In June’s Book of the Month, we’re reading Doug Needham’s “Data Structure Synthesis.” The tagline on the book is “Boosting Productivity Through Data Structure Reuse.” Ultimately, the book is about combining the mathematical truths of set theory and applying that to data modeling, but all wrapped together in an adventure with the author. 

Needham starts the book by setting the stage, giving a brief introduction to how he got to where he is today. This turns out to be critical to how the book flows. It gives readers an understanding of the person that applied math to data in a unique way. Without this introduction, the mathematics portrayed in the book would be difficult to get through, but Needham expertly takes the reader on his polymath journey, keeping them abreast of the complexities about to be explored in the book.  

After the introduction, Needham sets the stage with set theory and data vault. With his vast experience in data vault and data operations in general, he does an excellent job of bringing esoteric and academic concepts to the reader though his real-life experience. This grants the reader with a foundation of knowledge to progress through the rest of the book in a way that knowledge gained can be applied.  This is then further expanded upon with foundational knowledge on logic, prepositional calculus, SQL and – as a special treat – graph theory. 

With the details out of the way, Needham teaches about extract, transform, load (ETL or ELT) processes and how code reuse can happen, especially in a data vault environment. This is where the payoff comes for the hungry data engineer. Needham grants the reader his tangible experience in data operations, which can ultimately change a person’s approach to developing code in complex environments, like large data lakes pulling from disparate systems. 

The true treasure of this book isn’t just the math or the discussion on data vault and data structures, but the heart in which this is brought to the reader. Needham manages to take difficult academic topics and share them in a way that brings the reader through his life journey. To find a math textbook with emotion is difficult to describe but fascinating to read. This unique combination makes learning the content easier than it should be. Ultimately, this makes an excellent book for a team of data engineers. Learning from Needham’s experience could easily change the way your team functions. 

More about the Author 

Doug “The Data Guy” Needham started his career as a Marine database administrator supporting operational systems that spanned the globe in support of the Marine Corps missions. Since then, Needham has worked as a consultant, data engineer, and data architect for enterprises of all sizes. He is currently working as a data scientist, tinkering with graphs and enrichment platforms while showing others how to get more meaning from data. He always focuses on the data operations side of ensuring data moves throughout the enterprise in the most efficient manner.