Book Review: The Missing Readme
Sometimes the most challenging part of being a Software Engineer isn’t writing the software: It’s all the other aspects of the job. “The Missing Readme,” written by Chris Riccomini and Dmitriy Ryaboy and published by No Starch Press, seeks to provide a concise guide in the style of a project Readme to the other aspects of the Software Engineer job.
Except for a few odd geographical metaphors in the introduction, the book provides an accessible, handy guide to practical aspects of being a Software Engineer. The subtitle is “A Guide for the New Software Engineer.” However, the clear, Readme-style writing makes this book an excellent reference for any level Software Engineer from Intern to CTO.
It covers a comprehensive set of relevant topics: professional code, testing, code reviews, delivery, on-call, technical design, architecture, agile planning, managing and being managed, and career development. The Readme approach to each of these topics works well in the book, and as a Software Engineer, I can see myself using the book as a reference when I need to focus on a particular topic to approach a situation.
I particularly like how the authors promote general best practices in development and testing without being dogmatic. Coming from the position, “Here’s what you need to succeed as a software engineer in a company,” they focus on…
