Re: Python (was Re: I did not inhale)

On 25/08/2024 17:32, Nuno Silva wrote:

(Note: I'm not setting Followup-To since I don't know where the
participants are reading this, but do note that I'm only subscribed to
comp.unix.programmer. I will probably subscribe to .shell soon, though.)
  On 2024-08-21, David Brown wrote:
 

On 21/08/2024 17:37, John Ames wrote:

Yes, books can be wrong, and yes, community fora can have valuable
information - but there really is no substitute for a good manual, in
print or otherwise. StackOverflow is very useful for clearing up some
kinds of esoteric-yet-common questions, but if you just need to double-
check what the legal values for parameter X in function Y are, it's
much quicker (and usually less error-prone) to turn to a reference
guide than it is to go poking around looking for records of times in
history where someone else might've had the same question.
>
(Doubly so, now that Google is as friggin' useless as it's gotten the
last few years.)
>

>
I do like a good manual, whether it be a physical book or an online
manual.  So I am not objecting to reading them, learning from them, or
using them as references.

 I'd say the online manual can be useful as a reference, at least in my
experience with Linux programming. It also has some information on
POSIX. And is local, so can be used even in the absence of a network
connection of any sort.
 

Reference manuals relevant to the topic are, of course, extremely helpful to most people - whether they are physical manuals or online. But the key point is the /relevance/.  My argument is not that books or manuals are unnecessary, merely that there are no universally required or essential references or topics.  And you certainly don't need to read through an entire reference to have use of it.

Do people feel differently about online manuals on other systems? Or are
these usually good to be used as a reference? (Asking out of curiosity,
as I don't have much experience yet coding on environments other than
"GNU/Linux".)
 

For many programming languages or major libraries or toolkits, there are "official" online references, manuals or documentation, and these can often be valuable sources of information.  Often they are not at all suitable for reading through as a whole, and are no substitute for tutorials, courses, or other learning material.

I am just objecting to the concept that reading particular books is
somehow "required" in order to write "useful C" or "program for
Linux". They are neither necessary nor sufficient, especially when
picking one or two particular books.

 But once you start pointing out that there are bad books, doesn't that
also imply that people commenting on which books they found good is
useful, so that one can have an idea of which books to avoid or prefer,
even if some comments end up being subjective to some extent?
 

Sure.  It's fine - and possibly helpful - for someone to say "I liked this book".  It's even more helpful to have some details, such as "it was good for me because I was already an experienced programmer in languages X, Y and Z" or "it was good for me as a complete newbie who had to take things slowly".  What is almost never helpful, is someone claiming that you /must/ read this book or that it is somehow objectively the "best".

(But yes, it might well be the case that someone just can't work so well
with a book as a medium and prefers some other approach. A lot of people
these days are sharing youtube videos as "tutorials" and that's
something I can't easily "consume", so I can kind of imagine what that'd
be like. - Now if only Google had a GET parameter in the web (not video)
search for "do not provide video results. ever."...)
 

I think videos are a better medium than books for some things and some people, and vice versa.  As I mentioned before, there are a great many different ways to learn (and to reference details later).  The "best" choice at any given time depends on a large number of factors.