Knowledge sharing: Coders on GitHub collaborate on a definitive list of free programming books

Over 100 users on the popular collaborative code sharing host GitHub have resurrected and updated an A–Z of free programming books that first appeared on Q&A site StackOverflow. The list is a wonderful reading resource for enlightened coders and developers to delve into, perhaps looking to learn another programming language or to fill gaps in their knowledge.

If you’re searching for solid grounding in programming, then you might like MIT’s Harold Abelson and Gerald Jay Sussman’s influential ‘Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs’. Intermediate coders will enjoy the pearls of wisdom selected for O’Reilly’s ‘97 Things Every Programmer Should Know’ (available in its original text). My favourite, ‘The Nature of Code’ by Daniel Shiffman, explores ‘generative’ and computational design.

You can browse the exhaustive bibliography here on GitHub.

ASIDE: If you’re new to coding then you might start with Codeacademy’s interactive learning modules and Harvard’s OpenCourseware Introduction to Computer Science and Programming lectures, both of which are excellent and free, but not currently listed.