Head of Product at Temporal. Previously lead architect and low-level systems programmer for scale out SaaS offering. Game engine developer, ML engineering expert. DMs open on Twitter.
Is it necessary to know as many design patterns if you need to create a new software or are there just a handful of patterns that are actually needed.
Learning design patterns is a bit like learning phrases in a language. Yes you now know how to say “can I go to the bathroom?” but it doesn’t mean you can say “the bathroom is on fire”.
One of the best books you will ever read is Inside the Machine. If you can understand how a computer actually works, the way you write software will change. You will understand how your code affects the CPU, cache, memory etc. I really believe in learning the lowest granularity concepts you can handle. If you learn enough, you don’t need to focus as much on patterns and instead on recognizing the problems they attempt to solve. Also, I want to be honest with you. Most of the time, none of that crap matters. Minecraft had one of the worst codebases I’ve seen (not as bad as old terraria). It still made the guy 2 billion dollars.
Do you learn new stuff by reading books/docs about it or do you just dive in...
I’ve never really liked reading books to learn software stuff (with the above book as a limited exception). Nowadays I know enough building blocks that I can usually just dive into stuff and work things out as they happen. I definitely use docs.
In fact, I avoid memorizing most random stuff for languages I know, just google it. Don’t clutter your brain with the specific syntax of some JS API you’ll use 1 time a month. If you use it every day, commit it to memory.
Greetings from Sunnyvale, thanks for the great questions.
I don't think we should share illegal copies of (e)books here. If you want to do justice to the author, please share a link where people can pay for his work.
Head of Product at Temporal. Previously lead architect and low-level systems programmer for scale out SaaS offering. Game engine developer, ML engineering expert. DMs open on Twitter.
Why did you respond to my AMA when this is seems to be about my other post? Also, as I wrote in my article, the book is open source and partially available on Github.
Update: Also I reread and realized that I got confused earlier about the posts and thought you were replying to my very recent article (you can see why probably lol). So sorry about that.
Sorry about that. I haven't read your other post. I was responding to your comment in which you link to that PDF. So my comment is posted at the right place.
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the prior
written permission of the copyright owner and the publisher.
You write here, "the book is literally open source and partially available on github." Partially? So not all? I guess you should link to the GitHub repo than. Even when the source is published on GitHub, the final product (this (e)book) can still contain copyright notices and have different licenses assigned, as page 6 clearly states.
*edit,
Checking the repo github.com/collectiveidea/inside_t... it is also clear that the author of this book started a second edition. That second edition is not finished, but indeed released under the license CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. That does however not automatically mean that the first edition (your pdf) is also being republished under that license. So you do violate copyright here. And are linking to an illegal share of that book.
The second edition can be read here: inside-the-machine.com/ and contains currently 2 chapters. Where the first edition contains 12 chapters. The second edition is not finished and had its last contribution 4 years ago.
Head of Product at Temporal. Previously lead architect and low-level systems programmer for scale out SaaS offering. Game engine developer, ML engineering expert. DMs open on Twitter.
Considering that Jon (author of Inside the Machine) is promoting my tweet about the post, I doubt there is an issue. In fact, he said that it was the best thing he’d see on in a long time.
Thanks for genuine concern, it’s nice that someone is watching out for that stuff.
Head of Product at Temporal. Previously lead architect and low-level systems programmer for scale out SaaS offering. Game engine developer, ML engineering expert. DMs open on Twitter.
Also I reread and realized that I got confused earlier about the posts and thought you were replying to my very recent article (you can see why probably lol). So sorry about that.
Thank you for your quick and detailed response. And the source of the book is great, awesome. It looks like its that old but interesting thoughts about the processes. I guess a quick reading with a speedreader software wont do it. I also need to process the thought.
If I wouldn't know better (I still don't know :D), I'd say you programmed/trained your personal AI to be able answering all the questions here in a very detailed manner, right ?
Have a greate day !
For further actions, you may consider blocking this person and/or reporting abuse
We're a place where coders share, stay up-to-date and grow their careers.
Honestly, great questions.
Learning design patterns is a bit like learning phrases in a language. Yes you now know how to say “can I go to the bathroom?” but it doesn’t mean you can say “the bathroom is on fire”.
One of the best books you will ever read is Inside the Machine. If you can understand how a computer actually works, the way you write software will change. You will understand how your code affects the CPU, cache, memory etc. I really believe in learning the lowest granularity concepts you can handle. If you learn enough, you don’t need to focus as much on patterns and instead on recognizing the problems they attempt to solve. Also, I want to be honest with you. Most of the time, none of that crap matters. Minecraft had one of the worst codebases I’ve seen (not as bad as old terraria). It still made the guy 2 billion dollars.
I’ve never really liked reading books to learn software stuff (with the above book as a limited exception). Nowadays I know enough building blocks that I can usually just dive into stuff and work things out as they happen. I definitely use docs.
In fact, I avoid memorizing most random stuff for languages I know, just google it. Don’t clutter your brain with the specific syntax of some JS API you’ll use 1 time a month. If you use it every day, commit it to memory.
Greetings from Sunnyvale, thanks for the great questions.
I don't think we should share illegal copies of (e)books here. If you want to do justice to the author, please share a link where people can pay for his work.
For example, Amazon: amazon.com/Inside-Machine-Introduc...
Why did you respond to my AMA when this is seems to be about my other post? Also, as I wrote in my article, the book is open source and partially available on Github.
Update: Also I reread and realized that I got confused earlier about the posts and thought you were replying to my very recent article (you can see why probably lol). So sorry about that.
Sorry about that. I haven't read your other post. I was responding to your comment in which you link to that PDF. So my comment is posted at the right place.
And page 6 of that PDF clearly states:
You write here, "the book is literally open source and partially available on github." Partially? So not all? I guess you should link to the GitHub repo than. Even when the source is published on GitHub, the final product (this (e)book) can still contain copyright notices and have different licenses assigned, as page 6 clearly states.
*edit,
Checking the repo github.com/collectiveidea/inside_t... it is also clear that the author of this book started a second edition. That second edition is not finished, but indeed released under the license CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. That does however not automatically mean that the first edition (your pdf) is also being republished under that license. So you do violate copyright here. And are linking to an illegal share of that book.
The second edition can be read here: inside-the-machine.com/ and contains currently 2 chapters. Where the first edition contains 12 chapters. The second edition is not finished and had its last contribution 4 years ago.
Considering that Jon (author of Inside the Machine) is promoting my tweet about the post, I doubt there is an issue. In fact, he said that it was the best thing he’d see on in a long time.
Thanks for genuine concern, it’s nice that someone is watching out for that stuff.
twitter.com/jonst0kes/status/11460...
Also I reread and realized that I got confused earlier about the posts and thought you were replying to my very recent article (you can see why probably lol). So sorry about that.
Thank you for your quick and detailed response. And the source of the book is great, awesome. It looks like its that old but interesting thoughts about the processes. I guess a quick reading with a speedreader software wont do it. I also need to process the thought.
If I wouldn't know better (I still don't know :D), I'd say you programmed/trained your personal AI to be able answering all the questions here in a very detailed manner, right ?
Have a greate day !