from Hacker News

Learning resources for curious software engineers

by planetjones on 2/20/24, 4:48 AM with 14 comments

• by komali2 on 2/20/24, 6:13 AM

  The inclusion of the perspective section: https://github.com/charlax/professional-programming?tab=read... I think is really smart. Same for personal productivity. Two things that can dramatically change how and what you end up studying and doing with your time / life.

  I did a coding bootcamp and yeah the frontend knowledge they taught was useful, but I could have learned that online for free. I used to consume big githubs like this by by the bucketful, but none of them really focused on these soft skills. Looking back, the far more valuable thing I learned was these exact soft skills, that unlocked a level of discipline I'd never had, without which I'd never been able to have a career change, or a successful career after.

  The shared article in the github is incredible: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/sep/07/termin...

  I often wonder why I don't see more of these sorts of articles. From watching a family member slowly die of cancer, and from reading books like "When Breath Becomes Air," I'm guessing it's some combination of exhaustion, disability, and a new set of priorities that doesn't really involve death blogging. Still, I find these kinds of writings more poignant than most things I read.

• by bbor on 2/20/24, 6:26 AM

  Any thoughts for a Philosophy section? i.e. meta-CS. I'm thinking about stuff like this, though I guess it would better as blog posts or second-hand critiques:

  - Chomsky 1956, _Three models for the description of language_ https://chomsky.info/wp-content/uploads/195609-.pdf

  - Naur 1985, _Programming as theory building_ https://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~remzi/Naur.pdf

  - Simon & Newell 1970, _Human Problem Solving_ https://iiif.library.cmu.edu/file/Newell_box00018_fld01306_d...

  etc. Maybe too broad a topic? Basically this list feels like it's lacking answers to some fundamental "why is it like this" questions, if that makes sense.

• by iamsanteri on 2/20/24, 7:15 AM

  Does the language part really cover just JS and Python separately? Also, it looks to me like lots of developer-oriented stuff, whereas I have a picture of software engineering as the more hardcore side consisting of robust systems, scale, fault tolerance, reliability etc. Essentially, a step up in terms of the organization’s ability to put direct responsibility on a ”credentialed professional”, akin to an architect or a civil engineer constructing bridges and buildings.

• by jerrygoyal on 2/20/24, 6:32 AM

  Is there an article that teaches how to approach coding with future expansions in mind? It's understood that predicting all future features is impossible. Writing code for the product's current state often results in extensive refactoring when new functionalities are introduced.

• by swimwiththebeat on 2/20/24, 6:50 AM

  As someone who wants to learn and explore more areas of computer science and programming, this outline and centralized list of resources is incredibly helpful! Thanks so much.

• by ccppurcell on 2/20/24, 8:43 AM

  Cool but they should get rid of the medium links. I'm not that curious.