Computer Programming Quotes - Page 10

• The discipline of programming is most like sorcery. Both use precise language to instruct inanimate objects to do our bidding. Small mistakes in programs or spells can lead to completely unforseen behavior: e.g., see the story, "The Sorcerer's Apprentice". Neither study is easy: "...her [Galinda's] early appetite for sorcery had waned once she'd heard what a grind it was to learn spells and, worse, to understand them." from the book "Wicked" by G. Maguire.

  Richard E. Pattis

  Mistake, Book, Learning

  7 Copy quote

• You don't have to believe everything you think.

  Erykah Badu

  Believe, Thinking, Rationality

  FaceBook post by Erykah Badu from Jan 28, 2014

  41 Copy quote

  Show source

• When the words are fuzzy, the programmers reflexively retreat to the most precise method of articulation available: source code. Although there is nothing more precise than code, there is also nothing more permanent or resistant to change. So the situation frequently crops up where nomenclature confusion drives programmers to begin coding prematurely, and that code becomes the de facto design, regardless of its appropriateness or correctness.

  Amari Cooper

  Learning, Confusion, Design

  10 Copy quote

• Who dares to teach must never cease to learn.

  John Cotton Dana

  Inspirational, Education, Appreciation

  John Cotton Dana's remarks on a quotation suitable for inscription on a new building at Newark State College, Union, New Jersey (1912) as quoted in "The New York Times Book Review" (p. 55.), March 5, 1967.

  71 Copy quote

  Show source

• In the beginning we must simplify the subject, thus unavoidably falsifying it, and later we must sophisticate away the falsely simple beginning.

  Maimonides

  Learning, Simple, Programming

  20 Copy quote

• 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. Right practice aims at preventing insertion of errors and, failing that, removing them before testing or any other running of the program.

  Hayley Mills

  Running, Learning, Errors

  7 Copy quote

• A class, in Java, is where we teach objects how to behave.

  Richard E. Pattis

  Learning, Class, Java

  6 Copy quote

• Code should run as fast as necessary, but no faster; something important is always traded away to increase speed.

  Richard E. Pattis

  Running, Learning, Important

  9 Copy quote

• What I can't create I don't understand

  Richard P. Feynman

  Programming Languages, Computer Language, I Can

  Quoted in James Gleick, Genius: The Life and Science of Richard Feynman (1992)

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• You cannot teach beginners top-down programming, because they don't know which end is up.

  Tony Hoare

  Trust, Top Down, Beginners

  15 Copy quote

• They have computers, and they may have other weapons of mass destruction.

  Janet Reno

  Technology, Mass Destruction, May

  14 Copy quote

• If our designs are failing due to the constant rain of changing requirements, it is our designs that are at fault. We must somehow find a way to make our designs resilient to such changes and protect them from rotting.

  Robert Cecil Martin

  Rain, Learning, Simplicity

  7 Copy quote

• Awaken people's curiosity. It is enough to open minds, do not overload them. Put there just a spark.

  Anatole France

  Inspirational, Education, Appreciation

  21 Copy quote

• Shall I tell you the secret of the true scholar? It is this: every man I meet is my master in some point, and in that I learn of him.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Motivational, Learning, Men

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Illustrated)”, p.2667, Delphi Classics

  16 Copy quote

  Show source

• A process cannot be understood by stopping it. Understanding must move with the flow of the process, must join it and flow with it.

  Frank Herbert

  Inspirational, Business, Moving

  Frank Herbert (2003). “Dune”, p.35, Penguin

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• The structure of a software system provides the ecology in which code is born, matures, and dies. A well-designed habitat allows for the successful evolution of all the components needed in a software system.

  Richard E. Pattis

  Learning, Successful, Habitat

  8 Copy quote

• The only people who have anything to fear from free software are those whose products are worth even less.

  David F. Emery

  Technology, People, Computer

  7 Copy quote

• Besides a mathematical inclination, an exceptionally good mastery of one's native tongue is the most vital asset of a competent programmer.

  Edsger Dijkstra

  Learning, Mastery, Tongue

  Edsger W. Dijkstra (2012). “Selected Writings on Computing: A personal Perspective”, p.130, Springer Science & Business Media

  24 Copy quote

  Show source

• If you think you're a really good programmer... read Knuth's Art of Computer Programming... You should definitely send me a resume if you can read the whole thing.

  Bill Gates

  Art, Science, Thinking

  8 Copy quote

• I graduated from college with a 3.92 GPA with a degree in computer programming and a BFA in fine arts and animation. My first job was painting a mural in the Grimaldis in Queens.

  JWoww

  Art, Jobs, Queens

  6 Copy quote

• There is a construct in computer programming called 'the infinite loop' which enables a computer to do what no other physical machine can do - to operate in perpetuity without tiring. In the same way it doesn't know exhaustion, it doesn't know when it's wrong and it can keep doing the wrong thing over and over without tiring.

  John Maeda

  Machines, Way, Computer

  "Watson Is No Match for Humanity" by John Maeda, www.huffingtonpost.com. February 23, 2011.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• For his major contributions to the analysis of algorithms and the design of programming languages, and in particular for his contributions to the "art of computer programming" through his well-known books in a continuous series by this title.

  Donald Knuth

  Art, Book, Design

  16 Copy quote

• The best programs are written so that computing machines can perform them quickly and so that human beings can understand them clearly. A programmer is ideally an essayist who works with traditional aesthetic and literary forms as well as mathematical concepts, to communicate the way that an algorithm works and to convince a reader that the results will be correct.

  Donald Knuth

  Machines, Algorithms, Way

  23 Copy quote

• Give a man a program, frustrate him for a day. Teach a man to program, frustrate him for a lifetime.

  Muhammad Waseem

  Men, Giving, Computer

  6 Copy quote

• Creativity runs across many categories in life, from the arts-and-crafts project a mum or dad does with their kids, to the bestselling author's manuscript, to the designs of the hairdresser, to the creations of the computer programming genius.

  Tabatha Coffey

  Running, Art, Dad

  "I Am a Bitch!" by Tabatha Coffey, www.huffingtonpost.com. January 9, 2012.

  16 Copy quote

  Show source