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Summary: What Can I Add?
Review: There have already been over 130 reviews on this book, what can I add?All I can do is repeat the good reviews that have already been made. This book is wonderful! It is one of the few books that I would say are essential read for anyone who calls themself a programmer! (It would be nice if some managers would take the time to read it also) This book is old, but yet it is not out of date! The advise it gives is timeless. Oh how much better the worlds codebases would be if more programmers were to read this book! Good job Mr. McConnell.
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Summary: Start from here
Review: Every serious programmer, or at least the one who wants to become one should read this book. Book is supported with structured programming examples (Ada,C,Pascal), but the underlying principles that it is trying to present are as contemoporary as always. I started my career as a programmer. As a novice I got to work on some (other people's) pretty crappy code that kept me up very long at night, and costed me a great deal of stress. Learning from that frustrating experience I asked myself - what is a good programming, and what would it take to learn how to be a great programmer/developer.
I discovered Steve McConnel's book, and it helped me a lot in getting there. It remained one of the milestones of my career. This book will teach you a lot. It will show you a bad way to code, and the good way to do it. It will give you a great coding tips, and it will show you some, as the author calls them, "coding horrors". Moreover, it will tell you some great 80/20 rules that should help you with debugging, testing and refactoring focus.
It will definitely change you as a programmer - a lot. Do I need to say again that every serious programmer should read this book. The only thing that I could wish for would be a reflection on
Object-Oriented programming and its good vs. bad practices.
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Summary: Tour de Force
Review: There is no other work to compete with McConnell's Code Complete. Nearly unreadable end to end, it is an excellent reference for jr and mid level developers and managers to help understand the nuace of what programming really is.
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Summary: Dated, but still very worthwhile!
Review: This book is dated, but still very worthwhile! The mistake most coders make is that they jump into programming, don't! This book shows you how to develop good code, this book is great!
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Summary: It's All About Adaptation !!!
Review: Code Complete -- a book not about how to get it done, but more about what to adopt and why. The author, Steve McConnell, has compiled this book, out of the experiences of others as well as of himself, which talks about different tips which could be utilized during a software project. A very informative book, with many practices, when exploited would result in the construction of a high quality product. What one would appreciate about the book is that, it is written from a perspective of a programmer, who has committed mistakes, not a hot shot guy, who 'knows-it-all'. One also would value the last couple of chapters, which tell one how a programmer should adapt. Though this book has its boring bits, it is highly useful for a beginner or an expert.
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Summary: For Every Programmer
Review: Code Complete is a book for every beginner-intermediate level programmer. This book is for people serious about programming. This book is not based on syntask of any language but it more like tells you how to be a good programmer. It teaches you how to write better code. Steve McConnell has done a great job by compiling such enormous amounts of techniques, practices you can use to be a better programmer. Surely all of it has been compiled from years of experience. For a beginner it will be a huge leap towards being a professional. This book focses on code construction. The last few chapters tell us how our own character effects our code and how focusing on our personal character we can be better programmers. On the other side this book is about 800 pages long. It gets pretty dull and dry in the middle, but most of it is valuable stuff. It might be hard to finish the book but once you have you can give a pat on your own back for doing a great job.
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Summary: I recommeded it in my book as a must read.
Review: Simply put, this book has important fundamentals, that every programmer should know, and not easily found elsewhere. I read this book when it first came out and it helped accelerate my career wonderfully. Even though it's been around a while, most everything still holds true. Unfortunatley, it doesn't cover much object-oriented design the way more recent books do. Nonetheless, it contains concepts that still aren't taught in schools. It was ahead of its time when it was published and I made a point of making it required reading for the five-step training program in my book, "The Secret Path to Contract Programming Riches," where I stress how important this book is to becomming a master programmer. This book definitely has to be on the bookshelves of all serious programmers! ~ Michael Nigohosian, author - "The Secret Path to Contract Programming Riches: An Expert Consultant's Step-by-Step Guide That..."
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Summary: Book I refer to again and again
Review: I have been working as a software engineer for close to seven years, and have read many books on programming and software engineering. This is without a doubt the BEST book I have read about programming and software engineering that I have ever read. It is absolutely required reading for anyone that will be involved in writing code, reading code, or even working close to people involved with code. This book is as close to perfect as you can get. I refer to this book very often, especially when an arguement comes up at work about how you supposed to do something. Just this week I referred to it about how the best way to conduct a code walkthrough is. The book pointed out several things that my group was doing wrong. Implementing some of the ideas in this book helped to make our code reviews more efficient. I really like the examples and humor in the book. The writing is clear, and to the point. While quite a large book, it is both a page turner, and a great reference. Well organized, and to the point. I cannot say enough about how wonderful this book is. If I ever become a software manager I will buy a copy for every person on my team.
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Summary: A very useful book for any programmer
Review: This is a book about general aspects of the art of programming, like wich names you have to assign to variables, how long need to be the functions, how complex needs to be a module... All this things are aplicable to all the programming languages. The book has a lot of examples in C and in Basic, and the most important, a lot of errors that even the most experienced programmers make. This book it's a must have for any programmer. Be sure that after reading it you will write a cleaner and more beautiful code.
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Summary: Required Reading for all Programmers
Review: I am a development manager for a team of programmers and have made this required reading for every programmer who has worked for me. I have not since seen a reference that is just so darn practical and on point when it comes to the art of programming. Every time I reccomend this book to another programmer they always come back to me raving about how it changed their whole outlook on programming. I see a marked improvement in the code and work practices by every programmer that has worked for me after reading this book.
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