Best programming and hacker quotes. Ever.
Curated by fellow hackers Jarmo Pertman & Andri Möll
Program testing can be a very effective way to show the presence of bugs, but is hopelessly inadequate for showing their absence.
Edsger Dijkstra
A programming language is low level when its programs require attention to the irrelevant.
Alan J. Perlis
Part of the inhumanity of the computer is that, once it is competently programmed and working smoothly, it is completely honest.
Isaac Asimov
There are only two kinds of languages: the ones people complain about and the ones nobody uses.
Bjarne Stroustrup
Manually managing blocks of memory in C is like juggling bars of soap in a prison shower: It's all fun and games until you forget about one of them.
Anonymous
Every truth passes through three stages before it is recognized. In the first, it is ridiculed, in the second it is opposed, in the third it is regarded as self-evident.
Arthur Schopenhauer
Optimization hinders evolution.
Alan J. Perlis
... what society overwhelmingly asks for is snake oil. Of course, the snake oil has the most impressive names — otherwise you would be selling nothing — like "Structured Analysis and Design", "Software Engineering", "Maturity Models", "Management Information Systems", "Integrated Project Support Environments" "Object Orientation" and "Business Process Re-engineering" (the latter three being known as IPSE, OO and BPR, respectively).
Edsger W. Dijkstra
Interfaces keep things tidy, but don't accelerate growth: Functions do.
Alan J. Perlis
The first 90% of the code accounts for the first 90% of the development time. The remaining 10% of the code accounts for the other 90% of the development time.
Tom Cargill