structures and Algorithms chapter is too basic. There is not even any implementation provided. I thought it didn't offer anything more than you could find on Wikipedia if you add some illustration done with Paper by 53 app. I'd recommend "Grokking Algorithms" by Aditya Bhargava for this topic if you want illustrated explanations wi…

Wow, then you were definitely not the target audience!

Re: The Imposter's Handbook

#26

Post by frobozz »

eksemplar wrote: post #13

I have a degree in CS and I've never found myself in a situation where anyone would discuss bouble sort vs merge sort. Neither have I been in a situation where big-o was relevant beyond the basic concept of not doing obviously stupid shit. What you've really missed is things like best practices, design patterns and concepts like SOLID, but a lot of people with CS degrees missed some of those as well. If the book cove…

I disagree. The things that come up every day in practical, real-world professional software development, such as design patterns and SOLID are the things that professional autodidacts normally have plenty of experience in and knowledge of.

The things that they have missed by not taking a Computer Science degree are precisely those things that don't tend to come up, such as big-O and the behaviour of various sorting algorithms.

Anyway, here are two paragraphs on the linked page that you might like to see:

"More than just theory, this book covers many practical areas of the industry as well, such as: Database design, SOLID, How a compiler works, sorting and searching algorithms, Big-O notation, Lambda Calculus, TDD and BDD."

"One of the more subjective parts of the book, but I was asked by many people to write about these things. Specifically: SOLID, structural design, TDD, BDD, and design patterns."

Re: The Imposter's Handbook

#27

Post by [deleted] »

eksemplar wrote: post #13

I have a degree in CS and I've never found myself in a situation where anyone would discuss bouble sort vs merge sort. Neither have I been in a situation where big-o was relevant beyond the basic concept of not doing obviously stupid shit. What you've really missed is things like best practices, design patterns and concepts like SOLID, but a lot of people with CS degrees missed some of those as well. If the book cove…

[deleted]

Re: The Imposter's Handbook

#28

Post by datguacdoh »

anexprogrammer wrote: post #18

The main thing people miss out on not having a degree is not getting past silly HR "must have degree" filtration. Never once found a CS degree a worthwhile indicator of ability. It may be a superb book, but not even giving a sample chapter out to judge writing style, quality of explanations, depth and so on?

I've interviewed somewhere around 200 people at this point and from my perspective, the degree, university or GPA have had no correlation with how well the candidate does. Now, I interview for Ops roles and not software engineering, so this might not apply across the board for other roles, but I have my doubts.

Re: The Imposter's Handbook

#29

Post by sailfast »

eksemplar wrote: post #13

I have a degree in CS and I've never found myself in a situation where anyone would discuss bouble sort vs merge sort. Neither have I been in a situation where big-o was relevant beyond the basic concept of not doing obviously stupid shit. What you've really missed is things like best practices, design patterns and concepts like SOLID, but a lot of people with CS degrees missed some of those as well. If the book cove…

I don't have a CS degree, and while I know not to write ten nested loops it's nice to know the actual reasons behind why it's a problem. Understanding the core principles allows for a deeper understanding of what you're doing, and as a result might lead to some novel use of something.

Not saying novel use or innovative stuff requires a CS degree, merely that improved understanding of the basics of computing will likely improve the way you fully consider engineering problems. This one's definitely on my reading list for that reason (also MIT / Stanford open courses on the topic of algorithms, etc are super helpful for this kind of background)

Re: The Imposter's Handbook

#30

Post by sotojuan »

6DM wrote: post #22
anexprogrammer wrote: post #18

The main thing people miss out on not having a degree is not getting past silly HR "must have degree" filtration. Never once found a CS degree a worthwhile indicator of ability. It may be a superb book, but not even giving a sample chapter out to judge writing style, quality of explanations, depth and so on?

Even funnier, coming across companies that don't accept anyone who doesn't have a degree from xyz university.

That's the case for some elite finance institutions, but does it happen with programming?
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