[A]nd then it occurred to me that a computer is a stupid machine with the ability to do incredibly smart things, while computer programmers are smart people with the ability to do incredibly stupid things. They are, in short, a perfect match.
Showing posts with label Programming Quotes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Programming Quotes. Show all posts
You cannot teach beginners top...
You cannot teach beginners top-down programming, because they don't know which end is up.
Writing the first 90 percent o...
Writing the first 90 percent of a computer program takes 90 percent of the time. The remaining ten percent also takes 90 percent of the time and the final touches also take 90 percent of the time.
When you catch bugs early, you...
When you catch bugs early, you also get fewer compound bugs. Compound bugs are two separate bugs that interact: you trip going downstairs, and when you reach for the handrail it comes off in your hand.
When debugging, novices insert...
When debugging, novices insert corrective code; experts remove defective code.
When a programming language is...
When a programming language is created that allows programmers to program in simple English, it will be discovered that programmers cannot speak English.
What I mean is that if you rea...
What I mean is that if you really want to understand something, the best way is to try and explain it to someone else. That forces you to sort it out in your own mind. And the more slow and dim-witted your pupil, the more you have to break things down into more and more simple ideas. And that's really the essence of programming. By the time you've sorted out a complicated idea into little steps that even a stupid machine can deal with, you've certainly learned something about it yourself.
We should forget about small e...
We should forget about small efficiencies, say about 97% of the time: premature optimization is the root of all evil.
We don't manage our time as we...
We don't manage our time as well as we manage our space. There's an overhead of starting and an overhead of stopping a project because you kind of lose your momentum. And you've got to bracket and put aside all the things you're already doing. So you need reasonably large blocks of uninterrupted time if you're going to be successful at doing some of these things. That's why hackers tend to stay up late. If you stay up late and you have another hour of work to do, you can just stay up another hour later without running into a wall and having to stop. Whereas it might take three or four hours if you start over, you might finish if you just work that extra hour. If you're a morning person, the day always intrudes a fixed amount of time in the future. So it's much less efficient. Which is why I think computer people tend to be night people - because a machine doesn't get sleepy.
Version 1 of any software is f...
Version 1 of any software is full of bugs. Version 2 fixes all the bugs and is great. Version 3 adds all the things users ask for, but hides all the great stuff in Version 2.
There does not now, nor will t...
There does not now, nor will there ever exist, a programming language in which it is the least bit hard to write bad programs.
There are two ways to write er...
There are two ways to write error-free programs; only the third one works.
The only way for errors to occ...
The only way for errors to occur in a program is by being put there by the author. No other mechanisms are known. Programs can't acquire bugs by sitting around with other buggy programs.
The New Testament offers the b...
The New Testament offers the basis for modern computer coding theory, in the form of an affirmation of the binary number system. "But let your communication be Yea, yea; nay, nay: for whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil." Matthew 5:37
The magic of myth and legend h...
The magic of myth and legend has come true in our time. One types the correct incantation on a keyboard, and a display screen comes to life, showing things that never were nor could be.... The computer resembles the magic of legend in this respect, too. If one character, one pause, of the incantation is not strictly in proper form, the magic doesn't work. Human beings are not accustomed to being perfect, and few areas of human activity demand it. Adjusting to the requirement for perfection is, I think, the most difficult part of learning to program.
The best performance improveme...
The best performance improvement is the transition from the nonworking state to the working state.
Sometimes it pays to stay in b...
Sometimes it pays to stay in bed in Monday, rather than spending the rest of the week debugging Monday's code.
Should array indices start at ...
Should array indices start at 0 or 1? My compromise of 0.5 was rejected without, I thought, proper consideration.
Reusing pieces of code is like...
Reusing pieces of code is like picking off sentences from other people's stories and trying to make a magazine article.
Ready, fire, aim: the fa...
Ready, fire, aim: the fast approach to software development. Ready, aim, aim, aim, aim: the slow approach to software development.
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