Resources

These are the books and resources I'm exploring as I learn more about AI engineering, Java, Python, System Design, and Software Architecture.

System Design & Architecture

Building Microservices: Designing Fine-Grained Systems
Sam Newman
What I picked to learn microservices architecture, breaking down monoliths, and managing service boundaries.
Fundamentals of Software Architecture: An Engineering Approach
Mark Richards & Neal Ford
Keeps my architectural thinking sharp when evaluating component designs, system patterns, and technical trade-offs.
Designing Data-Intensive Applications: The Big Ideas Behind Reliable, Scalable, and Maintainable Systems
Martin Kleppmann & Chris Riccomini
My go-to resource for understanding distributed systems, especially when digging into storage engines, message queues, and data consistency.

AI Engineering Core & Agentic Track: LLM Engineering, RAG, QLoRA, Agents, MCP
Ed Donner
Hands-on walkthrough for modern AI workflows, including RAG pipelines, fine-tuning, and agent integration.

Automate the Boring Stuff With Python, Third Edition Practical Programming for Total Beginners
Al Sweigart
My hands-on intro to Python where I learned to automate daily tasks, scrape web data, and script file workflows.
Fluent Python Clear, Concise, and Effective Programming, 2nd Edition
Luciano Ramalho
The resource I to turn to when moving past the basics to write properly structured, clean Pythonic code.

Introduction to Java Programming and Data Structures
Daniel Liang
Took me from basic Java syntax to OOP fundamentals and core data structures through end-of-chapter exercises.
Spring Start Here
Laurentiu Spilca
The book that bridge my knowledge from core Java into Spring. Built out dependency injection, application context, and basic REST endpoints.
Java Persistence with Spring Data and Hibernate
Cătălin Tudose
This drives my understanding of database integration, domain modeling, ORMs, and handling data persistence properly.
Spring Security in Action
Laurentiu Spilca
Guide for backend security, covering authentication flows, authorization rules, and securing application data.
Spring Boot Up and Running
Mark Heckler
Ties Java and Spring concepts together for building and deploying production-ready backend applications.