The Tao of Programming

Written as a playful parody of the Zhuangzi, the Tao Te Ching and other classic Taoist writings, Geoffrey James's 1987 book hides a serious message under the joke. It consists of short anecdotes grouped into nine parts called books, running from The Silent Void and The Ancient Masters through Design, Coding and Maintenance to Management, Corporate Wisdom, Hardware and Software, and a closing Epilogue. The parables argue for hacker ideals: managers should let programmers get on with their work, code should stay small, elegant and easy to maintain, and corporate wisdom is usually a contradiction in terms. James later returned to the theme in The Zen of Programming and Computer Parables.