Designing Data-Intensive ApplicationsMartin Kleppmann
The only book that made distributed systems feel like engineering rather than folklore.
Library
Books that changed how I think about systems, work, or myself.
- Thinking in SystemsDonella Meadows
Changed how I read an architecture diagram more than any architecture book did.
- The Mythical Man-MonthFrederick P. Brooks Jr.
Fifty years old and still the most accurate description of why software is late.
- Release It!Michael T. Nygard
A catalogue of the specific ways production breaks, written by someone who was there.
- A Philosophy of Software DesignJohn Ousterhout
Short, opinionated, and the rare design book that argues instead of listing rules.
- The GoalEliyahu M. Goldratt
A novel about a factory that is secretly the best book on finding your bottleneck.
- Shape UpRyan Singer
The clearest description of how to scope work so it can actually finish.
- The Pragmatic ProgrammerHunt & Thomas
The one I re-read when I catch myself building something clever.
- Company of OnePaul Jarvis
An argument that staying small is a strategy, not a failure to grow.