Programmer Musings

Programmers and Reading

What is it with programmers who don't read?

Most of the best programmers I know are constantly learning. They seem to have an insatiable curiosity for any topic they are interested in. These programmers are often reading websites, books, and magazines almost constantly to help extend their knowledge and understanding.

Others never seem to read anything. Some appear to believe that once they learned enough to get a job in the field that more learning was unnecessary. Now it's possible that some people really are that good, or that they work with people that are such experts that they can learn everything they will ever need just by asking.

I wasn't born that good, and I've never worked with people who really knew everything (although I have worked with one or two who thought they did). In order to get better at my craft, I read quite a bit. Looking elsewhere in this blog, you can see a number of books that I have reviewed. My collection of computer books is significantly larger than what I have written about. I also read a few computing/programming magazines and even a couple of websites.

I do this for several reasons. I want to improve. I want to see where others are taking the field. I want to be able to learn from other people's experience, so I don't have to make all of the mistakes myself.

A programmer I worked with a few years ago said he saw a study covering the number of computing books that programmers had, on average. The number floored me...zero. I have over two hundred computing books in my personal library. Over the years, I have culled the ones that are really no longer relevant. I really don't have a good idea of how many programming books I've read.

I just can't imagine how someone can be a programmer without this kind of resource.