Masterminds of Programming
by Federico Biancuzzi, Shane Warden · first published 2008
70% recommend30% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Interviews with creators of major languages (C++, Python, Haskell, AWK, Eiffel, Forth, APL) that show the design decisions and history behind them; a light, engaging read for anyone curious about language design.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
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Masterminds of Programming[0] is another cool book on the subject. [0] http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596515171/
on “Coders at work is finally available” ↗…Lua was always designed with cleanness and simplicity of implementation in mind. Its developers have strong backgrounds in both theory and engineering, which you can see in their interview in the book Masterminds of Programming. They've been very conservative about the design of the language. In contrast, Ruby feels much messier and more "evolved" - look at its Yacc grammar[1], for example, compared to the grammar of JavaScript…
on “Love for LuaJIT” ↗…by Bjarne Stroustrup: "I--and my colleagues--needed a language that could express program organization as could be done in Simula...but also write efficient low-level code, as could be done in C." in Masterminds of Programming, p.2 (Interview with Bjarne Stroustrup) O'Reilly Media, Inc. (2009) A truly great read...
on “C++ and the Culture of Complexity” ↗While not a history book, per se, "Masterminds of Programming: Conversations with the Creators of Major Programming Languages" [1] is a pretty great read. You can get a ton of historical context from reading what the language designers were thinking when they created…
on “Ask HN: What are some good resources on the history of programming languages?” ↗A lot of great books are already mentioned. I also enjoyed "Masterminds of Programming: Conversations With The Creators Of Major Programming Languages" [0] It's a collection of interviews with creators of languages (FORTH, C++, Python, Haskell, and many more) You learn a lot about language…
on “Ask HN: Computer Science/History Books?” ↗…Software Engineering: from Turing to Dijkstra by Edgar G. Daylight (Author), Niklaus Wirth (Author), et. al * History of Programming Languages (Acm Monograph Series) by Richard L. Wexelblat (Editor) * Masterminds of Programming: Conversations with the Creators of Major Programming Languages (Theory in Practice (O'Reilly)) by Federico Biancuzzi (Author), Chromatic (Author) Related with narrower, non-OOP focus: * Beautiful Code:…
on “Book recommendations about the history of programming” ↗…edition is a good and interesting book about programming in general. I also recommend these two because they are much lighter reads, and maybe better for a vacation: "The Passionate Programmer" and also "Masterminds of Programming: Conversations with the Creators of Major Programming Languages". Another thing you could do is find some great piece of software by a well know Python hacker and read his code lol. You could put that…
on “Ask HN: Programming books to read while on vacation?” ↗I began to understand Regex after reading the awk chapter in Masterminds of Programming. After that I understood how "the machine" inside might work. I really understood how to apply Regex to single strings after I started to see a regex as a "mask", so very similar to your wildcard approach.
on “How "junior" developers can become regex wizards” ↗I have to say after I read the Eiffel chapter in the book Masterminds of Programming, I became a fan of Bertrand Meyer If you have time to learn a new language, I would recommend Eiffel
on “Introduction to Programming (course by Eiffel lang creator Bertrand Meyer)” ↗I am seriously going to miss Dr. Dobb's Jolt awards, it helped me find so many interesting books overtime (Release it!, Specification by example, Taming text, Team geek, Masterminds of Programming etc to name a few, here is the complete list if anyone else is interested http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jolt_Awards) Can't believe there won't be any jolt awards next year :(
on “Farewell, Dr. Dobb's” ↗Masterminds of Programming is a good read. It contains of interviews with lots of creators of programming languages. The interviews cover a broad range from history to design to philosophy.
on “Ask HN: What are some good resources on the history of programming languages?” ↗I was inspired to check out AWK after reading this sentence from the book Masterminds of Programming: "If I had to choose a word to describe our centering forces in language design, I’d say Kernighan emphasized ease of learning; Weiberger, soundness of implementation; and I, utility. I think AWK has…
on “Show HN: 3D shooter in your terminal using raycasting in Awk” ↗…I found myself, if anyone is interested: Book: MacLellan's Principles of Programming Languages. The principles are listed here: http://www.lshift.net/blog/2006/06/24/bruce-j-maclennans-pro... Book: Masterminds of Programming. Interviews with the designers of many languages. Not all equally good. Papers and Media: History of Programming Languages, proceedings 1-3. The third one includes video. (Paywalled -need an ACM subscription)…
on “Ask HN: What are the best references on language design” ↗YMMV but I found Masterminds of Programming quite a worthy read. It is an interview based book and talks to the creators of a variety programming languages, including such 'obscure' ones as Forth, APL and Eiffel. I am interested in programming…
on “Ask HN: Non-tech books that have helped you grow professionally?” ↗There's a more comprehensive interview that also includes Aho and Weinberger in the book Masterminds of Programming. Highly recommended
on “A brief interview with Awk creator Dr. Brian Kernighan (2022)” ↗