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Books I Recommend

blog.jessfraz.com

141–150 of 157 posts

Re: Books I Recommend

#142
post #21

I read/listen to a lot of books and the only book on there I’ve read so far is The Managers Path, which is about the transition of the software engineer in his/her career. It’s a great book for any software engineer, it’s short too. Given that I haven’t heard of many of the other books on the list, I’d say this is a good list I’ll be checking out a few of the titles. One trick about “reading” (listening) to a good ch…

> One trick about “reading” (listening) to a good chunk of books has been Audible, to retain the content I’m listening to on my commutes and on the go I take a lot of notes.

While I share your enthusiasm about audiobooks, I encourage you to leave Audible behind:

- Audible is heavy on DRM, for no particular reason except for platform lockin and control. There are plenty of DRM free alternatives e.g. https://audiobookstore.com/ or https://www.downpour.com/ . To this day Audible doesn't sell Little Brother by Cory Doctorow, because they insist on adding DRM (which the author doesn't permit – he has strong principles regarding digital freedom).

- Audible, like Amazon, is becoming too much of a monopoly, which in general harms the product/user (remember IE6?). You don't even have to look for alternatives because of lofty principles, but just for your selfish interests to have a prospering alternative at hand, when Audible/Amazon screws you over.

Re: Books I Recommend

#143
post #46

I wish this place was a bit more hospitable to literary fiction.

Yes, you can learn more from Moby Dick than 90% of the books on this list.

Additionally, Melville's "Confidence-Man" might best describe the past couple of years... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Confidence-Man

Re: Books I Recommend

#144
post #21

I read/listen to a lot of books and the only book on there I’ve read so far is The Managers Path, which is about the transition of the software engineer in his/her career. It’s a great book for any software engineer, it’s short too. Given that I haven’t heard of many of the other books on the list, I’d say this is a good list I’ll be checking out a few of the titles. One trick about “reading” (listening) to a good ch…

You should be upfront that this app is limited to 30 "articles" (or partial listens). Your app description makes it seem that the premium version adds only: "Subscribe to create your own playlist, download for offline listening, or browse through playlists that are tailored for your interest to discover new articles."

Premium is required beyond the 30? Listening to 5 seconds of an article counts as a play?

Overall really cool app though. Could see it branch out with an awesome feature set.

Re: Books I Recommend

#145
post #21

I read/listen to a lot of books and the only book on there I’ve read so far is The Managers Path, which is about the transition of the software engineer in his/her career. It’s a great book for any software engineer, it’s short too. Given that I haven’t heard of many of the other books on the list, I’d say this is a good list I’ll be checking out a few of the titles. One trick about “reading” (listening) to a good ch…

It would be nice if the Android sign up/log in forms allowed password paste, for use with a password manager.

Re: Books I Recommend

#146
post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, some are straightforward. Most are not. For example, suppose a student shows that T: V --> W is bijective and linear on the way to proving a solution to an exercise. The textbook solution shows dim( V ) = dim( W ) and T is injective instead. Another student shows that dim( V ) = dim( W ) and T is surjective, and still another student simply uses the rank-nullity theorem directly All of these solutions are equiva…

Yes, which is why you include "several proofs of this could include..."

Sure. But now you're talking about half a page to a full page of solution commentary for each exercise. Math textbooks at the upper-undergrad and grad level usually have 10-20 exercises per chapter. Those exercises will usually require a student to fill out a quarter to a half page for any correct solution. Even if an author was decidedly economical in how they did it, writing comprehensive solutions for each exercise would constitute another book's worth of material.

Can it be done? Yes, absolutely. It is likely to be done? Almost certainly not. This is why we have solutions books - you can usually write a full book consisting only of solutions to another book's exercises.

Re: Books I Recommend

#147
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes sense actually.. we all need time to think. I thinn walks where one could just let their mind wander are great. If I didn’t spend some time thinking I would’ve never built this thing :) Still though on these busy commutes, especially while standing, I find the time much better spent staying informed and learning but that’s just me.

That's why I prefer to listen to podcasts when taking walks etc, rather than full-on audiobooks - if my mind wanders and I start thinking about something else, it's not a big deal if I missed an episode of some tech podcast. With an audiobook, I have to try and find where my mind left off! (which is usually a lot more cumbersome than when the same thing happens while eye-reading)

Contra argument: this means podcast too. You need total solitude. Most podcast are useless, the only one I found useful (people in podcast just shit talk unlike audio books or/and crafted essays). Econ talk is great one (was recommended on HN) and every other where the guest is smart

Re: Books I Recommend

#148
post #21

I read/listen to a lot of books and the only book on there I’ve read so far is The Managers Path, which is about the transition of the software engineer in his/her career. It’s a great book for any software engineer, it’s short too. Given that I haven’t heard of many of the other books on the list, I’d say this is a good list I’ll be checking out a few of the titles. One trick about “reading” (listening) to a good ch…

Not available in my country(Romania). Guess I'll stick to TTS reading of epub/PDF version of them (I enjoy the Google TTS to avoid cognitive ease bias).

Re: Books I Recommend

#149
post #37

I would be glad if there was a little information about the author of the blog. I do not know who jess fraz is, why would I bother to see his/her recommendations? It would be pretty nice for posters to put some additional information about the topic rather than just posting a link.

For the same reason that you read hacker news I guess? You don't know who submitted the links and you still read them. So your point is moo (yes moo, not moot, like a cow's opinion). (It seems people really can be offended by anything these days, even by a book recommendation)

Yes, because I believe in the community. I was not stating the blog poster was not worthy, I was simply saying that even a single line of information by the OP would help to everyone. No hard feelings.

Re: Books I Recommend

#150
post #21

I read/listen to a lot of books and the only book on there I’ve read so far is The Managers Path, which is about the transition of the software engineer in his/her career. It’s a great book for any software engineer, it’s short too. Given that I haven’t heard of many of the other books on the list, I’d say this is a good list I’ll be checking out a few of the titles. One trick about “reading” (listening) to a good ch…

The one thing I wanted to find on your site I could not find: a sample audio generated from an article.
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