Clean Code
Robert C. Martin
47 people recommended it in 32 threads, 2011–2025.
6 commenters pushed back on it — worth reading the threads.
What people on Hacker News said
I'd still recommend it to junior colleagues paired with some caveats about avoiding seeing the world in black & white.
Clean Code (recommended if you want to invigorate your desire to write better code, there was a lot to both agree and disagree with though for me anyway)
If you get the chance, you could also consider reading "Clean Code", it doesn't have /as much/ "real world" source but is still excellent.
I also like Clean Code by Bob Martin. It covers similar ground to Code Complete but it is more opinionated, and was an easy read for me and has a narrative drive.
Honorable Mentions: 1. Clean Code (Writing code that is easy to understand by other developers)
Where it comes up
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- Ask HN: The book that did it for you in math and/or CS? 2022 · 1 recommendation
- Show HN: 40k HN comments mentioning books, extracted using deep learning 2021 · 1 recommendation
- Ask HN: Best book to gift someone for getting into software engineering? 2019 · 1 recommendation
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