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Code Complete, Second Edition (Paperback)
by Steve McConnell
| Category:
Software, IT, Technology |
| Market price: ¥ 488.00
MSL price:
¥ 458.00
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| Stock:
Pre-order item, lead time 3-7 weeks upon payment [ COD term does not apply to pre-order items ] |
MSL rating:
 Good for Gifts |
| MSL Pointer Review:
Focusing on actual code construction, but touching on every aspect of software engineering including psychology/behavior, this book is an essential reading for every and all developers. |
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Author: Steve McConnell
Publisher: Microsoft Press
Pub. in: June, 2004
ISBN: 0735619670
Pages: 960
Measurements: 9.2 x 7.4 x 1.6 inches
Origin of product: USA
Order code: BA00531
Other information: 2nd edition
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- Awards & Credential -
One of the top 2,000 bestsellers on Amazon.com. |
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- MSL Picks -
Code Complete by Steve McConnell is the convergence (the crossroads) of experience, research, and theory. This book is invaluable, the Holy Grail of programming reference books. McConnell's writing style is clear, concise, easy to understand and often humorous.
Programmers on every level (from introduction to master) will benefit from reading this book. Programmers at the introduction level may find some topics advanced, but references to additional resources are close at hand. This book covers a broad range of interconnected topics ranging from: variable names, code-tuning, personal character, managing your manager, gonzo programming and much more. The emphasis is always on successful software design techniques.
McConnell doesn't shy away from presenting hard data and details; he nails the "whys" that so many other texts avoid.
Selected quotes from Code Complete:
"People have already made all the mistakes that you're making now, and unless you're a glutton for punishment, you'll prefer reading their books and avoiding their mistakes to inventing new versions of old problems." (Chapter 35)
"Once a programmer realizes that programming principles transcend the syntax of any specific language, the doors swing open to knowledge that truly makes a difference in quality and productivity." (Preface)
"The value of hands-on experience as compared to book learning is smaller in software development than in many other fields" (Chapter 35)
It's interesting to note that Code Complete is a required read to become a practitioner (intermediate) level employee in McConnell's company (Construx).
Code Complete is often compared with The Pragmatic Programmer: From Journeyman to Master [Hunt, Andrew, and Thomas, David]; the topics covered in the Pragmatic Programmer are a small subset of Code Complete. Code Complete is consistently written at a higher level, and offers more references for continual research and professional development. But don't take my word for it; read both, the Pragmatic Programmer makes a good prerequisite to Code Complete.
Hailing this book as "The Holy Grail of programming references" may seem fanatical, but I have yet to find a book that remotely measures up to Code Complete.
(From quoting Adam Kahtava, USA)
Target readers:
Software developers, Software development project leaders and managers, Students of Computer Science and University teachers.
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Steve McConnell is Chief Software Engineer at Construx Software where he oversees Construx's software engineering practices. Steve is the lead for the Construction Knowledge Area of the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge (SWEBOK) project. Steve has worked on software projects at Microsoft, Boeing, and other Seattle-area companies. Steve is the author of Rapid Development (1996), Software Project Survival Guide (1998), and Professional Software Development (2004). His books have twice won Software Development magazine's Jolt Excellence award for outstanding software development book of the year.
In 1998, readers of Software Development magazine named Steve one of the three most influential people in the software industry along with Bill Gates and Linus Torvalds. Steve was also the lead developer of SPC Estimate Professional, winner of a "Software Development Productivity" award. Steve has worked in the desktop software industry since 1984 and has expertise in rapid development methodologies, project estimation, software construction practices, performance tuning, system integration, and third-party contract management.
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From the Publisher:
Take a strategic approach to software constructionand produce superior productswith this fully updated edition of Steve McConnells critically praised and award-winning guide to software development best practices.
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| View all 11 comments |
Steven (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
I don't know how much more I can say about this book that hasn't been said already but I will do my best to describe my experience with this book.
