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Programming
Learning Programming
A widely used programming language like Python is a great choice to start programming in. It is a well-designed language with an emphasis on readability. There are a multitude of resources and libraries to achieve almost any task imaginable.
Later on, you can explore other languages, comparing and contrasting them with your technical judgement and taste.
The official tutorial for programming in Python. Having some programming experience will help you to move through the material presented here at a faster pace.
Language Specific Resources
JavaScript
A modern introduction to web development using JavaScript.
Haskell
Learn you a Haskell for great good
A nicely illustrated book on functional programming in Haskell.
What I Wish I Knew When Learning Haskell 2.0
OCaml
A collection of OCaml resources.
A book about OCaml, a fast, functional programming language used in research and industry.
Lisp
Features of this family include expressivity, interactive-development (REPL), and metaprogramming in the form of macros (programs that write programs).
Every Lisp has its own strengths and weaknesses, pick whatever sounds good to you.
Modern Lisps
Clojure is a modern Lisp on the JVM (and the browser in the form of ClojureScript), which incorporates great ideas from multiple paradigms. Easy interoperability with the large number of available Java libraries can make it a no-brainer for enterprise usage.
It features persistent data structures, a well-designed sequence abstraction, great support for concurrency, and to round it off, good performance on the JVM.
These are modern Clojure-like Lisps without the JVM baggage.
A modern dialect of Scheme.
Common Lisp
Common Lisp was created to unify some dialects that were there at the time. The language spec is frozen, so code written in CL won’t need to be updated frequently to keep up with the times, as is common with many other languages.
Steve Losh’s recommendations on how to learn Common Lisp.
An introduction to Common Lisp describing the construction of practical, real world programs.
Probably the best open source Lisp implementation.
An implementation of CL that focuses on C++ interoperability.
Programming languages
A systems programming language which promotes memory safe programming.
A logic-programming language. You are probably best off starting with SWI-Prolog.
Raku is an expressive, gradually typed, multi-paradigm language drawing from the rich history and roll-up-your-sleeves-and-get-your-hands-dirty hacker-ethos of Perl with the explicit goal of being a fun language to program in.
Notable features include first-class support for grammars, modern concurrency primitives, a MOP, being able to easily define arbitrary operators, and keeping in line with Perl’s legacy, all new regexes.
Raku was formerly known as Perl 6. At some point the Perl community decided to create a “new” version of Perl i.e. Perl 6. As the changes became more and more backwards-incompatible, they realised that they were designing an all-new sister language. In 2020, after much discussion and Larry Wall’s blessing, Perl 6 was renamed to Raku.
Programming Language Theory
A blog and community for programming language enthusiasts.
Lots of papers on functional programming, type theory.
Networks
Beej’s Guide to Network Programming Using Internet Sockets
A guide to get started with network programming in C.
CS
Things to learn
What every computer science major should know
Matt Might’s advice on obtaining the essential education any student of CS ought to know.
Hiring/Interviews
Alex Bowe’s interview prep advice
Steve Yegge’s interview prep advice
Tools
General Programmer Tools
You will have to be familiar with the development tools like the compiler/interpreter and debugger because you’ll be spending a sizeable amount of your time working with them.
The GNU Debugger can help with finding what’s going wrong with your program. It’s usually used to debug C/C++ programs.
Building large projects can take a significant amount of time. ccache can help with reducing the time spent waiting for the build to finish.
Text editors
Knowing how to efficiently use a text editor is one of the most useful secondary skills of any programmer.
Among the free text editors, vim and emacs are particularly formidable. It’s undecided as to which is better, just like Tabs vs Spaces debate among programmers.
A modal text editor that has nice key bindings and an emphasis on speed. It is an important command-line survival skill. Once installed, run the “vimtutor” command to start a basic tutorial.
An operating system containing, amongst many other things, a file manager, calculator, games, package manager and also a text editor.
It can be extended in trivial, and non-trivial ways with Emacs Lisp, which also happens to be the language it is written in.
Many users of Emacs suffer from the dreaded “Emacs Pinky” due to having to press down the Control key (or the Caps Lock key for that matter) for almost every command.
This can be alleviated to some extent by adding support of another modifier key like “Hyper”, to reduce dependence on the Control key.
