Introduction

It’s day one on the job. You have programming chops, you’ve landed the job, you’re sitting at your workstation…now what? Before you, a new jungle awaits:

• Programming at industry scale, with code bases measured in thousands (or hundreds of thousands) of lines of code. How do you get your bearings and start contributing quickly?

• Navigating an organization containing programmers but also people in many, many other roles. When you need guidance on a product feature, who do you ask?

• Building your portfolio of achievements each year. When performance reviews lurk on the horizon, do you know what your boss is looking for and how you’ll be judged?

…and so much more. Your programming skills are only one part of what you’ll need in these first years on the job.

The lucky among us have guides who already know the landscape. This book is a virtual guide. It’ll get you oriented, point out the mountains and canyons ahead, and also save you from some nasty pitfalls.