Have you ever looked at a class, or a method that seems to work fine but it just doesn't "feel" right? For some reason it seems as if that method or class may be hard to debug in the future or that the code is hard to understand. Or have you gone back to a class file you wrote months ago and you spend an aweful lot of time trying to figure out what the heck is going on with that class file? Maybe the methods in the class are spaghetti like in nature, or maybe the names of your methods don't have a very good description so it's hard to figure out how everything ties together. I have had this problem. This book will teach you how to get out of those habbits. You will learn what a solid class or method looks like. You will learn how properly naming your classes and methods can greatly reduce complexity in the long run. Everything is backed by hard evidence. I should also mention that this is just one chapter in this wonderful book.
This book really drills down proper programming practices. A lot of times you may read a passage and think to yourself "well, of coarse!"... but then you realize you don't practice what's contained in the passage you just read. This book is great for both new programmers and experienced programmers alike. New programmers benefit greatly because they will learn how to construct software properly without having to go through all of the hoops. Experienced programmers will also learn a great deal, as well as be reminded that some of their habbits that they've developed over the years can hinder production and cause software development to become more complex then it really is.
Steve writes in a very clean style. It's very easy to read. You don't need to memorize anything in a book like this, instead you just need to gain an understanding of the concepts he brings forth. After reading this book I definitely follow a lot of his advice. When I build a new class, method or what-have-you I get a certain feeling of when it seems right and when something seems wrong. I am now much better at analyzing my code and figuring out what doesn't seem correct and I take his advice I learned in this book to help me to figure out - and correct the problem. After reading this book I feel like a lot of my rough edges as a developer have been rounded out. I feel as if I gained a years worth of experience just by reading this book.
This book is friendly for any software developer. The concepts he presents apply to all languages. This is a book that teaches you how to think about programming better and how to construct good solid code. This is one of the best books i've ever read. If you're even thinking about buying this book, then buy it.
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An American reader (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
Code Complete pops up regularly on the lists of the 'read this book or you'll never get a job and everyone else will laugh at you' genre, so if you're easily influenced, like me, you may approach this book with an air of duty rather than anticipation. Fortunately, despite its heft, this is well worth the plaudits that have been heaped upon it. I actually enjoyed this more than The Pragmatic Programmer and Programming Pearls, two books often mentioned in the same breath as this tome.
Code Complete covers pretty much every part of the software development lifecycle, from planning to code reviews to testing. These are all pretty good discussions, but the best bit is definitely the chapters on coding. Most of the examples are in Visual Basic or Java, so you'd do well to know one of those languages.
When it comes to object modelling, there's actually a reasonable set of guidelines harvestable from literature, and languages tend to diverge more on issues of packaging, so Code Complete is at its best at the lower level procedural details of code layout, formatting, loop construction, optimisation and so on. Many books claim to provide coding guidelines, but don't do much beyond stating the obvious like (for Java) "use camel case for variable names", "start class names with capital letters" and "avoid Hungarian notation". Code Complete is different because it actually provides useful recommendations. As an example, there's a very good discussion on when and where the use of loop-breaking constructs like break and continue ('next' in Ruby and Perl) are appropriate. Few (if any) other books provide this sort of practical detail.
It's well-written, with just the right amount of humour in its exhortations - the withering references to coders who investigate loop bugs by randomly adjusting the termination criterion up or down by one until it works raised a wry smile from this reviewer.
To summarize, this is a collection of best practices distilled from a pretty huge amount of reading, and is genuinely helpful. I would certainly point any programming beginner at this book. |
Scott Brookhart (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-10 00:00>
Steve McConnell has shared some invaluable insight to software developers with Code Complete. This is one of those books that every developer should read. Those who do read this book will come away with insight on developing applications smarter. There is alot of insight in this book that enhance every aspect of the development lifecycle. This book is not just Steve sitting down and writing a book, this is best practices gleaned from various sources and reviewed by the gurus in the industry. Check out his website for this book (...) for more information. Enjoy. |
Adel (MSL quote), Egypt
<2007-01-10 00:00>
This is an excellent book. Software life cycle can be divided into multiple stages: requirements specification, architectural design, writing code, testing and deployment. This book is covering one stage of the software life cycle, which is software construction (writing code).
The book is great, giving a lot of real world's statistical data to support and explain each point.
The book covers software construction in a great detail, explaining and discussing every possible point related to writing code. The only criticism that was said about this book is that it didn't mention or discuss security related issues in code construction, but I think that this doesn't decrease the value of the book. |
View all 11 comments |
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