Yes.
Ask HN: Is Knuth's TAOCP worth the time and effort?
91–100 of 192 posts
Re: Ask HN: Is Knuth's TAOCP worth the time and effort?
#92TAOCP for computers. Baby Rudin for math. The Feynman Lectures for physics.
Re: Ask HN: Is Knuth's TAOCP worth the time and effort?
#93A little bit of history about the book series may help understand what is in it. In 1956, Knuth graduated high school and entered college, where he encountered a computer for the first time (the IBM 650, to which the series of books is dedicated). He took to programming like a fish to water, and by the time he finished college in 1960, he was a legendary programmer, single-handedly writing several compilers on par wi…
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Re: Ask HN: Is Knuth's TAOCP worth the time and effort?
#94No, most of this is made trivial and redundant today.
Understanding your std library performance is lot more important
Re: Ask HN: Is Knuth's TAOCP worth the time and effort?
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wanna sell it?
Weirdly, probably not. I know if I sold it, then I'd suddenly get the urge to read it. Also, it's really heavy (I'd say at least over 1kg), so by the time I sold it at less than the current price because it's no longer new (also mine is 1-4A, the current edition is 1-4B) and paid postage to package and ship it somewhere, it's probably not really worth the effort.
Memento Mori.
You should imagine that you are forced to sell it every day. Eventually you'll either sell it (or donate it (your local library might appreciate it)) or start reading it.
Re: Ask HN: Is Knuth's TAOCP worth the time and effort?
#96It's definitely a good reference, but I'll never read them cover to cover. Not unless I'm having trouble sleeping. :-)
Re: Ask HN: Is Knuth's TAOCP worth the time and effort?
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
His first publication was "Potrzebie System of Weights and Measures" for Mad Magazine in June 1967 when he was 19-years old. https://silezukuk.tumblr.com/image/616657913
I don't know anything about that, but he was born in 1938, so he wasn't 19 years old.
MAD Magazine 1957, not 1967.
Re: Ask HN: Is Knuth's TAOCP worth the time and effort?
#98I recommend this book to anyone starting CS and wondering "why do I have to learn all this stuff?" "What good is data structures and algorithms?"
Read from a certain perspective, TAOCP is less a book about how to do things better (the focus of many CS courses), and more about "wow, who would have imagined ...". I think CS students might find their curricula more engaging if, rather than having a set of concepts to master, there were actually interesting puzzles to solve. Thus, I suggest reading TAOCP not as a text book, but more as a novel. Take a look at the parts that interest you (how many ways of sorting 10 numbers can you think of just using paper and pencil?). CS is a lot easier to learn as a process of surprising discovery, than as a set of barriers that must be overcome.
Re: Ask HN: Is Knuth's TAOCP worth the time and effort?
#99I find reading the historic academic papers and technical reports on a specific subject that is covered by TAOCP more rewarding. I see TAOCP as a survey of the different fields and read the original sources for more depth.
Re: Ask HN: Is Knuth's TAOCP worth the time and effort?
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thanks for the great comment. It made me desire again to buy the books. But I know they will just sit on a shelf mostly unread.
I've wanted to buy these since the late 90s when I used to enjoy thinking about algorithms in the abstract, but never bought them because at the start of my career I felt quite poor and it didn't seem like a good use of my money. In 2015, I decided I was no longer poor and should buy the box-set as a treat. I set aside time to read a chapter in the first week after it arrived, but realised that it would take years to…
Maybe try putting a volume in the lavatory? That’s my algorithm for getting things going with a stuck read.