My new book, "Refactor Your Wetware", now in Beta

The most popular talks I’ve been giving over the last two years or so are Refactoring Your Wetware, Pragmatic Learning, and Herding Racehorses and Racing Sheep. Folks keep asking for more info on these topics, so I thought maybe it was time to actually write this stuff down.

The first couple chapters of Refactor Your Wetware: Pragmatic Thinking and Learning are now available as a beta book. I plan to add chapters every two weeks or so throughout the beta period.

I’ve written many times that the two most important skills for a programmer (IMHO) are communications and learning. In this book, I’m taking a hard look at expertise, thinking and learning.

The fact is we have to learn new stuff all the time. Not just the new technologies (although that's a pretty big challenge right there), but we have to learn about the problem domain, about the team and organizational dynamics, about the system itself as it stumbles to life.

But what have you ever been taught about learning? If you're like most people, probably not much. Nor are we really ever taught much about how our brains work, or how to take advantage of that. But of course, in our field, all the action is in our heads. The rest is just typing :-)

These are the main chapters in the book:

• From Novice to Expert: Use the Dreyfus Model on the road to expertise
• This is Your Brain: Linear-mode and Rich-mode cognitive processing
• Get in your Right Mind: Cultivating Rich-mode processes
• Debug Your Mind: Recognizing and avoiding cognitive biases
• Learn Deliberately: Practical techniques to learn more, faster, and more effectively
• Working with Knowledge: Managing knowledge, attention, and context

The Dreyfus model, featured in my talk Herding Racehorses and Racing Sheep, has long been a favored topic. It turns out to be a very useful way to begin to talk about building expertise, how to make the journey from novice to expert.

How we think, and how we think about thinking, makes a dramatic difference on your ability to solve problems and invent new solutions. Learning how the brain works (at least, part of it) can really help, so I'll tell you all about the Linear-mode (L-mode) and Rich-mode (R-mode) cognitive processes, how and when to use them, and how to harness more brain power. I know I can use all the help I can get.

I'll be posting more on these topics over the coming weeks, in the meantime, enjoy the first part of the book!

/\ndy

Comments

[matt mcknight]

Finished reading the beta last night. I loved this talk at NFJS (and the herding racehorses one), and to have it in book form- spectacular. I even got my wife to get started on "drawing on the right side of the brain". All of this material has really changed my life! Mostly for the better :-)

[Michael Doornbos]

Loved the beta book. Can't wait for the last few chapters to come out.

[Remko Tronçon]

I had a lot of fun reading this beta book as well. Interesting stuff, and again extremely familiar situations and experiences. Having to wait for the last chapters is probably a good thing, too: this gives our R-brains a chance to index the raw data it recorded from the first half, allowing us to read the remainder of the book with more context-awareness.

[Markus Jais]

that looks very interesting. looking forward to the final version.

[Didier Thizy]

Wonderful idea, why didn't I think of all that :) Truly insightful.

[Antony Stubbs]

I asked Dave the same thing:
http://pragdave.blogs.pragprog.com/pragdave/2004/04/end_of_the_know.html?cid=118634946#comment-118634946

Is there a recording of either of these talks online?

[/\ndy]

No, not that I'm aware of. I've given this talk dozens of times over the last couple of years, but the only recordings were made at private companies.

The book -- which is nearly done -- is currently the best source for more information.

thanks!