Tech Reads
I think I may have mentioned this in a previous piece of writing, but I like books. I have a lot of them, both fiction (mostly fantasy and sf…) and non-fiction. I will read almost anything you put in front of me. I would and will read anywhere — on a bus, waiting at the doctor’s office, on my lunch break, and basically every night before I turn in. I enjoy the feel and the act of reading a physical book, and ironically as much as computers, electronics and their related technologies are my work and one of my passions, I have difficulty really focusing on reading a book in an electronic format. I can do it, but it isn’t my first choice.
That being said, here are three technical books I have read over the years that I found very useful. A lot of what they cover would be considered the basics, but I am a believer in knowing the basics very well, and I re-visit and review seminal information all the time. Being able to apply the basics in a practical sense is, I think, more rare that we realize.
Code by Charles Petzold
Mr. Petzold is a pioneer of personal computing. He has extensive history working with PC Magazine and Microsoft both as a programmer and as a technical writer, and originally obtained an Msc in mathematics from Stevens Institute of Technology. There are probably many others out there who remember some of his other books such as his Programming Windows series which spawned six editions.
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Code is an amazing journey into the basics of programming, Boolean logic, and the fundamental concepts involved in computing as we know it. I have always found his analogies and writing style to be easy to digest. This is a book I would also recommend to someone who was a non-technical user of devices that wanted some insight into how they work at a very basic level, or someone just starting out who wants a read that is perhaps more engaging than some textbooks you find.
The Pattern In the Stone by Daniel Hillis
Professor Hillis has been involved with a fantastic variety of projects, companies, and organizations. He schooled at M.I.T. in mathematics, worked under Seymour Papert developing LOGO, worked on AI and educational toys, and co-founded a number of companies.
The Pattern In The Stone covers a great deal of the territory that Code does, but does it with the unique style of the author even so, such as his famous TinkerToy calculating machine. He also looks at Boolean logic, through his own analogies, and is able to illustrate fairly simply some concepts that people might struggle with a little normally.
NUMBERS, Their Tales, Types, and Treasures by Posamentier & Thaller
I have never felt that I am very good with mathematics — I usually received good grades in whatever math I had in school, but still didn’t feel I understood some things fully. With some of my electronics education, I revisited a lot of basic algebra and some complex/imaginary numbers concepts (hello circuit analysis and AC power…). With my hobby programming, depending on what I was working on, I utilized some math as well, but often it was very situational — working on a specific little project, you acquaint or re-acquaint yourself with enough specific math ideas to get it done, and that is that.
This book really was an eye opener for me in that sense — it introduced me to some ideas with numbers and even basic mathematics that I just wasn’t aware of, or had not put together for myself. There are more than a few complicated ideas in math that are built on a larger number of simpler ideas, and for me this book helped to process some of those.
As I mentioned, anyone in the field of programming, electronics, or mathematics might find these fairly basic, but sometimes looking at the basics through the lens that someone else provides is beneficial. For someone who is not in these fields, but wants a more understanding than a casual article online or in a magazine can provide, these are also very good in my opinion.
