The Mythical Man-Month Chp. 1
The first chapter was amazing. It gets you into the book very quickly!
Frederick starts the chapter with an analogy of how large system programming is like the tar pits of yester-millennium — “The fiercer the struggle, the more entangling the tar”
Beautiful!
It then describes what a programming systems product really is, especially compared to just a program. He explains the amount of money, and work involved in bringing a program to the aforementioned state, and how rare and difficult it is.
Then, to lighten the mood, he goes into quite a bit of detail of why us programmers love what we do! One thing he said here really stood out to me as both beautiful and inspiring.
“Finally, there is the delight of working in such a tractable medium. The programmer, like the poet, works only slightly removed from pure thought-stuff. He builds his castles in the air, from air, creating by exertion of the imagination.”
Brooks finishes the chapter by discussing how programming is not all sunshine, lollipops and rainbows.
I must say though, if the rest of the book is even remotely as elegantly written as this first chapter, I may have to consider the best book on the subject I have read.
