Book · 2020 · Computers
Software Engineering at Google
Lessons Learned from Programming Over Time
- mentions
- 9
- people
- 4
- podcast
- 1
- episodes
- 3
- recommendations
- 0
Your code base is sustainable if for any valuable change that comes along, you are capable of making that change safely.
What they say about it
- Discussing book contents“go through this in the SVE book”2
The best things said about it
In the realm of programming, lone craftspeople are extremely rare, and even when they do exist, they don't perform superhuman achievements in a vacuum.
Software Engineering at Google book, one of my favorite books.
Software engineering at Google it's also it's available for free online.
4 people who brought it up
Why people recommend it
Software Engineering at Google by Titus Winters, Tom Manshreck, and Hyrum Wright documents the engineering practices, cultural values, and scaling strategies that sustain Google's massive codebases. On The Pragmatic Engineer podcast, Titus Winters discussed the origins of the book, explaining how a dedicated team spent roughly two years compiling institutional knowledge and overshooting their original text goals. Titus noted that the opening pages establish a core thesis: a codebase remains sustainable if teams can make any valuable change safely. On the same podcast, Gergely Orosz quoted passages from the book regarding the rarity of lone craftspeople and the collaborative nature of software engineering, while Elin Nilsson highlighted how the text outlines the characteristics of being googly and is freely available online. Addy Osmani also praised the book on the podcast, noting his happiness at seeing internal Google practices captured for a broader audience. Across these conversations, speakers used the publication to explore sustainable engineering cultures, tooling evolution, and the hard-won lessons of keeping massive software systems operational over decades, cementing its reputation as a vital resource for engineering organizations.
Every mention
Gergely Orosz And also I I guess this goes back to like do the right thing. It's it's a it's in this book. I I just read… 4
“Speaking of hard hard lessons and and documenting them, can we talk about software engineering Google, the book that you're quite well known for?”
“Well, interestingly enough, the I mean, the book is very very thorough on how it gets to production, but it it it it does not cover the operational part, which I guess it's it's the history of the book. There isn't a history book, which”
“In the book, you write about the importance of a team, and I I I'll quote you. Uh in the realm of programming, lone craftspeople are extremely rare, and even when they do exist, they don't perform superhuman achievements in a vacuum.”
“And also I I guess this goes back to like do the right thing. It's it's a it's in this book. I I just read it. But the right thing for who?”
Elin Nilsson there's also an SV book um software engineering at Google the office yeah I have I have it here on my desk… 2
“there's also an SV book um software engineering at Google the office yeah I have I have it here on my desk software engineering at Google it's also it's available for free online”
“They go through this in the SVE book actually. Uh but like they have a couple of kind of like values or characteristics if you will uh of being googly.”
Titus Winters And I think it's in the first two or three pages of the book uh I've said now for 10 years you know, your c… 2
“And I think it's in the first two or three pages of the book uh I've said now for 10 years you know, your code base is sustainable if for any valuable change that comes along, you are capable of making that change safely, right?”
“Um the whole task was actually almost 2 years. Uh certainly not full-time. Like we were at most probably putting in quarter to half-time in most of that time. Um but yeah, like we wrangled together way too much text from way too many people, and I don't think I realized just how much we overshot until I saw a”
Addy Osmani So, for example, the Software Engineering at Google book, one of my favorite books. I was very happy to see… 1
“So, for example, the Software Engineering at Google book, one of my favorite books. I was very happy to see different flavors of that over the years internally at the company”
Other mentions (1: passing, ad reads, own books)
“Before, he spent more than 10 years at Google, was the lead author of the book Software Engineering at Google, and ran the company's readability program.”