The Unix Programming Environment
The Unix Programming Environment by Kernighan and Pikeby Brian W. Kernighan
Shares rank 71 of 115 programming books by recommenders
Recommended for showing how much can be done with a few basic Unix tools and plain text files, and for hands-on projects like implementing hoc.
Recommended for showing how much can be done with a few basic Unix tools and plain text files, and for hands-on projects like implementing hoc.
3 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 3
- criticize it
- 0
- approval share
- 100%
Recommended in 3 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 3 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- Nobody criticizes itNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 3 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, not met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Shows what basic tools can accomplish
“It's made me realize how much can be accomplished with a few basic tools and files”
Comment from 18 Jan 2026 in “A Social Filesystem” Encourages using plain text more
“it's made me want to use text for a lot more things”
Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “How Markdown Took over the World” Hands-on projects like implementing hoc
“where you can implement `hoc` in a couple hours”
Comment from 15 Apr 2026 in “Want to Write a Compiler? Just Read These Two Papers (2008)” Cited as a recommended read
“or The Unix Programming Environment by Kernighan and Pike.”
Comment from 6 Feb 2026 in “C Isn't a Language”
Other programming books people recommend
The four most recommended other programming books, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Crafting Interpretersby Robert Nystrom | 60 | 4 | 94% | 10 | — | Approved |
| Clean Codeby Robert C. Martin | 31 | 87 | 26% | 9 | — | — |
| The Pragmatic Programmerby Andy Hunt and Dave Thomas | 28 | 1 | 97% | 7 | — | Approved |
| How to Design Programsby Matthias Felleisen and Robert Bruce Findler and Matthew Flatt and Shriram Krishnamurthi | 18 | 2 | 90% | 7 | — | Approved |
| The Unix Programming Environmentby Brian W. KernighanThis page | 3 | 0 | 100% | 3 | — | — |
What people said
All 4 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“where you can implement `hoc` in a couple hours”
“or The Unix Programming Environment by Kernighan and Pike.”
“It's made me realize how much can be accomplished with a few basic tools and files”
“it's made me want to use text for a lot more things”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.