I'm a weak chess player. I don't know any openings, my endgame is weaker than most, and let's not discuss the midgame, please. I enjoy chess, though, so I was pleased that out of the ether comes a nice blog entry comparing chess tactics to programming.
Fast-forward over the part where I read a big stack of chess books: endgame theory, entire books on specific units, books about the history of chess, books about the psychology of the game, the official USCF rules. Each one improved my games only marginally, if at all, and most ended up as bathroom literature in our house, which really irritates my wife. My rating had barely improved in the few years since I read "Chess for Dummies", and I was still the worst player in the club. I knew that I was looking for a way to improve my game in general, but re-reading the general books wasn't a help, and the advice from people who've mastered chess is really inconsistent. (Frankly, people who write about chess are mostly aging child prodigies, who don't really believe it is possible to learn the game as an adult). Then, by some random stroke of luck, I stumbled on a very thin, very simple book in the book store: "Rapid Chess Improvement", by Michael de la Maza. It's a small book, but I can distill it even further: study tactics. To be fair, the book actually outlines a specific study program, which is great, but the important lesson is just those two words: study tactics.
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Can this study method be translated into programming? Yes. I believe the equivalent is reviewing code on paper. Not necessarily literally on paper, but in isolation from the compiler, the schedule, the politics and everything else that comes with a professional software project. Just the code. Unlike chess, the problem description is always the same: "how can this code be improved." Ignore the big picture, the product, and high-level software objectives such as performance, portability or reusability. Just think literally: how can the CODE be improved, from the perspective of a human reader.
To me this comes back to the theme of craftmanship.
Plus I need to find "Rapid Chess Improvement" (and find time to read it).
