This book,Code Complete, Second Edition (Dv-Professional) [Amazon.com], by Steve McConnell is the best programming book I have ever read.
I believe that my own productivity increased by about 50% at least after reading it.
Code Complete answers many of the questions that nag the working programmer, and busts through much of the BS that people spout about programming.
The book covers a huge range of material, from code formatting and style, to how to build teams. Clue: don’t put all the programmers no one else wants in a team to build an important project ;-)
The writing style is friendly and peppered with hilarious case studies such as ‘Escape from Gilligan’s Island’, where the same mistakes happen over and over again.
Everyone who has worked on large programming projects will recognise some of these anecdotes. In one case I watched from start to finish as an ‘experienced consultant’ ruined a perfectly good project with secrecy over his bad and undocumented code. All the warning signs were there. If the manager had read this book, a programming catastrophe might have been averted.
I have bought this book a few times, and given it to management in-duh-viduals to read. Sometimes it helped.
If you are a programmer or a manager, or just interested in software, buy this book and read it. I guarantee you will learn something.
