by Peter Seibel
-- A fantastic collection of interviews with 15 famous programmers. Contains some great history and insights on the field of "computer science."
-- Geeks, drugs, and deception. An entertaining look into the (fictional) lives of techno con artists, and how a recently-fired comic book artist get pulled into their inner circle.
"
-- Particularly useful reference when trying to eek out a few extra milliseconds of load times in older browsers.
-- Interesting tech, and somewhat engaging, but disappointing ending (or lack thereof.)
, by Neil Strauss
-- An engaging, first-person account on transforming from an urban writer into "Jason Bourne."
, by Cory Doctrow
-- A high school hacker fights the 'Department of Homeland Security' to reclaim American civil liberties after anti-terror tactics are taken to a new level.
-- Techniques-for, and the value-of sketching interactivity before developing products. Good ideas. OK book.
" -- About finding untapped opportunities in your market and repositioning yourself to capitalize on them. Easy to grasp; Longer then it needed to be.
" -- A thin book with some good best-practices, but a little disappointing. Perhaps it's JavaScript's fault, not the author's ;-)
" -- Good overview of usability issues in designing HTML forms, backed by examples and eye-tracking research. I bought the digital edition, which was slightly cheaper. (You can use code: WFDDE to get an extra 10% off any purchase on the publisher's site.)
" by Marshall Goldsmith
-- Discusses interpersonal skills (and how to identify and fix them) that most commonly hold executives back in their career advancement.
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-- Lesson: Cut the corporate B.S. and stop wasting your time. Focus only on what matters most.
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-- Lessons on handling tough conversations: firing people, relationship problems, hostage negotiations (well, maybe not that last one.) Wasn't an exciting read, but I've been paying more attention to "turning points" in conversations since reading it.
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-- Lessons in building reusable ("pluggable") Django applications. Assumes you know the basics of Django and Python.
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-- I really enjoyed this one. Lots of suggestions and strategies for negotiating.
Just a reminder — BarCamp Austin 2007 is coming up, March 9th – 10th (during SXSW Interactive.) The event is currently planned to happen at Bourbon Rocks (Neches and 6th), but you’ll want to check the wiki the day before in case something changes.