The greatest computer books of all

The Greatest Computer Books of All Time
Fifteen major works of computing literature, from history to how-tos. Read 'em all!
By Harry McCracken  |  Monday, November 29, 2010 at 12:40 am
Writing about music, a famous,impossible-to-properly-attribute saying goes, is like dancing about architecture. In 2010, anyone who dares write a book about computers runs the risk of facing a variant of thisconundrum. The Web is so good at conveying information about technology that it’s hard to recall an age when the default medium for any discussion of computers more ambitious than a magazine article was a static, difficult-to-update, not-necessarily-illustrated printed volume.
But that era existed. The best books about computers were enormously successful, and many of them were really good. Theydeserve to be celebrated.
When I sought out tomes for this list, my goal was to identify ones that were interesting, influential, and of lasting significance. (Two thirds of the ones I ended up picking are still in print, including at least a couple that are theoretically obsolete.) I relied on my own excessive library and solicited advice from my Twitter pals, who both confirmed some of my choicesand reminded me of contenders I’d forgotten about. Along the way, I decided not to include works of fiction (someone should write “The Ten Greatest Computer-Related Novels,” but that someone isn’t me).
The earliest book here came out in 1968; the newest one was first published in 1999. I didn’t set out to exclude works published in recent years–it just worked out that way, and even though I’mnot arguing that new computer books are obsolete in the 21st century, I think the focus on the past makes sense. (Chris Anderson’s The Long Tail is a very good book, but we’ll know it’s a great one if it’s still in print and still being talked about in, say, 2027.)
The works that follow are listed in chronological order. As in “The 25 Most Notable Quotes in Tech History,” I’ve also listed eachbook’s Googleosity–the number of references to it on the Web, as determined by a Google search. It’s an imprecise but telling indicator of each work’s lasting impact.
The Art of Computer Programming
Author: Donald Knuth
Published: 1968 (first edition of first volume)
Still in print? Yes
Googleosity: 254,000
Why it matters: The Art of Computer Programming isn’t exactly Programming for Dummies. Forone thing, all examples are presented in MIX, an assembly-language-like programming language of author Knuth’s own devising; to understand this multi-volume work, you’ve got to learn a new programming language which you’re not going to use in the real world. For another, it runs to more than 3000 pages even in its current, incomplete form. But its essential usefulness is reflected in the fact thatpeople still care about it more than four decades after the first release of its first volume. It’s a little as if a car repair manual that originated in the Model T era was still widely read and respected–and was still a work in progress.
And you don’t have to actually read TAOCP–or, for that matter, be a computer programmer–to be fascinated by it. Knuth’s Web site is a treasure trove ofintriguing stuff, including his explanation of why he stopped using e-mail twenty years ago, information about his offer of a $2.56 bounty for errors found in his books (and why it’s now paid as a deposit into a fictional bank in an imaginary country), and much more.
TAOCP also led to the creation of an important piece of software. In 1977, unhappy with the quality of the typography in the proofs ofthe second edition of its second volume, Knuth created TeX, a sophisticated digital typesetting system that continues to be used to this day, particularly for technical publications and those full of mathematical formulas.
Bill Gates once said that anyone who had actually read all of The Art of Computer Programming should send him his or her résumé. But nobody’s yet read it in its entirety,...