[Home]BobLee

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I love reading.
My thoughts for how a Wiki bookshelf is helpful:

So, use the Open Source dynamic, with enough eyes, these problems aren't hard at all!

Books I'm Currently Reading:
Books I Recommend: A continuing story, in no particular order yet.
Science Fiction Recommendations: Ones I recall struck me.
Books I Remember I've Disliked: A rarer continuing story
Since I went back to school for my Masters starting December 2001, I've fallen in love with the RIT (Rochester Institute of Technology) library -- there's so little overlap between its titles and the public library (whose titles I'd nearly squeezed dry, at least those of interest.) Up until last year my frequent reading tended toward science fiction/fantasy. (sigh! there's so little "science" left in "science fiction"!) In addition, I like to read (and occasionally reread) my private tech library.

Since discovering the RIT library, and discovering that grad students are allowed 32 concurrent checked-out books, I've gone on a binge to explore the delta between the academic shelves and my own tastes in technical authors / books. I was discouraged to find nothing by KentBeck in the catalog, so I read ExtremeProgrammingExplained via interlibrary loan. The web-access has made libraries much more accessable, and management of renewals more tolerable as ATMs have improved banking. I approve!!!

I had initial quandraries about the academic book selection process - as seen through the contents of RIT's library catalog. Too many of the software authors I consider vital are absent altogether from their catalog. However, I've enjoyed my class in Software Project Management where the 4 course books were: SteveMcConnell - RapidDevelopment; Rob Thomsett - Third Wave Project Management; TomDeMarco & TimLister - PeoplewareProductiveProjectsAndTeamsSecondEdition ; and FrederickBrooks - MythicalManMonthAnniversaryEdition. (There's hope here!!!)

Since becoming significantly underemployed in November 1999, I've reduced my book purchases drastically in favor of library (FREE!) access. When your gross income takes an 80%-90% dive, some things have to give.

You'll usually find me on Jerry Weinberg's SHAPE forum, and on several Wikis with Nynke, Jerry, Becky, Laurent, edits with Johanna...

A handy cheatsheet for this wiki's magic edit character rules:
This Wiki is based on UseMod:UseModWiki so the UseMod:TextFormattingRules apply.
Bob, I can't wait to see your list "Books I've Disliked". I never thought of making such a list. Partly because when I start disliking a book, I discontinue reading it ... Ah, but why not try to discover my own patterns in "dislike" ... or yours ... Ummm ... I do feel curious.--Nynke

I think that of the books listed on my page, the only two I disliked were AntiPatterns? and MetaphorsToLiveBy?. I rarely read books I don't like. Possibly I'm just lucky, or it might have to do with my method of selecting books - grab interesting titles by the same author, or titles in the biography of the one I've liked, or books that people with the same tastes I've liked. In fact, part of the motivation for Bookshelved, I now realize, is that I want to apply to my reading the motto "If you're not making any mistakes, you're not taking enough risks, and you're not learning." I wasn't making enough mistakes in my book selections. -- lb

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Last edited December 10, 2004 2:09 pm by BilKleb (diff)
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