Tom Drapeau

If you are thinking about being a programmer, pick any interview from this book and read it. If, after reading it, you aren’t excited about programming, then just stop. This is the best book I’ve ever read that gets inside the mind of a great programmer. True greats, the pioneers of computer science and industry achievement.

The interviewer, Peter Siebel, does a remarkable job hanging with these giants of programming. Siebel is able to inject himself to probe when necessary, able to ask a few stock questions without it feeling overly rehearsed, and then get out of the way to let these folks talk.

I learned things about programming that I had previously under appreciated, such as the usefulness of monads and closures. I found the interviewees to be extremely candid, with profound answers to such questions as “do you think programming is a young person’s game” (with a variety of answers) and “do you think of yourself as a craftsman, engineer, scientist or artist?”

A few attitudes shared by most if not all interviewed:

• C++ is not a good choice of language
• There is no silver bullet for debugging or reading code written by others
• Using puzzles in technical interviews is not the best way to determine who to hire
• Don Knuth’s “The Art of Computer Science” is tough to get through (even for Don himself!)
• Get something easy working first before you optimize it

I really enjoyed reading Doug Crockford (of Atari, Lucasfilm, Yahoo and JSON fame) talk about JavaScript. I enjoyed hearing Dan Ingalls (implementer of several versions of Smalltalk) talk about teaching a new programmer by tapping into their inner passions, vs. teaching programming for its own sake. I particularly enjoyed reading the Guy Steele interview. Guy, co-creator of Common Lisp and Scheme, talks about magic and programming (pp360-361):

“I think it’s not an accident that we often use the imagery of magic to describe programming. We speak of computing wizards and we think of things happening by magic or automagically. And I think that’s because being able to get a machine to do what you want is the closest thing we’ve got in technology to adolescent wish-fulfillment.”

Reading this book helped to recreate the magic of programming for me. I would recommend it to any programmer, old or new. You don’t have to read it all straight through either… feel free to pick and choose, without fear of losing context. You can read the introductions to each interview here.

tdrapeau Books Book Review, programming

Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations by Clay Shirky

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is the best book I’ve ever read on the intersection of anthropology and the internet. Shirky has tremendous powers of observation, and his text is unencumbered by societal norms and restrictions. As is written on the front book cover, “Revolution doesn’t happen when society adopts new technology, it happens when society adopts new behaviors.”

The book tackles several coordination, cooperation and publish then filter scenarios via in depth analysis of real world events. And as with the profound statement on revolution from the book cover, the examples lead with the interpersonal aspects; the tools (Wikipedia, Flickr, Linux, Livejournal, Facebook) are shown, sometimes to show how they supported the interpersonal aspects, sometimes to show how they enabled them to happen in the first place.

I thoroughly enjoyed this enlightening, if sometimes a bit dense text. The updated epilogue talks about how unincorporated groups in today’s society are still somewhat powerless when compared to businesses, and suggests that the coming months and years will see experimentation on bridging that gap.

If you work on the internet, or are interested in the digital age and its tools, or even anthropology regardless of its intersection with technology, this book is worth a read.

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tdrapeau Books Book Review, Clay Shirky, Online Communities, Web 2.0

Don’t Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability by Steve Krug

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is my absolute favorite book on designing websites with the user in mind. Far too often websites are designed from the perspective of a salesperson, a marketer, an engineer or a designer. Far too seldom are they created from the perspective of a person who will actually use the site. Steve Krug teaches from the user’s perspective, and does so without many wasted words.

The chapters in the “Things You Need to Get Right” section are my favorite, in particular Chapter 6: Street Signs and Breadcrumbs. That plus the practical advice on usability testing in Chapter 9 are worth the price of the book alone.

I recommend this book to anyone involved with making websites–you will be better at it once you adhere to the lessons in this book. I know I am.


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tdrapeau Books Book, Book Review, Usability

Road Player by Jerry Forsyth

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars



Boy, this book gets right to it. Danny Diliberto is a gambler and a pool hustler whose sensational stories fill each of the 231 pages of this volume. Adhering somewhat to chronology, the book focuses on Danny’s exploits and the exploits of his fellow hustlers on the Pro Billiards Tour as well as the Johnston City tournaments. With names such as Cornbread Red, Boston Shorty and the Deacon, the figures described take on legenday proportions. Even Willie Mosconi, the king of pocket billiards, makes appearances.

Although short of a life story, Danny’s past as a lightweight boxer who trained under Angelo Dundee sets the stage for his rough and tumble existence as a road player. The scores were big, the losses bigger and danger always around the corner.

Read the book if you want to hear stories of the hustle–details of the games themselves are often vague, only giving enough detail to spice up the score at the end of the session. For the non-players out there, you’ll need to brush up on your pool jargon to follow some of these sections–but the payoff is worth it.

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tdrapeau Books Book, Book Review, Danny Diliberto, Hustler, Pool

The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream by Barack Obama

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars

I had high hopes for this book, as Mr. Obama has since become the POTUS. It did not let me down. Obama has a fabulous way of writing about complex issues that does not dumb them down, but respects their complexity while giving his reasoned opinion.

