Best programming and hacker quotes. Ever.
Curated by fellow hackers Jarmo Pertman & Andri Möll
[The common definition of estimate is] "An estimate is the most optimistic prediction that has a non-zero probability of coming true" . . . Accepting this definition leads irrevocably toward a method called what's-the-earliest- date-by-which-you-can't-prove-you-won't-be- finished estimating.
Tom DeMarco
Any code of your own that you haven't looked at for six or more months might as well have been written by someone else.
Eagleson's Law
As soon as we started programming, we found to our surprise that it wasn't as easy to get programs right as we had thought.
Maurice Wilkes
The most important computer is the one that rages in our skulls and ever seeks that satisfactory external emulator. The standarization of real computers would be a disaster - and so it probably won't happen.
Alan J. Perlis
It is better to have 100 functions operate on one data structure than 10 functions on 10 data structures.
Alan J. Perlis
C++ is an horrible language. Even if the choice of C were to do *nothing* but keep the C++ programmers out, that in itself would be a huge reason to use C.
Linus Torvalds
Three things should never be seen in the process of being created: laws, sausage, and software.
Anonymous
If Java had true garbage collection, most programs would delete themselves upon execution.
Robert Sewell
Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it.
Donald Knuth
We have the mini and the micro computer. In what semantic niche would the pico computer fall?
Alan J. Perlis