Programmers, what would you do with $500 for personal improvement?

[madknight3]

Fellow developers, what would you do if you were given $500 that had to be spent towards "personal improvement".

 

Would you spend it on learning resources? Software? Hardware? Travel expenses for an event? Something else? You aren't limited to a single purchase. Feel free to get specific. 

[trag1c]

I would personally spend that money to go towards something like GDC. You can never go wrong with books either. 

[Atmos]

New keyboard, and a couple ssds for the workstation. Can never go wrong beefing up storage, especially since I've still not upgraded to ssd's purely in that thing.

[Cryosec]

more displays! more SSDs! more pizzaaaa

[alex75871]

1 year subscription at pluralsight

[mathijs727]

Graphics Card (cough, need it for work, cough), larger SSD, second display, tickets to GDC (more then 500 dollars especially with the cost of flying to NA).

[Enderman]

more and better monitors

 

[GreezyJeezy]

i'd probably use it all on sites like lyna (or better ones) to learn how to program better.

 

[Joegeddon]

I would buy a Lynda.com subscription or something. Or things to make your workstation more comfortable. Don't buy new components or anything because chances are you're fine with what you've got. Just make things more comfortable and focus on investing in education.

[madknight3]

2 hours ago, trag1c said:

You can never go wrong with books either. 

I'm certainly considering books. I've got quite a few in mind. The hardest part is deciding between them.

 

[burnttoastnice]

Another monitor to compliment my desktop workstation, and parts towards a better project hosting server. Probably even a smaller laptop (thinking Lenovo Ideapad 100S, but with 4gb RAM).

 

Definitely SSDs too.

[trag1c]

2 minutes ago, madknight3 said:

I'm certainly considering books. I've got quite a few in mind. The hardest part is deciding between them.

 

It most certainly is. I've got my eye on around 5 different books but I can only afford 1 at the moment. I might just let the C++ gods RNG a number between 1 and 5 to pick between them.

[madknight3]

1 minute ago, trag1c said:

It most certainly is. I've got my eye on around 5 different books but I can only afford 1 at the moment. I might just let the C++ gods RNG a number between 1 and 5 to pick between them.

That might be a good way to go if you want all 5 of them about equally. What books are they if you don't mind me asking?

 

My amazon wish list has around 70 books on it at the moment so I've gotta go through that and pick out the ones that interest me the most before I can make any final decisions.

[trag1c]

@madknight3 I forgot to quote your post lol.

Effective C++ by Scott Meyer, Game Engine Architecture Second Edition, Frand D Luna's 3D Game Programming With DirectX 12, OpenGL Super Bible. I've also been wanting to get more into assembly as well so a book for that.

 

That's a pretty big wish list. Thats probably going to take you some time to sort through. 

[madknight3]

3 minutes ago, trag1c said:

Effective C++ by Scott Meyer, Game Engine Architecture Second Edition, Frand D Luna's 3D Game Programming With DirectX 12, OpenGL Super Bible. I've also been wanting to get more into assembly as well so a book for that.

Neat. Nothing there on my list but I certainly get the appeal. I might get into some basic game dev at some point, just to play around with stuff, but it would more likely be C#/Unity type stuff than really diving into the details like you're doing.

 

6 minutes ago, trag1c said:

That's a pretty big wish list. Thats probably going to take you some time to sort through. 

Yeah, I've built it up over time and I probably won't ever get them all. Sometimes I'll throw some stuff on there to consider for later as I'm not sure if I want it or not at the time and I don't want to forget about it.

[Guest]

Application fee to college.

[trag1c]

3 hours ago, madknight3 said:

Neat. Nothing there on my list but I certainly get the appeal. I might get into some basic game dev at some point, just to play around with stuff, but it would more likely be C#/Unity type stuff than really diving into the details like you're doing.

 

Yeah, I've built it up over time and I probably won't ever get them all. Sometimes I'll throw some stuff on there to consider for later as I'm not sure if I want it or not at the time and I don't want to forget about it.

It's pretty fun stuff. It has a lot of interesting and new quirks beyond more generic programming that provide a bit of a challenge. I would definitely recommend starting with something like Unity before diving in head first into the low level stuff. It helps you get a true grasp of what you're actually trying to accomplish.

 

 That's not a bad idea. You would always have a potential book on stand bye if the need arises.

[prolemur]

1440p monitor(s) and the rest on books for whatever I'm currently into: node, express, mongoDB etc.

 

Having a high res monitor would save a bunch of time switching window to window, when they could just be side by side

[madknight3]

1 hour ago, trag1c said:

That's not a bad idea. You would always have a potential book on stand bye if the need arises.

Yeah, the list doesn't have every topic covered, like game development for example, but it covers a pretty wide range of topics. Design patterns, architecture, refactoring, algorithms, functional/object oriented programming and principles, automation, etc. Basically a lot of language agnostic stuff. I have a some .NET specific books on the list as well because that's what my job uses.

[Nineshadow]

Another monitor.

A mechanical keyboard.

Books

 

Oh, and 1 SSD for my desktop. Or I could use put the one from my laptop.

[Gachr]

Another monitor, my hardware is in a pretty good shape.

If we exclude the workstation:

Books, things like RPi/Arduino are really handy.

[.:MARK:.]

I have all the learning resources I need so I would go for a larger SSD so I can actually install my develop environments. XD.

[KuJoe]

Buy another 27" monitor, get 2 more SSDs and a RAID card, and a better keyboard.

[Nuluvius]

Well I have access to plenty of e-learning so that's not an issue. I wouldn't ever spend it on textbooks because; one, I see them as a waste of time as the industry simply moves too quickly; and two, I can get those for free anyway. Hardware? Don't really need anymore right now...

 

I know exactly what I'd do with it - I would use it for a short break! To get as far away from a computerized device as is feasibly possible in order to improve my mood!

[fizzlesticks]

A new chair, a cheeseburger and some mountain dew. But mostly the chair.

 

17 hours ago, trag1c said:

Effective C++ by Scott Meyer, Game Engine Architecture Second Edition

I have the first edition of GEA, definitely a good choice. Been looking to get the second edition if I could find a cheap used copy.

As for Effective C++, I'd say it's a bit dated. Still an excellent book and worth the read but a lot of the book is essentially "write C++, not C." If you don't have "Effective Modern C++" and "More Effective C++" I would get them first.