Ask HN: Which are the best written tutorials you have seen till now?
Starting next year, I am planning to write more well-organized tutorials as a way to increase my rate of learning and understanding (The topics won't be of interest to general HN community). But I wanted the see what kind of best practices are appreciated in the community. I am not referring to documentation per se, of which I do plenty for myself during work. But on improving myself as a communicator in the written medium when explaining things through code+simpler language.
24 comments
I'm sure it's a cliche at this point, but I don't think enough writers emulate K&R's style on The C Programming Language. The prose is short, dense, and yet not tedious.
Another great "tutorial" to emulate is the TeXbook by Knuth. This one is verbose, but it shows the reader all the little details and pitfalls about the software without becoming boring.
Another great "tutorial" to emulate is the TeXbook by Knuth. This one is verbose, but it shows the reader all the little details and pitfalls about the software without becoming boring.
>I'm sure it's a cliche at this point, but I don't think enough writers emulate K&R's style on The C Programming Language. The prose is short, dense, and yet not tedious.
Agreed. It's also very clear, although at least I had to read many paragraphs more than once to really grok the meaning.
Anecdote: Some years after learning C from that book, and using it a lot at work, I once conducted a C programming course for 10 to 15 senior devs of the IT dept. of a public sector company (Hindustan Aeronautics Limited), all of whom had over 10 years software experience (but not on C and Unix, their experience was on some mainframe, I think Unisys, and some proprietary software running on it). I used the K&R C book for the course. I put a lot of effort into it, and they were pleased with the training. They arranged a small send-off for me on the last evening, with tea and snacks, the manager of the team made a brief speech, thanking me (they were that formal kind) and they gave me a gift as a token of appreciation - a quartz wall clock, which I still have. Another fun thing I remember from that course was that I asked them this question at the end of the course:
"How do you write a C program?"
As expected, they were all puzzled. I mean, they had just attended the course, right? They knew now (some) how to write C programs. No one could think of an appropriate answer. Then I gave them my answer:
"Very carefully."
Agreed. It's also very clear, although at least I had to read many paragraphs more than once to really grok the meaning.
Anecdote: Some years after learning C from that book, and using it a lot at work, I once conducted a C programming course for 10 to 15 senior devs of the IT dept. of a public sector company (Hindustan Aeronautics Limited), all of whom had over 10 years software experience (but not on C and Unix, their experience was on some mainframe, I think Unisys, and some proprietary software running on it). I used the K&R C book for the course. I put a lot of effort into it, and they were pleased with the training. They arranged a small send-off for me on the last evening, with tea and snacks, the manager of the team made a brief speech, thanking me (they were that formal kind) and they gave me a gift as a token of appreciation - a quartz wall clock, which I still have. Another fun thing I remember from that course was that I asked them this question at the end of the course:
"How do you write a C program?"
As expected, they were all puzzled. I mean, they had just attended the course, right? They knew now (some) how to write C programs. No one could think of an appropriate answer. Then I gave them my answer:
"Very carefully."
Thanks!
Kubernetes the hard way: https://github.com/kelseyhightower/kubernetes-the-hard-way
Gave me the necessary understanding of the core layers of a cluster.
The Digital Ocean docs were already mentioned but they're also an exellent reference source.
Gave me the necessary understanding of the core layers of a cluster.
The Digital Ocean docs were already mentioned but they're also an exellent reference source.
These are nice. Thanks!
Any of the Explorable Explanations that Bret Victor creates. Later followed up by more from Nicky Case, and more
All the links I clicked led to other websites. Is it an aggregator?
What you saw probably was the collection created by Nicky Case. Check his own explanations though https://ncase.me/ and then also check http://worrydream.com/#!/ExplorableExplanations (and other explanations by Bret Victor)
I thought Eloquent Javascript was wonderfully done. Read online here: http://eloquentjavascript.net/
Everything by Julia Evans https://jvns.ca/ , Arnold Robbins, Brian Kernighan (e.g. The AWK Programming Language)
More mathematical: Knuth et al, Concrete Mathematics; John Stillwell, Mathematics and its History; Tristan Needham, Visual Complex Mathematics
Everything by Julia Evans https://jvns.ca/ , Arnold Robbins, Brian Kernighan (e.g. The AWK Programming Language)
More mathematical: Knuth et al, Concrete Mathematics; John Stillwell, Mathematics and its History; Tristan Needham, Visual Complex Mathematics
This was probably the most effective tutorial I have ever used: https://www.amazon.com/RPG-III-400-Shelly-Cashman/dp/0878352...
Early in my consulting career, I got a gig doing RPG III and in three days got up to speed.
Not relevant to many folks these days.
Early in my consulting career, I got a gig doing RPG III and in three days got up to speed.
Not relevant to many folks these days.
I'm more interested in exposition style, rather than topics. Is there anything particular you liked about that book? I'll try to find a PDF for a looksie.
It was an unusually clear and understandable tutorial that worked well for someone not familiar with the machine. Examples that were broken down in very understandable chunks, expositions of applicable context, very clear non-jargon language.
https://internetingishard.com - one of the best ever tutorials on HTML and CSS.
Learn from Kernighan. Most tutorials are dry and teach "follow these steps". The better ones explain the "why" of the feature. Kernighan comes up with fun examples to keep the reader engaged.
https://www.raywenderlich.com/
Funny, insightful, plenty of screenshots and very detailed explanations.
Funny, insightful, plenty of screenshots and very detailed explanations.
Go lang turorial.
It is very good to learn while running source codes.
The official go lang tutorial?
Yes.
I did not remember tutorial's name, but I found it when I searched.
I think it is easy to understand.
https://tour.golang.org/
Almost anything on NSHipster
vimtutor