Software Engineering at Google: Lessons Learned from Programming Over Time

Colophon The animal on the cover of Software Engineering at Google is an American flamingo (Phoenicopterus ruber). This bird can be found primarily near the coast in Central and South America and the Gulf of Mexico, though they will sometimes travel as far as Southern Florida in the United States. The flamingo’s habitat consists of mudflats and coastal salt water lagoons. The iconic pink plumage of the flamingo is acquired as the bird matures and comes from carotenoid pigments in its food. Because these pigments are more readily found in their natural food sources, wild flamingos tend to display more vibrant plumage than their captive counterparts, although zoos will sometimes add supplemental pig‐ ments to their diets. Flamingos are typically about 42 inches tall, and their black- tipped wingspan extends approximately five feet. A wading bird, the flamingo has webbed, three-toed pink feet. Though there are no common distinctions between male and female flamingos, males tend to be a little larger. Flamingos are filter feeders and use their long legs and necks to feed in deep water, and they spend most of their day searching for food. They have two rows of lamellae inside their bills, which are comb-like bristles that filter their diet of seeds, algae, microscopic organisms, and small shrimp. Flamingos live in large groups of up to 10,000 and will migrate when they have eaten all the food in one location. In addition to being social birds, flamingos are extremely vocal. They have location calls to help find specific mates and alarm calls to warn the larger group. Though it was once considered a part of the same species as the greater flamingo (Phoenicopterus roseus), which may be found in Africa, Asia, and souther Europe, the American flamingo is now considered to be a separate species. While the American flamingo’s current conservation status is currently listed as of Least Concern, many of the animals on O’Reilly covers are endangered; all of them are important to the world. The cover illustration is by Karen Montgomery, based on a black and white engraving from Cassell’s Natural History. The cover fonts are Gilroy Semibold and Guardian Sans. The text font is Adobe Minion Pro; the heading font is Adobe Myriad Con‐ densed; and the code font is Dalton Maag’s Ubuntu Mono.

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