I'd start at http://www.kohala.com/start/
Must Read CS Books For Self Self-Taught Programmers
31–40 of 63 posts
Re: Must Read CS Books For Self Self-Taught Programmers
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've heard "The Art of Prolog" is good, too... a quick glance at Amazon shows it to be ridiculously expensive, though.
It is quite good, and the hardcover version is beautiful as well -- good enough to be a coffee table book. But yeah, $250 is pretty steep.
You should be able to get it cheaper than that—I did. AbeBooks shows it available for $40 or so, plus p&p.
Re: Must Read CS Books For Self Self-Taught Programmers
#33I can't remember who said it, but
"If you can write a compiler, you can write any program."
Hence, I'd get compiler books. Modern Compiler Implementation in Standard ML, SICP has a couple of sections on compilation, there's a computational theory book that I don't have on hand which would be useful to this end too.
Re: Must Read CS Books For Self Self-Taught Programmers
#34I can't remember who said it, but "If you can write a compiler, you can write any program." Hence, I'd get compiler books. Modern Compiler Implementation in Standard ML, SICP has a couple of sections on compilation, there's a computational theory book that I don't have on hand which would be useful to this end too.
I happened to be looking at Tony 'Quicksort' Hoare's page at Microsoft Research and I noticed this:
"His research goal was to understand why operating systems were so much more difficult than compilers"
Re: Must Read CS Books For Self Self-Taught Programmers
#35I am also self-taught, although I dropped out of University two years into a CompSci/Engineering double major, so I will recommend some resources to you that helped me immensely. Each of these books has an associated MIT course with lecture video, notes, etc. available online. First is Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs[1], which you can read online, and the associated course at MIT, which is 6.001[2]…
That's a great collection of books, but when I see a list of link-shortened URLs to what context dictates are book web pages, I automatically assume they are affiliate links. Please just use the real URLs so people know what they're getting into.
For the record the shortened URLs are not affiliate links, and I'm not trying to make any statement about affiliate links. Here are the original URLs:
[1] http://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/full-text/book/book.html
[2] http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/electrical-engineering-and-comput...
[3] http://dragonbook.stanford.edu/
[4] http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/electrical-engineering-and-comput...
[5] http://greenteapress.com/thinkpython/
[6] http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/electrical-engineering-and-comput...
Re: Must Read CS Books For Self Self-Taught Programmers
#36Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture by Martin Fowler helped me make the jump from small systems built for myself to large, sophisticated systems built for others.
The Mythical Man Month by Fred Brooks really helped me learn to think about large projects from a personnel and planning perspective. There are some ideas there that have become part of the CS canon; "no silver bullet" and the slightly sexist but accurate metaphor for throwing more people at an overdue project, "nine women can't make a baby in one month." The Mythical Man Month was written in 1975, but it holds up remarkably well.
Re: Must Read CS Books For Self Self-Taught Programmers
#37My vote goes for The Little Schemer. It's short (but don't read it all in one sitting), entertaining, and will teach you some important concepts.
http://www.amazon.com/Little-Schemer-Daniel-P-Friedman/dp/02...
Re: Must Read CS Books For Self Self-Taught Programmers
#38Previous HN thread on a similar topic: http://news.ycombinator.org/item?id=2262527
Re: Must Read CS Books For Self Self-Taught Programmers
#39FYI, you have listed several books twice (SICP, Intro to Algorithms).
Re: Must Read CS Books For Self Self-Taught Programmers
#40Updated list: (still unsorted)