Key concepts and best practices for new software engineers — stuff critical to your workplace success that you weren’t taught in school. For new software engineers, knowing how to program is only half the battle. You’ll quickly find that many of the skills and processes key to your success are not taught in any school or bootcamp. The Missing README fills in that gap—a distillation of workplace lessons, best practices, and engineering fundamentals that the authors have taught rookie developers at top companies for more than a decade. Early chapters explain what to expect when you begin your career at a company. The book’s middle section expands your technical education, teaching you how to work with existing codebases, address and prevent technical debt, write production-grade software, manage dependencies, test effectively, do code reviews, safely deploy software, design evolvable architectures, and handle incidents when you’re on-call. Additional chapters cover planning and interpersonal skills such as Agile planning, working effectively with your manager, and growing to senior levels and beyond. You’ll learn: How to use the legacy code change algorithm, and leave code cleaner than you found it How to write operable code with logging, metrics, configuration, and defensive programming How to write deterministic tests, submit code reviews, and give feedback on other people’s code The technical design process, including experiments, problem definition, documentation, and collaboration What to do when you are on-call, and how to navigate production incidents Architectural techniques that make code change easier Agile development practices like sprint planning, stand-ups, and retrospectives This is the book your tech lead wishes every new engineer would read before they start. By the end, you’ll know what it takes to transition into the workplace–from CS classes or bootcamps to professional software engineering.

Flash Fiction

Flash Fiction

“Stephenson has a once-in-a-generation gift: he makes complex ideas clear, and he makes them funny, heartbreaking, and thrilling.” —Time The #1 New York Times bestselling author of Anathem, Neal Stephenson is continually rocking the literary world with his brazen and brilliant fictional creations—whether he’s reimagining the past (The Baroque Cycle), inventing the future (Snow Crash), or both (Cryptonomicon). With Reamde, this visionary author whose mind-stretching fiction has been enthusiastically compared to the work of Thomas Pynchon, Don DeLillo, Kurt Vonnegut, and David Foster Wallace—not to mention William Gibson and Michael Crichton—once again blazes new ground with a high-stakes thriller that will enthrall his loyal audience, science and science fiction, and espionage fiction fans equally. The breathtaking tale of a wealthy tech entrepreneur caught in the very real crossfire of his own online fantasy war game, Reamde is a new high—and a new world—for the remarkable Neal Stephenson.

This book provides beginning researchers with an overview of techniques for making data and an explanation of the ways different tools fit different purposes to provide different research experiences and outcomes. The authors clearly explain why there are many methods and show readers how to locate their study within that choice. Written as a pragmatic companion, this text will help readers get confidently and competently started on a research path that works for their study.

An intimate, revealing memoir from one of the most important activists of our time. While working as an intelligence analyst in Iraq for the United States Army in 2010, Chelsea Manning disclosed more than seven hundred thousand classified military and diplomatic records that she had smuggled out of the country on the memory card of her digital camera. In 2011, she was charged with twenty-two counts related to the unauthorized possession and distribution of classified military records, and in 2013, she was sentenced to thirty-five years in military prison. The day after her conviction, Manning declared her gender identity as a woman and began to transition, seeking hormones through the federal court system. In 2017, President Barack Obama commuted her sentence and she was released from prison. In README.txt, Manning recounts how her pleas for increased institutional transparency and government accountability took place alongside a fight to defend her rights as a trans woman. Manning details the challenges of her childhood and adolescence as a naive, computer-savvy kid, what drew her to the military, and the fierce pride she has about the work she does. This powerful, observant memoir will stand as one of the definitive testaments of our digital, information-driven age.

Barbara Reid's celebration of reading and sharing has a fresh, new look! Best-selling author and illustrator Barbara Reid has created a colourful celebration of the pleasures of reading to babies and young children, any time and anywhere. Warm and detailed Plasticine illustrations of adults and children reading together join with bouncy, rhythmic verse to invite children and parents to share the joy of reading indoors and out, at any time of day! The perfect gift for new parents, Read Me a Book reminds us that reading to young children is key to the development of literacy and the enjoyment of learning -- plus the simple text also makes it great for kids just learning to read back to their parents.

The Third Edition of this README FIRST for a User's Guide to Qualitative Methods offers those new to qualitative inquiry a clear and practical handbook to doing qualitative research, the fit of questions to methods, and the tasks of getting started. In their direct and friendly style, Lyn Richards and Janice Morse help researchers reflect on why they are working qualitatively, choose an appropriate method, and confidently approach research design, data making, coding, analyzing and finally writing up their results.

This text offers current thinking in the field. The authors are well-established qualitative researchers and have pulled off a great text for the beginning researcher.

'An important contribution to the YA literary canon and a welcome reminder that love is love, no matter what.' - Jodi Picoult, New York Times bestselling author The first YA novel from bestselling author Liz Kessler, Read Me Like A Book is a brave, honest and vital coming-out story that follows one girl's exploration of love, identity and sexuality. Ashleigh Walker is having a difficult year. She's struggling at school, and coming home to parents who are on the verge of divorce. She knows she should be happy spending time with her boyfriend - but, for some reason, being around him just makes her worry more. It's only in her English teacher, Miss Murray, that she feels she's found a kindred spirit. Miss Murray helps Ashleigh develop her writing skills and her confidence - but what happens when boundaries begin to blur? What will the repercussions be for Ashleigh? And how will she navigate her own sexuality?