Why I Read Technical Books

That was a gem, absolutely.

Also on Lobste.rs: https://lobste.rs/s/11chzy/broligarchs_don_t_speak_for_me

It’s so sad and disheartening to me that you’d need to explain to anyone why books (meaning book-length texts, not necessarily paper books) are different from blog posts and why they’re important.

For me the physicality of books give it more authority in my mind over blogs or articles. I know that’s very absurd cause words are words, but I think it’s a result of education.

That said it’s hard to deny that books don’t have comments and can get quickly outdated.

I like books because I can queue them up physically. I’ve got a pile of books on my desk and right now one of them is technical. I have no idea when I will get to it, but I definitely will because it’s on my desk and I’ve never taken a book that someone recommended me off my desk without reading it. This is stronger for me than a virtual bookmark list.

reading books is like being in a paradise all to yourself; I like to read just to practice my creativity. I usually flip through the pages until a good idea comes to mind even reading random facts or stuff about almost anything, and then I decide to stop reading and put what I’ve just learned into practice

at least that’s how it was before the market changed so much that now, whenever I’m not working, I don’t even want to see a computer because the grind it’s really intense

I can pull that book off the shelf later to reference it.

This is my favorite thing about owning technical books. I can’t remember everything, especially as I age and acquire more stuff to remember in general. Low bandwidth issue, I guess.

I also posit that people who read technical books tend to be more self-sufficient. More to a point, they get that exposure to the information (“I may not understand it all yet, but I’ve seen it.” ~ Dave Gauer) which helps create the framework of how to find the right answer. Too often, we get impatient, wanting to just get to the point so we can move on, forgetting that context and learning in a structured, cohesive way is how we set ourselves up for better troubleshooting when things inevitably fail later on.

Looking at this from a different angle, good technical books also set us up to asking more intelligent questions by supplying that foundational knowledge. Starting your quest for answers by trying to learn more about what is happening is a fantastic way to expand one’s skills. There’s an old html book I like to reference, as it rings true even more so today, tackling the way in which we handle seeking out information and hinting at why generation after generation, we seem to be getting more deficient at it.

How to Ask Questions the Smart Way: http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

reading books, especially physical, provides a kind of focus that i can’t really get when i’m reading documentation online - no 50 tabs and 3 terminals open just trying to figure something out. some of it could be attributed to the fact that your browser is basically manufactured to pull attention everywhere all at once, but the locality of information is also just very convenient

I see a reference to Hamming’s The Art of Doing Science and Engineering – what are some other highly recommendable technical books?

Somewhat facetious: I read technical books when melatonin isn’t doing the trick.

In my experience, you can easily distinguish people who read technical books that those who don’t. The ones who read usually have a deeper understanding of fundamentals and details.

I especially like the collateral learning the books provide. When you read an article or watch a video, you only learn for what you were looking for. In a book however, you are usually exposed things that you didn’t even heard of before. That makes you build knowledge like nothing else.

I’m going to go out on a limb and say it really depends on what you’re trying to learn and, crucially, in which era the thing you’re learning was most actively developed. My first favorite book as a kid was Cooking with HyperTalk. Back then, books had no competition. I even enjoyed some of my college textbooks. The one on assembly (I wish I could remember the name) was surprisingly good. Post-college, I really enjoyed The Little Schemer because not a lot has changed in the language from a beginner’s point of view. It’s conceivable it could have been written as a series of blog articles, but there were no blogs when it was written and it would be quite a challenge to improve upon.

The books I tend not to read are the ones that relate directly to my day job. I have yet to find one where the better source of information isn’t online (official docs, a well-written blog, or source code). So much of what I do is on the web, and the web is constantly evolving.

I stand ready to be wrong. Can someone cite an example of a technical book they like about something created in the last decade?

When you have a book, you have it. When you rely on the internet it can and probably will be taken away from you, slowly if not all at once. Books may well survive many things that would kill the internet.

Agree.

1. Curated
This is possibly the most important reason for me. With 20 bucks you can buy distilled knowledge from a fellow programmer who decide to endure the effort of writing a book.

2. The media format
The book as media push for deep thinking. You have one shot, once printed you need a new book for updates. You have all the room you want to elaborate on details.

3. Highlight and notes
If it’s a physical book you can highlight and take note. Quite useful when you get back for skim and scan.

4. It works without current
Not too bad if you go in some remote area or apocalyptic stuff happens.