Ask HN: Best books under 200 pages for developers?
11–20 of 106 posts
Re: Ask HN: Best books under 200 pages for developers?
#12For those of you who claim to start and finish a book in a weekend, are you spending literally the entire weekend doing nothing by reading? Do you take breaks? Do you speed read? Do you take notes? What's your strategy?
Huckelberry Finn, which is a pretty complicated book given all the dialect and the ideas it presents, used to take me about 8-9 hours. I recently read it over a period of 2 days in ebook reader during pauses in a pretty heavy schedule of taking care of kids, cleaning house etc.
Re: Ask HN: Best books under 200 pages for developers?
#13Compiler Construction https://inf.ethz.ch/personal/wirth/CompilerConstruction/inde... How to build a compiler from scractch (if you read German, there is an even more concise book by him, "Übersetzerbau)".
Project Oberon https://inf.ethz.ch/personal/wirth/ProjectOberon/index.html How to build a personal workstation including all software from scratch.
Re: Ask HN: Best books under 200 pages for developers?
#14Classic MIT text. Pretty dense feeling though, my brain melts after a chapter or two at a time
Re: Ask HN: Best books under 200 pages for developers?
#15Re: Ask HN: Best books under 200 pages for developers?
#16Re: Ask HN: Best books under 200 pages for developers?
#17Re: Ask HN: Best books under 200 pages for developers?
#18"User Interface Design for Programmers" (159 pages)
Amongst my many weaknesses, UI is the weakest.
Re: Ask HN: Best books under 200 pages for developers?
#19Grokking Algorithms An Illustrated Guide For Programmers and Other Curious People (235 pages)
Re: Ask HN: Best books under 200 pages for developers?
#20For those of you who claim to start and finish a book in a weekend, are you spending literally the entire weekend doing nothing by reading? Do you take breaks? Do you speed read? Do you take notes? What's your strategy?
If I really push I can do a 350 page book in one day of about eight hours.
I do take breaks if I have a need such as eating, or the rest room.
I do not speed read. My strategy is to sit down, read, and get done at some point.
Non fiction is a bit different, and depends wildly on the topic, how familiar I am with the topic, and how dry the book is.
I also enjoy nonfiction podcasts, and talks which I play at 1.5x speed while doing things like bike riding, or cleaning.
I don't think there's a particular reason to read a book in one weekend. For me the outside world kinda just fades away as I do it like it does when you binge a lot of things. But if you don't have the time or that ability, shorter chunks, even a chapter a night or splitting it over multiple weekends seems like a good idea to me.