4 ms·

Favourite Programming Quotes

43 points by rlmw 16y ago

iwwr 16y ago
There are only two kinds of languages: the ones people complain about and the ones nobody uses Bjarne Stroustrup
- Avshalom 16y ago
  Well, and COBOL, but I don't blame Bjarne for pretending it doesn't exist.
edanm 16y ago
This just takes the cake, because it's so true and so old: "On two occasions I have been asked, "Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?" In one case a member of the Upper, and in the other a member of the Lower House put this question. I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question. — Charles Babbage"
- dctoedt 16y ago
  The questioners -- each of whom was a member of Parliament -- might have been using a superficially-polite circumlocution to raise (what we would now call) the GIGO question.
  - edanm 16y ago
    Interesting, never heard that phrase. Anyone who's interested, GIGO means "Garbage In, Garbage Out". Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GIGO http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GIGO. By the way, the Wikipedia page specifically mentions Babbage's quote.
rlmw 16y ago
I quite liked "Walking on water and developing software from a specification are easy if both are frozen."
- rlmw 16y ago
  Oh, and "Nine people can't make a baby in a month."
Luyt 16y ago
"Good programming is not learned from generalities, but by seeing how significant programs can be made clean, easy to read, easy to maintain and modify, human-engineered, efficient, and reliable, by the application of common sense and good programming practices. Careful study and imitation of good programs leads to better writing." - Kernighan and Plauger, motto of 'Software Tools'
rick_2047 16y ago
Not exactly programming, but more about cracking "cracking is like sex with a prostitute, you have to get in, take all the goodies and get out without leaving a trace." EDIT: spelling mistake
- rick_2047 16y ago
  Downvoted? I can't imagine how this could be wrong, care to explain?
ctkrohn 16y ago
"Debugging: considered with dread, attempted with reluctance, bragged about with enthusiasm" Not sure what the original source is, or even what the original formulation is, but it rings true to me.
meadhikari 16y ago
This simple thought makes your code quite good looking. Always code as if the guy who ends up maintaining your code will be a violent psychopath who knows where you live.
aaronbrethorst 16y ago
This one was a new for me: > There are 2 hard problems in computer science: cache invalidation, naming things, and off-by-1 errors.
silentbicycle 16y ago
"If you don't have the right abstractions, you can make things artificially difficult." - Joe Armstrong "How long will people continue believing in the myth of the 15-year-old hacker genius while simultaneously decrying the unreliability of software before the cognitive dissonance finally cracks?" - Dave Herman (http://calculist.blogspot.com/2005/12/12-weeks-with-geeks.html http://calculist.blogspot.com/2005/12/12-weeks-with-geeks.ht...) Also, there are quite a few at cat-v (http://quotes.cat-v.org/programming/ http://quotes.cat-v.org/programming/).
nuxi 16y ago
Ouch: “I saw `cout’ being shifted “Hello world” times to the left and stopped right there.” — Steve Gonedes (via http://q4td.blogspot.com/search/label/programming http://q4td.blogspot.com/search/label/programming)
jamii 16y ago
A couple of favourites: "I'm not a computer guy,” they'll say with a big smile on their face. Well gee, the personal computer is only the most significant invention to come along in the past 100 years. You'd think one might be mildly curious about how it works. -- Anon By relieving the brain of all unnecessary work, a good notation sets it free to concentrate on more advanced problems, and, in effect, increases the mental power of the race. -- Alfred Whitehead (replace notation by abstraction and it holds for programming too) As soon as we started programming, we found out to our surprise that it wasn't as easy to get programs right as we had thought. Debugging had to be discovered. I can remember the exact instant when I realized that a large part of my life from then on was going to be spent in finding mistakes in my own programs -- Maurice Wilkes Eventually a friend of a friend is a security hole -- Anon
- hakl 16y ago
  I think the Whitehead quote applies as is: unnecessarily complex syntax makes me stupider.
J3L2404 16y ago
"Every program can be reduced by at least one line and every program contains at least one error. Therefore every program can be reduced to one line, which is wrong!" Dan Garcia

