Rating: 
Summary: Recommended for All my Team
Review: The Pragmatic Programmer is the book all programmers should have to read before they are unleashed onto your source base.The book is nice and terse, covering the ground it needs to cover in little over 250 pages. Clearly the authors are applying the lessons they learnt from Unix, Perl, c++ and a variety of other sources. Rather than wasting words trying to beat home their lessons, the authors have trusted that the reader has some degree of intelligence. They present each nibble of wisdom in a few paragraphs of pithy text which helps to support the 70 tips they provide throughout the book. The book covers a fair degree of ground in it's 258 pages. Testing, documentation, automation and even requirements specifications all get a look in. Most of the book however, is devoted to that part of the art which is harder to define and learn. It is usually learnt from painful experience, or passed on by a senior programmer if you are lucky enough to have one around. It is this knowledge that makes the book worth the read. It's value is not so much that you will find anything revolutionary inside the book, you wont, but that the book provides a terse and approachable font of wisdom for programmers of all skill levels. It is filled with the sort of sensible advice that stops you getting third degree burns while cooking, or cutting your hand off while doing woodshop. Managing to convey that knowledge without sounding preachy or ivory tower in nature adds to it's charm. This book will be required reading for all the programmers on my team at work. It will help them to understand the bigger picture of development, rather than focusing on the minutae of cutting code.
Rating:
Summary: IF you program anything, BUY THIS BOOK NOW!!
Review: This book has already been well reviewed and praised here so I'll keep this short. If you do any sort of programming at all or ever even think you will, do yourself a wonderful favor and buy this book immediately. I cannot say enough good about it. From the author's approach to their content, it's fun, informative, challenging, enlightening and inspirational. A must have for all programmers. And even thought it is directed at programmers the ideas easily carry over into all walks of life. Making it not just a programmers guide to thinking and approach but also a new way to think and approach any problem in general. A new way to approach life. GET IT. You won't regret it in the least.
Rating:
Summary: Do Your Job Better, Enjoy It More
Review: Okay, so it has been a long time since you read "Code Complete". Time to brush up. This book is a retreat for road-worn warriors. Many good ideas (okay, not all of us will give up our productive IDE habits). Good presentation. I like the exercises along with the answers in the back. I especially like how the answers are presented. Typically, it is just the answers. This book has both the questions AND the answers in the back. No need to flip back and forth. Also, it is harder to get the answer to the next question by accident (typically if it is just answers, my eyes wander to the next answer). The only complaints I have are the cover. First, it curls too easily. After reading first 20 pages, had permanent curl to it. Second, the color/material is grease prone. I take good care of my books (I often sell after reading once and the buyers swear they are in mint condition). However, after that same 20 pages, the cover had fingerprints and smears on it. It may be due to the dark charcoal color. Probably more due to poor materials. So, buy it, read it, keep it on your bookshelf.
Rating:
Summary: Great Help Toward More Professionalism and Job Satisfaction
Review: This book is an excellent distillation of practical experience and advice covering all phases of software development. While it's written mainly for the software developer, project managers will get valuable insight from the book on effective software development practice. The strength of this book is that it draws heavily from the authors' experience. Rather that promote a methodology, it promotes attitudes, values, tools and proven practices that will help anyone become a better software developer and make the job of software development more creative and stimulating. It's especially good for new software developers as it contains many lessons that experienced developers only learn the hard way. The book is well organized in easily digestible segments, with a very good cross reference system that makes it handy for repeated use. The appendix presents many valuable resources that professional programmers will want to explore.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent, No-non-sense Advice for Programmers
Review: This is truly one of the best books I've read. The authors distill decades of experience through a series of good, to-the-point advice that is just indispensable for programmers. Perhaps what I liked most about this book is that it is simple (but powerful) and to the point, but still with plenty of *relevant* code examples. Instead of wandering through blah-blah-blah and making the book huge (which seems to be the case with most computer-related books these days) the authors do a great job of sticking to the purposes of the book.
Rating: 
Summary: Software as an evolutive craft
Review: This book has a lot of experience written inside it. However as any software engineering books, you need to read with a light touch. Not everything can be applied to your style but they can guide you in the correct direction. The content of the book has been divied in practical section. There is no real need to read it cover to cover. Instead, you can easily select a specific section before a development cycle and applied what you need. This also guide you on what you need to be aware. For sure, this book will stay in my library as a reference.
Rating:
Summary: An exceptional, amazing, must-have book
Review: This book is simply exceptional book to know "craftmanship" as computer programmer. The book explains how to be "being a good programmer" rather than how to program. The authors doesn't show how to code hash-table, how to fix subtle bugs, or how to choose better data-structure or algorithms. Instead they spend many pages to exhibit good attitude, thinking-way when to be programming. Unfortunately, the book is a little expensive despite it has just about 300 pages and big letters and wide spaces. What's more, it is not well organized. The sections have many cross-references. But, the book gives us how to be simply "better" programmer, which other books don't cover. Being better programmer is not synonymous with being knowledgeable brainy programmer, but he is a man who doesn't neglect nasty code. I strongly recommend the book for all programmers from beginners to hackers, and even someone who wants to know what's a programmer.
Rating:
Summary: Sculpt me into something more powerful
Review: The most challenging thing that I have to overcome as a developer is to make the most use of all the tools that I have acquired from reading technical books and papers. Most of the time, I find that I know how to do something, but I need a push in the right direction to show me what is achievable with my skills. This book doesn't teach you how to create X using Y. It doesn't tell you how to write sort algorithms or develop asynchronous messaging systems. It makes the daring assumption that you already know how to do all that type of stuff. Instead, it teaches you how to rearrange your skills into a more efficient and inspiring toolset. The most important thing to ask yourself is not "What do I know" but instead, "What is possible". This book lays out a framework for thinking more in these terms without concerning yourself with the minor details that can be looked up in a book. I hate to borrow from the old "Teach a man to fish..." story but I have to say, I'm catching fish all over the place!
Rating:
Summary: Excellant Book
Review: This is an excellant book for the experienced programmer or the newcomer. It is loaded with many tips on how to become a good programmer and keeping your code error free. As the book says, it will not teach you how to program, but it will lay the groundwork for you to become a complete, well rounded programmer.
Rating:
Summary: Guide for today's programmers
Review: An outstanding book, discussing every aspect of programming that has impact on the final product. Skilled programmers have an underlying basis for most everything they do, and rarely does a book summarize this reasoned approach. While I didn't agree with every idea (using a single editor for code, documents, etc.) and some ideas could have been better flushed out (the discussion on blackboards and a workflow rules engine), the book is invaluable. Two other pluses - the ancedotes are great, and the humor is actually humorous.
| 
