For what it's worth, I think this "deep study" mode of learning is perhaps less useful today in tech. We have a lot more things we need to work with with now, and a searchable internet means we can draft off other people's learning a lot more. Deep understanding is both less possible and less useful for the bulk of us, who are mainly integrating lots of libraries, services, tools, and frameworks.
But for every given topic, we still need deep experts, like Bruce Dawson was for this processor at Microsoft. So I think this mode is still very valuable, so I agree with Ciantic: this way of learning is something everybody should have at least some practice in.
What he is describing is just RTFM. It shouldn't be groundbreaking or really up for debate yet here we are. Manuals are written expressly for this purpose. A properly written manual has everything you need to know to get it working in a practical sense. Theory is a different matter altogether. But we are talking about engineering not science. Engineering is very much in realm of practical application.
If reading a manual front to back for a bit of tech doesn't tell you everything you need to know to use it properly then its not a good manual.
This applies well for some manuals and poorly for others. When technology changes fast you're likely to read a lot of deprecated stuff. It's an unfortunate state of affairs we find ourselves in.
I think it is my fault, I misunderstood that the GP meant RTFM where available essentially. Though I think it's still relevant, as what is clear to me now is that a lot of us are working with tech that has no true manual, just reference docs, which is a poor substitute for a real user manual.
My argument was essentially that you gain very little from memorizing reference docs. Reading a good manual is definitely invaluable on the other hand.
I am not sure why you were downvoted, this is a fairly common response to real world work. There is so much to know, and as systems get more abstracted working in the industry typically requires breadth not depth.
Is that good? Honestly I don't think so, it would be nice to be able to spend more time mastering a stack and using that, and I feel like the outcomes would be infinitely better than jumping ship every 12 months. But that is the reality of parts of the industry, it moves fast.
But for every given topic, we still need deep experts, like Bruce Dawson was for this processor at Microsoft. So I think this mode is still very valuable, so I agree with Ciantic: this way of learning is something everybody should have at least some practice in.