Taking Your Programming Skills to the Next Level?

An anonymous reader asks: "About 6 years ago I graduated with a degree in Computer Science. Since that time I've been working on and off as a programmer, however I feel that my programming skills haven't really progressed to the next level as I had hoped. I guess part of the problem is that my work environment hasn't been especially technical or challenging, so I really need to try and improve my skills independently. What strategies did Slashdot readers use to improve their programming skills Which books are useful in this area?"

Comments

It's not the eyes, but the brain

[Pig Hogger]

Reading books is one way, yes, but like muscles, the brain must be exercised.

Practice. Learn a new language, just for fun. To do so, program a new application to do something useless that has been nagging you for months.

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[illuminatedwax]

Several suggestions:

• Learn different programming languages. Perl, C++, Python, Ruby, and make sure to include functional ones like Lisp, Haskell, and ML. Build something useful or interesting in each of them.
  
• Study algorithms. Get an algorithms textbook and learn about trees, linked lists, hashes, etc.
  
• Study complexity theory. Learn how to find the big-O running time of an algorithm. Learn how to reduce an NP-complete problem so you can tell if the problem you are working on is intractible.
  
• Study math. Learn cryptography, etc.
  
• Read Knuth's Art of Computer Programming.
  
• Complete all the tasks you can from the 2006 ICFP Contest.
  

Re:Expand

[AKAImBatman]

Learn different programming languages. Study algorithms. Study complexity theory. Study math. Learn cryptography, etc. Read Knuth's Art of Computer Programming.

Funny. That sounds an awful lot like a CompSci degree.

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Just saying.

Re:Solve problems, but don't worry about full prog

[Silver Sloth]

I once read in Accidental Empires? that there are three types of coders - and the terms are not mine

1. Code bashers - these are people who bash out endless lines of cobol (probaly VB nowadays) with no real feel for the craft
2. Hippies - Hippies write good code badly. Once the problem of how to code this task is resolved they lose interest so the actual transformation of the concept to the written code is poorly executed
3. Nerds - Nerds write bad code very well. Nerds become obsessed with particular techniques and will use that techniqu whether it is relevant or not. However their attention to detail means that the code is well executed

Looks like you, like me, are a hippie under these definitions.