[cvwright]

Unfortunately even in the old days, a truly good programming book like you’re describing was depressingly rare.

Younger me really enjoyed some of the game programming books by Andre Lamothe.

Most “Learn Language X” books were terrible with over focus on syntax and very little thought into organization.

[wyclif]

Apparently the guy who wrote the Camel book on Perl made less than $1000 from that book. I was shocked when I heard about that because back in the day when I was learning that book was incredibly popular and seemed to be everywhere.

EDIT: Edited, not wrote. My bad. That's a crucial distinction. Also, I meant the Llama book, not the Camel book.

[sriram_malhar]

That’s not true. I wrote the Panther book, Advanced Perl Programming, and easily made way more than 100k. Of the 25-30 or so dollars the books cost, I got 10% per copy, or $2 after taxes. The first print run of 35000 sold within the first three weeks.

The Camel book was already a huge bestseller, and was one of the anchor books of the early OReilly series. It made Larry a pretty penny

[smallerize]

The 4th edition authors included brian d foy, who said "I think Tom [Christiansen] and I worked for about two years to produce the current edition. I certainly wouldn't want to spend that much time again to make less than $1,000... It's a huge effort from the editors and proofreaders and the book won't sell enough to make back the effort they put into it." https://www.reddit.com/r/perl/comments/1ns5r9n/comment/ngmvt...

[sriram_malhar]

I wasn't aware of this.

The first edition came out in 1991. The 4th ed came out in 2012, by which time Perl was no longer the duct tape of the internet. Perl 6 had muddied the waters, and Ruby and Rails had peaked.

Still, 1000 is painfully low, esp. for a high quality product.

[wyclif]

Yes, you're right. That is the comment I was referring to.

[ptek]

If only Amiga assembler books hit those type of numbers.

[snvzz]

Do you suggest any such books?

[boisterousness]

These are good ...

"Python for Data Analysis" by McKinney (2018)

"The Go Programming Language" by Donovan and Kernighan (2016)

"Hacker's Delight" by Warren (2013)

"Algorithm Design Manual" by Skiena (2008)

"Purely Functional Data Structures" by Okasaki (1998)

"Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs" by Abelson and Sussman (1985)

[nottorp]

> Unfortunately even in the old days, a truly good programming book like you’re describing was depressingly rare.

And when you got past the beginner stuff, non existent.

I've randomly tried to improve my $LANGUAGE_I_ALREADY_SHIPPED_SOMETHING_IN knowledge across the years, but if you look at books there's a plateau, and it's not too high.

With the internet, there are random posts here and there with pieces of info that will help you improve yourself. But no books.

[skydhash]

You’re better off learning foundational knowledge. Languages are notations, not intent. What has been useful for me are Computation theory, Algorithms, Concurrency, Distributed Systems, Operating Systems theory, Practical system administration, Computer Organization, Networking,…

I do get language books, but only as a reference. For anything more advance, I usually read the sources.

[nottorp]

You’d think someone would write about the tricks you learn breaking your teeth on the language though.

And they do, in random forum and blog posts though.

[NikolaNovak]

Agreed, Books on specific programming language were indeed tricky.

I found books on architecture, systems, or patterns, were more available. E.g. On relational database optimization principles, or Unix system administration, or graphics algorithms and rendering math, etc :)