The Hacker's Path
krainboltgreene.heroku.com
The Hacker's Path
1–10 of 78 posts
Re: The Hacker's Path
#2OK, _why is amazing, but the Poignant Guide is really not the best place to learn Ruby. It may be for some, but I have to be honest, it diverges so much into madness and a pointless, meandering storyline for so long that I couldn't bring myself to finish it. I've spoken to others with the same experience. Maybe the first few chapters are worth reading, if only to get references like "chunky bacon". I suggest the pick-axe book for some good Ruby learning.
Re: The Hacker's Path
#3OK, _why is amazing, but the Poignant Guide is really not the best place to learn Ruby. It may be for some, but I have to be honest, it diverges so much into madness and a pointless, meandering storyline for so long that I couldn't bring myself to finish it. I've spoken to others with the same experience. Maybe the first few chapters are worth reading, if only to get references like "chunky bacon". I suggest the pick…
You may be right to suggest another book as an eager student's introduction to Ruby, but the Poignant Guide is a really awesome book that absolutely deserves a mention. The meandering storyline and its quirky character are part of its charm.
_why's explanation of block syntax in the Poignant Guide sticks with me to this day! The imagery of a little waterslide that block arguments slide down into their block is both charming and memorable.
Re: The Hacker's Path
#4OK, _why is amazing, but the Poignant Guide is really not the best place to learn Ruby. It may be for some, but I have to be honest, it diverges so much into madness and a pointless, meandering storyline for so long that I couldn't bring myself to finish it. I've spoken to others with the same experience. Maybe the first few chapters are worth reading, if only to get references like "chunky bacon". I suggest the pick…
the Poignant Guide to Ruby is a good, gentle introduction for a true novice, which is why it is listed in the 'getting started' section.
The pick-axe book is listed in the next section.
Re: The Hacker's Path
#5There are some problems with rendering this text in Chromium - words around some of the punctuation overlap. Also, I think that ESR's guide is much more informative:
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/hacker-howto.html
The OP omits some of the points I consider important - problem-solving attitude, low level programming, learning unix. Also I think that starting with both Python and Ruby is a bit strange idea - they are really similar (in almost every way I can think of) and such course of learning may cause some confusion (e.g. which pieces of syntax belong to which language?).
Re: The Hacker's Path
#6Has anyone actually been successful following a similar path? Has the author actually read all these books? This is just a list of books on programming languages and tools. Why am I learning Ruby and Python? Why am I avoiding relational database servers and learning SQLite? Nothing is explained.
Re: The Hacker's Path
#7OK, _why is amazing, but the Poignant Guide is really not the best place to learn Ruby. It may be for some, but I have to be honest, it diverges so much into madness and a pointless, meandering storyline for so long that I couldn't bring myself to finish it. I've spoken to others with the same experience. Maybe the first few chapters are worth reading, if only to get references like "chunky bacon". I suggest the pick…
I am picking up Ruby, and the Poignant Guide is... uh... lousy. It maunders and meanders and diverges into slightly drunk? stoned? btardy? certainly ridiculous areas.
Problem is, I'm trying to maintain a focus: learning Ruby. Humor is fine. But I want to focus and Get Stuff Done.
So the Poignant Guide is very frustrating.
Dive Into Python IMO is a very good text.
Re: The Hacker's Path
#8OK, _why is amazing, but the Poignant Guide is really not the best place to learn Ruby. It may be for some, but I have to be honest, it diverges so much into madness and a pointless, meandering storyline for so long that I couldn't bring myself to finish it. I've spoken to others with the same experience. Maybe the first few chapters are worth reading, if only to get references like "chunky bacon". I suggest the pick…
I am picking up Ruby, and the Poignant Guide is... uh... lousy. It maunders and meanders and diverges into slightly drunk? stoned? btardy? certainly ridiculous areas. Problem is, I'm trying to maintain a focus: learning Ruby. Humor is fine. But I want to focus and Get Stuff Done. So the Poignant Guide is very frustrating. Dive Into Python IMO is a very good text.
This is part of why I liked LYAH, it's silly but doesn't ever feel like the weird drags on for an eternity.
Re: The Hacker's Path
#9Has anyone actually been successful following a similar path? Has the author actually read all these books? This is just a list of books on programming languages and tools. Why am I learning Ruby and Python? Why am I avoiding relational database servers and learning SQLite? Nothing is explained.
Yeah, I think a better way is to just pick some software or project you care about and dive right in. The books mentioned in the articles are all fine, but without a goal and lots of experimentation, reading books won't make you great at anything.
That said, picking a Ruby/Python project first and picking up some of the topics mentioned in the article on the way is certainly not a bad thing.
Re: The Hacker's Path
#10blech. this is an alright recipe to being a standard nerd/web developer and reads far too much like a list of things the author has done, especially the hobbies part which imo has bugger-all to do with being a hacker.
my personal idea of a hacker is someone who knows _everything_ and is not afraid to take advantage of that knowledge. of course it's impossible to know everything, but the best hackers I know do a very good job of approximating that :)