43 points by rlmw 16y ago

iwwr 16y ago

There are only two kinds of languages: the ones people complain about and the ones nobody uses Bjarne Stroustrup

Avshalom 16y ago
Well, and COBOL, but I don't blame Bjarne for pretending it doesn't exist.

edanm 16y ago

This just takes the cake, because it's so true and so old: "On two occasions I have been asked, "Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?" In one case a member of the Upper, and in the other a member of the Lower House put this question. I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question. — Charles Babbage"

dctoedt 16y ago
The questioners -- each of whom was a member of Parliament -- might have been using a superficially-polite circumlocution to raise (what we would now call) the GIGO question.
- edanm 16y ago
  Interesting, never heard that phrase. Anyone who's interested, GIGO means "Garbage In, Garbage Out". Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GIGO http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GIGO. By the way, the Wikipedia page specifically mentions Babbage's quote.

rlmw 16y ago

I quite liked "Walking on water and developing software from a specification are easy if both are frozen."

rlmw 16y ago
Oh, and "Nine people can't make a baby in a month."

Luyt 16y ago

"Good programming is not learned from generalities, but by seeing how significant programs can be made clean, easy to read, easy to maintain and modify, human-engineered, efficient, and reliable, by the application of common sense and good programming practices. Careful study and imitation of good programs leads to better writing." - Kernighan and Plauger, motto of 'Software Tools'

rick_2047 16y ago

Not exactly programming, but more about cracking "cracking is like sex with a prostitute, you have to get in, take all the goodies and get out without leaving a trace." EDIT: spelling mistake

rick_2047 16y ago
Downvoted? I can't imagine how this could be wrong, care to explain?

ctkrohn 16y ago

"Debugging: considered with dread, attempted with reluctance, bragged about with enthusiasm" Not sure what the original source is, or even what the original formulation is, but it rings true to me.

meadhikari 16y ago

This simple thought makes your code quite good looking. Always code as if the guy who ends up maintaining your code will be a violent psychopath who knows where you live.

aaronbrethorst 16y ago

This one was a new for me: > There are 2 hard problems in computer science: cache invalidation, naming things, and off-by-1 errors.

silentbicycle 16y ago

"If you don't have the right abstractions, you can make things artificially difficult." - Joe Armstrong "How long will people continue believing in the myth of the 15-year-old hacker genius while simultaneously decrying the unreliability of software before the cognitive dissonance finally cracks?" - Dave Herman (http://calculist.blogspot.com/2005/12/12-weeks-with-geeks.html http://calculist.blogspot.com/2005/12/12-weeks-with-geeks.ht...) Also, there are quite a few at cat-v (http://quotes.cat-v.org/programming/ http://quotes.cat-v.org/programming/).

nuxi 16y ago

Ouch: “I saw `cout’ being shifted “Hello world” times to the left and stopped right there.” — Steve Gonedes (via http://q4td.blogspot.com/search/label/programming http://q4td.blogspot.com/search/label/programming)

jamii 16y ago

A couple of favourites: "I'm not a computer guy,” they'll say with a big smile on their face. Well gee, the personal computer is only the most significant invention to come along in the past 100 years. You'd think one might be mildly curious about how it works. -- Anon By relieving the brain of all unnecessary work, a good notation sets it free to concentrate on more advanced problems, and, in effect, increases the mental power of the race. -- Alfred Whitehead (replace notation by abstraction and it holds for programming too) As soon as we started programming, we found out to our surprise that it wasn't as easy to get programs right as we had thought. Debugging had to be discovered. I can remember the exact instant when I realized that a large part of my life from then on was going to be spent in finding mistakes in my own programs -- Maurice Wilkes Eventually a friend of a friend is a security hole -- Anon

hakl 16y ago
I think the Whitehead quote applies as is: unnecessarily complex syntax makes me stupider.

J3L2404 16y ago

"Every program can be reduced by at least one line and every program contains at least one error. Therefore every program can be reduced to one line, which is wrong!" Dan Garcia