Two Famous Developer Essays

March 27th, 2008

After doing some "Spring Cleaning" on my computer, I found two programming essays that are still a great read.

After going through my ebooks that I've purchased and collected over the years, I came across two of my favorite essays from Scott Ambler.

For those who don't know Mr. Ambler, he is another individual who I admire in the software industry. I've been reading his material since 1998. He created Ambysoft, wrote some great books, and has a lot of free essays which assisted me throughout my career.

If you are an object-oriented gearhead like me, there are two essays that stand out:

I would recommend reading them in order since the Persistence Layer refers back to the mapping objects document. And since ASP.NET's LINQ is moving more into the limelight, these essays project more value since developers are moving towards a business object model approach.

Scott Ambler moves past the language barriers, so these essays are more for experienced programmers who mastered a particular language and want to extend their knowledge in using CRUD (Create, Retrieve, Update, and Delete) with business objects and databases.

Scott shows you how to take your programming to the next level in these essays. Not only does he provide a way of looking at business objects with databases and attaches more of a technique to programming, but he also shows how your code can become more maintainable and supportable...oh...and readable.

In essence, your code can evolve into something a little smarter than just "pounded-out" code.

Now, here is the funny part about the essays: He doesn't have any code in the essays. So you can apply his way of thinking and techniques to your favorite language.

If you are looking for someone who has some years of experience behind them as a developer, it's obvious that Scott Ambler provides that knowledge through his writings.

Both essays are definitely a good read when you want to delve deeper into programming.

Do you have any programming essays that you remember the most? Post your programming essay links in the comments below.