{"id":296,"date":"2017-01-16T09:00:23","date_gmt":"2017-01-16T15:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/?p=296"},"modified":"2018-05-30T14:12:48","modified_gmt":"2018-05-30T19:12:48","slug":"reading-summary-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/2017\/01\/16\/reading-summary-2016\/","title":{"rendered":"Reading Summary – 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

Posting book recommendations seems to be a thing when New Years rolls around.  The last time<\/a> I posted about books, I put together a list of my favorite recommendations.  This time around, I put together a list of books I read over the past year.<\/p>\n

Essential ASP.NET with Examples in C#<\/a> – A bit obsolete.  Vanilla web forms rather than MVC.  However, I did find some useful nuggets around IIS and ASPX page architecture.  Any of you still involved in IIS hosting or legacy support might find some value.<\/p>\n

Wherever You Go, There You Are : Mindfulness Meditation In Everyday Life<\/a> – In depth overview of mindfulness with various case studies and examples or thought experiments in easily digestible form.  A good read for those seeking the value of being present and deliberate.<\/p>\n

Richest Man In Babylon<\/a> – A book on financial health with guidelines packed into parable form.  It’s mostly common sense stuff and a bit repetitive, but still useful.  ‘The 10% Rule’ was most valuable to me.<\/p>\n

Clean Code<\/a> – A classic book on software quality that easily makes most developer’s reading lists.  Some of the most valuable pieces for me were:<\/p>\n

Focusing on indentation – The idea that if your indentation is sloppy, you should focus on that before anything else<\/p>\n

Boy Scout Rule – Always leaving code better than you found it<\/p>\n

Test Driven Development – The principle that tests are always closer to the truth about code’s purpose than comments or documentation<\/p>\n

Leviathan Wakes<\/a> – The novels on which the series The Expanse<\/a> is based on – I honestly haven’t had a book grab my attention like this in a long time and would highly recommend it to any sci-fi fan. The setting is gritty with enough everyday human concerns to be a believable future state while still having stakes and scope worthy of space opera.<\/p>\n

Waking Up<\/a> – Interesting premises on the nature of the mind, the concepts of self and better living through meditation.<\/p>\n

The Analects<\/a> – A collection of Confuscious’ sayings and one of the core works of Confuscianism, the main idea of which is virtuous living and self development according to The Way.  It’s a decent read but I get the feeling that The Way being discussed is very specific to the author and his students (Upper Class Chinese Nobility)  For the modern reader, The Way may be more subjective but the call to action is not.<\/p>\n

The Death of Common Sense<\/a> – I heard a rumor that this book was an inspiration for the character of Hank Hill (King of the Hill), so I had to take a look.  An indictment of following the letter of the law at the expense of the spirit.<\/p>\n

Meditations<\/a> –  A collection of the writings of Marcus Aurelius and one of the core works of Stoicism.  I’d compare this to the Analects as far as the need for context.  But again, the call to action is definitely not subjective.<\/p>\n

Not a long list, to be sure.   This year I’m hoping to double it, but hopefully not just for the sake of quantity.  I think my pile of books to read actually grew more this year.<\/p>\n

I’d love to hear any feedback on this list and invite you to share your own reviews or recommendations.  As always, if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to add them here or address them to john@benedettitech.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Thanks for looking in!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Posting book recommendations seems to be a thing when New Years rolls around.  The last time I posted about books, I put together a list of my favorite recommendations.  This time around, I put together a list of books I read over the past year. Essential ASP.NET with Examples in C# – A bit obsolete.  Vanilla … Continue reading Reading Summary – 2016<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Reading Summary - 2016 #readinglist","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[14],"class_list":["post-296","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-becauseican","tag-books"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7dlOQ-4M","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=296"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":300,"href":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/296\/revisions\/300"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=296"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=296"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.benedettitech.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=296"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}