Resources for learning AI & ML

#machinelearning #ai #learning

AI is still the hot thing right now, and it doesn't show any signs of giving up. Where generative AI may have lost some of its shine there are still interesting developments every day and VCs are still throwing money at companies working on AI.

Even if AI does end up replacing a lot of low level software engineering jobs, or there being fewer jobs available due to so-called “productivity boosts”, AI engineers are unlikely to suffer the same fate.

Like many of you, my AI knowledge is mostly limited to using LLMs but at work we have started seriously looking into machine learning (ML) and AI to see how best it can be used.

Below are some links to books and courses that I have found (but not yet tried) that have been recommended on various forums as good places to learn AI & ML.

I have just grouped (probably incorrectly) anything relating to big data analysis and deep learning as ML and everything else as AI.

If you know of any other great resources let me know, and I will add then to this list on my website.

Note: Some links below are affiliate links where I will earn a small commission (at no extra cost to you) to help fund this newsletter. These are clearly labelled should you not wish to click on them.

AI Resources #

📝 What Is ChatGPT Doing … and Why Does It Work?
📚 AI Engineering: Building Applications with Foundation Models (affiliate link)
🎓 Neural Networks: Zero To Hero
📚 Natural Language Processing with Transformers (affiliate link)
📚 Generative Deep Learning: Teaching Machines to Paint, Write, Compose, and Play (affiliate link)
📝 The 2025 AI Engineering Reading List — More advanced reading, mostly research papers.
📚 Transformers for Natural Language Processing and Computer Vision (affiliate link)
📝 duncantmiller/ai-developer-resources — There is a big list here of courses and books

ML Resources #

📚 The Hundred-Page Machine Learning Book (affiliate link) — One of the most recommended books on ML.
📚 Hands-On Machine Learning with Scikit-Learn, Keras, and Tensorflow (affiliate link)
📚 An Introduction to Statistical Learning
📚 Deep Learning: Foundations and Concepts (affiliate link)
📚 Understanding Deep Learning
📚 Dive into Deep Learning (affiliate link)
📚 Probabilistic machine learning
📚 Applied Machine Learning and AI for Engineers: Solve Business Problems That Can't Be Solved Algorithmically (affiliate link)
📚 Designing Data-Intensive Applications: The Big Ideas Behind Reliable, Scalable, and Maintainable Systems (affiliate link)
📚 Deep Learning (Adaptive Computation and Machine Learning series (affiliate link)
📚 Pattern Recognition and Machine Learning (Information Science and Statistics) (affiliate link)
📚 Machine Learning For Absolute Beginners: A Plain English Introduction: 3 (AI, Data Science, Python & Statistics for Beginners) (affiliate link)
📚 Information Theory, Inference and Learning Algorithms (affiliate link)
📚 Machine Learning Algorithms in Depth (affiliate link)

❤️ Picks of the Week #

I had a job getting through my RSS feeds, this week. I think everyone is starting the new year strong, so there is a lot to share in this week's issue:

📝 Article — Troubleshooting blocked queries in PostgreSQL — I use PostgreSQL every day at work and this is definitely going to come in handy.

📝 Article — Rules for writing software tutorials — Some great advice here if you write programming tutorials

📝 Article — Diagnosing an Unusual WiFi Issue (2020) — I am always interested to see how people solve odd problems like this.

📝 Article — B-Trees: More Than I Thought I'd Want to Know — B-Trees are used all the time for indexes. It is good to know how they work.

📝 Article — Web page annoyances that I don't inflict on you — This is definitely a bit of a rant article, but I agree with most of it. I think the internet would be a much better place if websites at least stopping doing half the things on this list.

📝 Article — Researchers design wearable tech that can sense glucose levels more accurately — I am not diabetic, but I am starting to pay more attention to my sugar intake. If this works I think it could be really interesting. I bought the book Glucose Revolution (affiliate link) last week to help my get better at this.

🎬 Video — Guten: A Tiny Newspaper Printer — I love weird little projects like this. I need to start building more creative projects in my spare time.

📝 Article — First impressions of Ghostty — I mentioned Ghostty in my picks the other week. I haven't tried, but I think I will this week after reading this.

📝 Article — Uncut Currency — I didn't know this was a thing. It was interesting to learn that all these uncut notes start with a 9 so that you can identify them. Useful if you see someone selling a wrongly cut note for some ridiculous price.

📱 Gadget — Nvidia's Project Digits is a 'personal AI supercomputer' — We are slowly getting closer to the film Her. I am not sure if that is a good thing though.

📝 Article — Learning Synths — I love interactive articles like this, and it is probably good if you want to learn about this. I just thought it was fun!

📝 Article — Mistakes engineers make in large established codebases — Definitely some good advice here.

📝 Article — Magic/tragic email links: don't make them the only option — I am not a fan of magic links. I don't want to have to switch to a different application to log in. I use Firefox Multi-Account Containers to separate work and personal accounts and these magic links usually cause issues.

📝 Article — Laid off for the first time in my career, and twice in one year - Some good advice here if you get laid off. It can happen to any of us nowadays.

🌌 Atlas — Atlas of Space — This is very cool, and it is showing the trajectories in real-time too.

📝 Article — Salesforce will hire no more software engineers in 2025 — Are they really not hiring due to productivity increases due to AI or are they just trying to cut down their overheads?

📝 Article — You don't have to pay the Microsoft 365 price increase — I haven't seen an email about any price increases yet but worth keeping in mind. I am not sure I want AI in my spreadsheets or word documents.

👾 Tool — Factorio Blueprint Visualizer — Factorio has been on my to play list for a while and I know it is popular with other software engineers. You might like this.

📝 Article — Lines of code that will beat A/B testing every time (2012) — I am definitely trying this ext time I get asked to implement AI.

📝 Article — I've acquired a new superpower — Solve even hard spot the difference puzzles by crossing your eyes. It works as long as the image is big enough.

📝 Article — Common misconceptions about the complexity in robotics vs AI — An interesting article explaining why some things are harder to solve than they seem.

🎬 Video — Bad Apple but it's 6,500 regexes that I search for in Vim — Not sure why you would want to do this but oh well!

📝 Article — Fluid Simulation Pendant — This is really cool. It's a shame the battery doesn't last all day or multiple days for that matter, but otherwise it is a really cool project.

⌨️ Keyboard — Cosmos Keyboard: Scan your hand, build a keyboard — I am not sure how well I would get on with a split keyboard but these look awesome. I guess it would force me to touch type properly.

🛠️ Tool — Webtop: Alpine,Ubuntu,Fedora,and Arch containers containing full desktop envs — I haven't found a use for this on my home server, but I want to try it.

📝 Website — FFmpeg by Example — FFmpeg is really powerful, but it isn't the easiest tool to use. This website has some great examples of how to use it.

📝 Article — Nobody cares — This is definitely a rant and is mostly talking about the US, but I see the same things in the UK. I think a lot of it comes from companies take, take, take attitude which leaves people with an all for themselves attitude. Unfortunately I don't think that is going to change anytime soon.

🎬 Video — Nintendo announces the Switch 2 — The Switch 2 looks really nice. I don't play my Switch much since I got my Steam Deck, but it looks fancy!

📝 Article — Oh Shit, Git? — This is great. I must admit that on more than 1 occasion I have accidentally committed directly to main and had to look up how to undo it. I have actually set up Git Branch Protection in VS Code to avoid me from doing this by mistake.