Some sections of the book are a bit drawn out and his background as a lawyer becomes evident–although those times are few. I found his chapters on Politics, Race, and the World Beyond Our Borders to be excellently written, and spot on.

I also enjoyed seeing how candidly he spoke about the current state of families, using his own family in the analysis. The book as a whole felt like a personal journey, and ending the book with a chapter on family, particularly his family, was fitting.

I recommend this as a good read that gives the reader a solid insight to the way Barack Obama looks at the world.

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tdrapeau Books Barack Obama, Book Review, Books, Hope

Running the Table: The Legend of Kid Delicious, the Last Great American Pool Hustler by L. Jon Wertheim

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
I have had the good fortune to meet Danny Basavich at the Ocean State 9-Ball Championship in Providence, RI about 3 years ago. He really is a nice guy, who takes time to chat with us regular people while not playing world class pool. I did not have the opportunity to watch him hustle, although watching him beat top-class pros was almost as good.

I play some pool myself, and am somewhat immersed in the subculture. For me, the book was a lot of fun, very accurate in its portrayal of pool halls and the gambling therein. I enjoyed reading all of Delicious’ crazy exploits and his teaming with Bristol Bob.

Reading this book has inspired me to move onto the Danny Diliberto Story, by Jerry Forsyth. I’m hoping to see Delicious back out there on tour soon — he is a true character.

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tdrapeau Books Book, Book Review, Hustler, Kid Delicious, Pool

Random Walk Down Wall Street The Time Tested Strategy for Successful Investing Rev, A by Burton G. Malkiel

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is a great read that explains all of the core concepts related to Wall Street and financial investment, and takes the time to explain the historical significance of them as well. Malkiel discusses valuation (firm foundation vs. castle in the air), technical (charting) and fundamental analysis on his way to modern portfolio theory and behavioral finance. He stops to debunk theories that would deny the efficient-market theory, and then launches into some great practical advice for the investor.

Besides strongly encouraging investing in index funds as a way to minimize risk, he suggests looking into closed-end funds when offered at a large enough discount from the net asset value. A guide to mutual funds and a primer on derivatives round out the book.

If you didn’t understand some of the above, you should definitely read the book, as I didn’t understand a good deal of it before I started. I highly recommend this to all new investors as a solid, no frills investment tutorial.


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tdrapeau Books Book Review, Finance, Wall Street

Geeks: How Two Lost Boys Rode the Internet Out of Idaho by Jon Katz

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
Great look at the world of geeks circa 1999. At a time when internet access was mainly for academics and geek culture, Slashdot.org just coming into prominence, and the computing world ablaze, we follow the author and 2 teenagers from Idaho on their journey into Chicago and the world. Interesting how the story runs into the MSM coverage of the Columbine shootings, causing the beginning of the Hellmouth series on Slashdot. Well written book — at the end you feel you really know who Jesse (the more outgoing of the 2) is.


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The Cult of the Amateur: How today’s Internet is killing our culture by Andrew Keen

rating: 4 of 5 stars
I went into reading this book having already viewed a Google talk video where the author discussed it and took Q&A. I found that the core tenet of the book, that the “Web 2.0″ so-called democratization of all media is a profoundly bad thing that undermines talent and professional skill and does nothing to enrich our lives, is pretty accurate. The promise of the democratization, that an average citizen can publish a blog post, a song or a video that is as valuable to the reader, listener and viewer, is preposterous. There is more separating professionals and amateurs than access to raw tools.

I agree that the points made in the “moral disorder” chapter need to be addressed as well — the internet should be a place that has its freedoms without exposing children to porn.

I think the arguments made by the author get stretched a little thin in the 1984 (v2.0) chapter — this argument is a little 1997, that Google and Yahoo have all of your personal information and they will sell you out, so don’t even accept cookies. I think that viewpoint is a little extreme, I’m not sure I buy it anymore.

I’m happy to have read this book — I think it brings up some great questions that need answering.


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Update (October 29th): James Marcus, a colleague and friend of mine, has a much more literate review of this book here. Right – what he said.

tdrapeau Books Amateur, Andrew Keen, Book Review, Cult

I have been programming for over a decade now, but mainly focused on back end technologies. Thus, I have never really taken the time to learn Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). CSS, as it turns out, was the last core web technology in widespread use that I still had not yet learned. A project came up for work that demanded me to jump into CSS, so I purchased this O’Reilly title. I am a huge fan of O’Reilly work… my bookshelves are sagging with O’Reilly titles. I didn’t really have the time to sit back and savor this read, as my work demanded I just gulp it down.

I have to say, I sincerely enjoyed this gulp. Eric Meyer is a web standards guru, and really, really understands CSS to its core. I fully admit my geekness and say that anyone who can break down a technology the way Eric did for CSS can hold my attention for 450 pages, no problem.

I did come away with a healthy appreciation for how complex good CSS can be for a sophisticated web site that is expected to work across all mainstream web browsers. With the guide, though, I came away with the tools to manage it.

I highly recommend this book to any programmer looking to create good looking websites.

tdrapeau Books Book Review, Books, CSS, eric meyer, OReilly