Ask YC: What is the most embarrassing technical book that you have ever owned?
I'm particularly interested in knowing about technical books from the 80s that look silly/ridiculous now.
25 comments
Hard to say...There've been so many...
I had this awesome book full of BASIC games for the Commodore 64. It ruled.
Mastering Amiga Assembler
Teach Yourself C in 24 Hours (all of the Teach Yourself * in 24 Hours books are embarrassing, though not as embarrassing as "For Dummies" books).
Ooh...No, I've got it: I took the TCP/IP portion of the MCSE exams, and I had a study guide for that. That's the most embarrassing (because it indicates I took an MCSE exam...but, there were dark times in IT before most of you were born...many servers ran this OS named Windows NT, instead of UNIX or Linux).
I had this awesome book full of BASIC games for the Commodore 64. It ruled.
Mastering Amiga Assembler
Teach Yourself C in 24 Hours (all of the Teach Yourself * in 24 Hours books are embarrassing, though not as embarrassing as "For Dummies" books).
Ooh...No, I've got it: I took the TCP/IP portion of the MCSE exams, and I had a study guide for that. That's the most embarrassing (because it indicates I took an MCSE exam...but, there were dark times in IT before most of you were born...many servers ran this OS named Windows NT, instead of UNIX or Linux).
In 1997, getting my first HTML lessons using an illustrated guide.
The moment when I typed something in notepad and it opened in IE I was running all over the house screaming "IT WORKED!."
The moment when I typed something in notepad and it opened in IE I was running all over the house screaming "IT WORKED!."
I had a similar reaction. I think a lot of people did. One should never underestimate the power of (a) making it easy for people to get a hello world running, and (b) view->source.
Thats one of the really interesting things about the OLPC - most of the programs are written in Python, and it has a 'source' button on the keyboard, so users can view and modify stuff [http://www.olpcnews.com/hardware/keyboard/children_view_sour...]
I had that same experience with HTML, I'm sure if I could've viewed source on a load of decent Python programs I would've gone nuts for it as a kid. A hell of an improvement to feeding a book full of BASIC into a C64. If the rest goes to plan, there'll be a lot of handy hackers around in a few years.
I had that same experience with HTML, I'm sure if I could've viewed source on a load of decent Python programs I would've gone nuts for it as a kid. A hell of an improvement to feeding a book full of BASIC into a C64. If the rest goes to plan, there'll be a lot of handy hackers around in a few years.
Not from the 80s, but Wolfram's "A New Kind of Science".
I'm going to say GoF. Flame me.
Also "Learn Java" (1996) and "Enterprise Java Beans" (2000).
Also "Learn Java" (1996) and "Enterprise Java Beans" (2000).
"The Joy of Sex" HA!
1978 Guerin's, Vaschalde's and Warusfel's "Le calculateur programmable de poche" (in French, translated: "The Programmable Pocket Calculator"). A translated excerpt: "... we can imagine that [in the future] programmable calculators will be branched through the telephone network to central computers that hold massive amounts of data. "
Anything with "Certification" and "Microsoft" in the title. It was a present. I swear. IT WAS A GIFT, OKAY? I have elderly relatives. [sigh] On the other hand, that really shouldn't count as a technical book.
Also, "The Road Ahead" by BillG. From my aunt.
Also, "The Road Ahead" by BillG. From my aunt.
VB.NET for Dummies. Maybe it was VB for Dummies...i can't remember, it was 4 years ago, and I threw it away, along with my Java, C++ and Technical Math book (I regretted throwing the math book away).
Teach Yourself Visual Basic 6.0 in 24 Hours.
I should make up some story about finding it in a dumpster or buying it for $2 at a garage sale or something, but whatever.
I should make up some story about finding it in a dumpster or buying it for $2 at a garage sale or something, but whatever.
Sybex HTML Complete.
Worst book ever. Not worth the paper it's printed on. Bought it when I was in elementary school though..
C for Dummies.
Data Binding in Windows Forms 2.0. The book is terrible, but the API is worse, so...
Dating Design Patterns
Visual Basic 6.0 For Dummies (the french edition).
Herb Schildt's "The Complete Reference: C++"
Secrets of the 3D Game Programming Sages.
Did not plan on seeing that when I opened this, I have it too.... somewhere
XML Web Services for ASP.NET
Teach Yourself Windows CE Programming in 6 Hours.