Top 5 Software Development Magazines?

juanescalante asks: "I graduated with a B.S. in Computer Science about 9 months ago and I have been working as a software developer for more than a year now. I keep looking for ways to improve myself in what I do, and seeking to gain knowledge from those who have a lot more experience than me. I've been reading books like 'Code Complete' and 'The Pragmatic Programmer' and I would also like to subscribe to a couple of great magazines. So, to all you experienced developers, which are the top software development magazines?"

Comments

Embedded

[Mark of THE CITY]

Embedded Systems Design is a magazine and a web site that covers that field. Realizing that many embedded s/w engineers are really dual-hatted EEs, they have had some "basics" articles over the last few years.

Wrong question

[jhoger]

The right question is "how do I become a better programmer?"

The answer is: write more code, and learn more programming techniques and languages. Also learn about infrastructure software like databases, and the more rigorous aspects of the OSes you use like networking and security.

Certainly you should read books, especially "programming methodology" types of things. Not because there's a silver bullet laying around, but because it helps you think about how to improve the quality and efficiency of your work.

But the bottom line is write lots of code. You can get lots of experience and help in this by joining some open source projects and contributing, or you can just work on your own projects or products.

If you have any time left in the month, you can lay in bed reading the computer mags. But really, if you join some real projects you'll spend too much time reading mailing lists to waste much time reading print mags.

-- John.

ACM, IEEE

[lotussuper7]

Have you considered publications put out by folks like the ACM or IEEE?

When I was an active programmer, doing OS development and such, I used to read publications from both.

IEEE has many journals, conference proceedings, and standards.

ACM has just as much, but, IMHO, is somewhat more acedemic in slant. I'll leave the exploration of the ACM web site in your able hands.

CLiki, ll-discuss, Bugtraq, Practical Common Lisp

[RAMMS EIN]

While not magazines, I've found these resources to be useful in becoming a better programmer:

CLiki, a programming language blog. Contains lots of stuff on programming languages and paradigms, including debates on merits and disadvantages.

ll-discuss, a mailing list related to programming language concepts. Perhaps most interesting if you're into language implementation, but it's the closest thing to a magazine that I can recommend.

Bugtraq, a (the?) security list. This will teach you what things to avoid; at least, the 3 most common errors.

Practical Common Lisp, a book that basically provides a crash course on Common Lisp. It shows you how things are done in Common Lisp, why they are done that way, and occasionally draws comparisons with other languages, everything including practical examples. It is said that, even if you don't program in Lisp, knowing it makes you a better programmer.

How to Design Programs, a fairly extensive book on program design. I haven't read the whole book, but it seems to both solidly and concisely cover many fundamentals. It uses Scheme for explaining things, but the material applies to other languages just as well.