Users who prefer Vim’s more ergonomic keybindings have a lot of options in making Emacs work that way.
A next-generation vim-inspired text editor.
Version Control
A Version Control System (VCS) is used to track changes in files. Even the most trivial projects can quickly become unmanageable if a VCS is not used.
A solid introduction to the powerful Git version control system.
A modern version control system.
A lightweight version control system written by DRH.
It is important to write good commit messages so that commit history is readable.
Command-line
Mastering the command line is not something that can be avoided.
An easy to use shell, with great defaults.
Switching between multiple terminal emulator instances can hamper productivity. This terminal multiplexer can be used with a tiling window manager for a killer combination.
The GNU coreutils bundled with GNU/Linux can be used to perform straighforward tasks, and also arcane wizardry.
For as long as text terminals are used, it will be worth your while to be comfortable with using these.
A command line fuzzy finder.
Similar to other popular search tools like The Silver Searcher, ack and grep which can be used to search directories recursively.
Window Managers
Tiling
Tiling window managers are useful in a typical programming session when you have to repeatedly switch between your text-editor, terminal emulator, web-browser, and any number of other programs you may have running.
A tiling window manager written in Haskell.
Graphics
An easy to use vector graphics editor.
A digital painting program.
Miscellaneous
Easily converts between a great variety of markup formats.
CS Theory
Algorithms
A handy cheatsheet of algorithmic complexities associated with commonly used data structures and algorithms.
References
Learning to use references is one of the essential skills of a programmer. References are by necessity large and intimidating, but with time they become indispensable.
Programming Language References
C++
Handy quick reference while writing C++ code. It can be downloaded for offline use.
Another reference on C++. It has clear examples to help you learn how to use the standard library.
Fairly large collection of C++ FAQs and their answers.
C++ Frequently Questioned Answers.
Common Lisp
Simplified Common Lisp Reference
A selection of commonly used symbols.
The entire ANSI CL standard in HTML.
A nicer way to read the HyperSpec.
Protocols, Specifications
Freely available specifications for various internet-related protocols.
Programming Exercises
A good source of many exercise problems. Many of the problems here require some mathematical (and programming) knowledge.
Some practical programming problems in addition to the sorts of problems found at Project Euler.
Fun exercises.
Operating Systems
Any operating system that you are productive in, and happy with, is fine. If that is not the case, however, these are some of our recommendations.
A rock solid and stable Linux distribution.
A Linux distribution with an emphasis on simplicity, configurability and having the latest software packages. Rolling releases keep your system at the bleeding edge.
A pre-configured distribution based on Arch Linux.
It is worth checking out some BSDs as well. Features include first-class support for ZFS, great networking software, excellent documentation, no dependence on systemd, and the BSD license for those who prefer it to Linux’s GPL.
Miscellaneous
Articles
A good introduction to what it means to be a hacker, and how to get there.
What I Tell All New Programmers
Good advice that new programmers will do well to follow.
Teach Yourself Programming in Ten Years
Check out his other articles, as well.
Joe Armstrong’s recommendations as to what might be worth learning.
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
It’s a good idea to read this before asking questions on the internet (and in real life).
Fascinating insights into the life experiences of a scientist, and his colleagues.
Programming Language Comparison by Mike Vanier
Slightly dated, but still a good comparison between the various languages the author has used in his career.
Books
Algorithms
A freely available book on Programming Algorithms. Common Lisp is used as the implementation language.
Distributed Systems
Designing Data-Intensive Applications
Any one working with backend web applications, database infrastructure will need to have a good understanding of distributed systems, for which this book is the premier resource for working professionals. An absolute must-read that will pay dividends many times over in your career.
Introductory programming
An excellent way to learn C, a widely used, influential programming language.
Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs (SICP)
An enlightening introduction to computation and programming. Racket is a good choice for running the example code and doing the exercises from the book as it has a sublanguage for that specific dialect of Scheme.
Lisp Books
Paradigms of Artificial Intelligence Programming: Case Studies in Common Lisp
Peter Norvig has kindly made this book freely available which deals with implementing classical AI algorithms in Common Lisp.
While we are on the subject of Mr. Norvig, his articles on Solving Every Sudoku Puzzle and How to Write a Spelling Corrector are legendary. It is manifest how powerful and elegant programming can be when performed by a master.