personal-growth

Can you recommend "Software Masterpiece"?

I found there is "Software Masterpiece" from c2.com. Reading and studying these kinds of software codes will be great step being better programmer. But I want to know more softwares not just listed ones - Qmail, Emacs, Python and etc. Can you recommend "Software Masterpiece"? ...

How Do You Read Books?

I was reading a couple of books on programming in python. I found that annotation helps me keep track of useful information and other thoughts. I was hoping to find out how others read the books: How do you read books, especially books that teach you a new technology (and, if you read physical books at all)? Do you grok it (along with...

How do you define a "good" programmer?

I often hear it mentioned such sentences as, "it is easy to find a blank-language programmer, but as always, it is hard to find a good programmer" What exactly defines a good programmer? What are the tell-tale signs of a good programmer? (edit: duplicate? What are the signs of talent in programming) ...

Programmer development: Programmer OR Hack?

What are the skills that distinguish a programmer from a hack? ...

Archetypes Of Developer Career Paths

I've seen this many times. A junior developer grows in skills and knowledge to reach some intermediate-advanced stage after about 6-9 years in the field and starts wondering "what next?". I'm collating a top-level view of a handful of paths or archetypes for such a person to consider: The Guru: This is a "growth in depth" approach, one...

Teammember over-estimating abilities. How to help him grow?

What is the best way to help a somewhat stubborn unskilled team member gain some insight and grow as a programmer? One of our network administrators has had a long standing desire to take his hobby java programming to a new level. He hasn't been happy with his current job, so being the altruistic guy that he is, our Boss decided to give...

Making lemonade from lemons

I'm just curious as to what other developers do to make the best of a sub-optimal situation. I'm currently contracting on a project where there is lots of room for improvement particularly when it comes to cut and pasted code. However I'm a mere developer, and although I've approached both the project lead, and the manager himself, wit...

What traits can hint a teenager he should pursue software development career?

We're gonna have a day when employees' kids will visit our company office. The idea is that they will come see "how parents work", "how cool stuff is done", have fun, etc. Kids will be up to 17 years old. Now I suppose some of the teenagers already think of what they wanna do when they finally grow up and will ask questions like "how ca...