Simple, clear purpose and principles give rise to complex, intelligent
behavior. Complex rules and regulations give rise to simple, stupid
behavior.
-- Dee Hock, Birth of the Chaordic Age
It's no trick for talented people to be interesting, but it's a gift to
be interested. We want an organization filled with interested people.
-- Randy S. Nelson (dean of Pixar University)
I feel it is everybodies obligation to reach for the best in themselves
and use that for the interest of mankind.
-- Corneluis (comment on 'Are you going to change the world? (Really?)')
Functional programming is to algorithms as the ubiquitous little black
dress is to women's fashion.
-- Mark Tarver (of "The bipolar Lisp programmer" fame)
What Paul does, and does very well, is to take ideas and concepts that
are beautiful in the abstract, and brings them down to a real world
level. That's a rare talent to find in writing these days.
-- Jeff "hemos" Bates, Director, OSDN; Co-evolver, Slashdot
While I’ve always appreciated beautiful code, I share Jonathan’s concern
about studying it too much. I think studying beauty in music and
painting has led us to modern classical music and painting that the
majority of us just don’t get. Beauty can be seen when it emerges, but
isn’t something to strive for in isolation of a larger context. In the
software world, the larger context would be the utility of the software
to the end user.
-- [A comment on a blog]
Hire people smarter than you. Work with people smarter than you.
Listen to them. Let them lead you. Take the blame for all failures,
give away the credit for all successes.
-- How to fail: 25 secrets learned through failure
You think you know when you learn, are more sure when you can write,
even more when you can teach, but certain when you can program.
-- Alan J. Perlis (Epigrams in programming)
What I didn't understand was that the value of some new acquisition
wasn't the difference between its retail price and what I paid for it.
It was the value I derived from it. Stuff is an extremely illiquid
asset. Unless you have some plan for selling that valuable thing you got
so cheaply, what difference does it make what it's "worth?" The only way
you're ever going to extract any value from it is to use it. And if you
don't have any immediate use for it, you probably never will.
-- Paul Graham
I feel it is everybodies obligation to reach for the best in themselves
and use that for the interest of mankind.
-- Corneluis (comment on 'Are you going to change the world? (Really?)')
Wear your best for your execution and stand dignified. Your last
recourse against randomness is how you act — if you can’t control
outcomes, you can control the elegance of your behaviour. You will
always have the last word.
-- Nassim Taleb
The best programmers are not marginally better than merely good ones.
They are an order-of-magnitude better, measured by whatever standard:
conceptual creativity, speed, ingenuity of design, or problem-solving
ability.
-- Randall E. Stross
That is the inevitable human response. We’re reluctant to believe that
great discoveries are in the air. We want to believe that great
discoveries are in our heads—and to each party in the multiple the
presence of the other party is invariably cause for suspicion.
-- Malcolm Gladwell, Who says big ideas are rare?
Let me try to get this straight: Lisp is a language for describing
algorithms. This was JohnMcCarthy's original purpose, anyway: to build
something more convenient than a Turing machine. Lisp is not about file,
socket or GUI programming - Lisp is about expressive power. (For
example, you can design multiple object systems for Lisp, in Lisp. Or
implement the now-fashionable AOP. Or do arbitrary transformations on
parsed source code.) If you don't value expressive power, Lisp ain't for
you. I, personally, would prefer Lisp to not become mainstream: this
would necessarily involve a dumbing down.
-- VladimirSlepnev
You have to write for your audience. I would never write (1..5).map
&'*2' in Java when I could write
ListFactoryFactory.getListFactoryFromResource(
new ResourceName('com.javax.magnitudes.integers').
setLowerBound(1).setUpperBound(5).setStep(1).applyFunctor(
new Functor () { public void eval (x) { return x * 2; } }))
I'm simplifying, of course, I've left out the security and logging
wrappers.
-- Reginald Braithwait
Well, if you talk about programming to a group of programmers who use
the same language, they can become almost evangelistic about the
language. They form a tight-knit community, hold to certain beliefs, and
follow certain rules in their programming. It’s like a church with a
programming language for a Bible.
-- Gary Kildall (inventor of CP/M, one of the first OS for the micro).
1 - Creativity and innovation always build on the past.
2 - The past always tries to control the creativity that builds on it.
3 - Free societies enable the future by limiting the past.
4 - Ours is less and less a free society.
-- Lawrence Lessig, Free Culture.
I was talking recently to a friend who teaches at MIT. His field is hot
now and every year he is inundated by applications from would-be
graduate students. "A lot of them seem smart," he said. "What I can't
tell is whether they have any kind of taste."
-- Paul Graham
Well then. How could you possibly live without automated refactoring
tools? How else could you coordinate the caterpillar-like motions of all
Java’s identical tiny legs, its thousands of similar parts?
I’ll tell you how:
Ruby is a butterfly.
-- Stevey, Refactoring Trilogy, Part 1.
And if you go too far up, abstraction-wise, you run out of oxygen.
Sometimes smart thinkers just don't know when to stop, and they create
these absurd, all-encompassing, high-level pictures of the universe that
are all good and fine, but don't actually mean anything at all.
-- Joel Spolsky
While I’ve always appreciated beautiful code, I share Jonathan’s concern
about studying it too much. I think studying beauty in music and
painting has led us to modern classical music and painting that the
majority of us just don’t get. Beauty can be seen when it emerges, but
isn’t something to strive for in isolation of a larger context. In the
software world, the larger context would be the utility of the software
to the end user.
-- [A comment on a blog]
That is one of the most distinctive differences between school and the
real world: there is no reward for putting in a good effort. In fact,
the whole concept of a "good effort" is a fake idea adults invented to
encourage kids. It is not found in nature.
-- Paul Graham
Ce n'est que par les relations qu'on entretient entre nos différentes
connaissances qu'elles nous restent accessibles.
-- Shnuup, sur l'hypertexte (SELFHTML -> Introduction -> Definitions sur l'hypertexte)
In general, we can think of data as defined by some collection of
selectors and constructors, together with specified conditions that
these procedures must fulfill in order to be a valid representation.
-- SICP, What is meant by data?
A person won't become proficient at something until he or she has done
it many times. In other words., if you want someone to be really good at
building a software system, he or she will have to have built 10 or more
systems of that type.
-- Philip Greenspun
We now come to the decisive step of mathematical abstraction: we forget
about what the symbols stand for. ...[The mathematician] need not be
idle; there are many operations which he may carry out with these
symbols, without ever having to look at the things they stand for.
-- Hermann Weyl, The Mathematical Way of Thinking
Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people
always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can
become great.
-- Mark Twain
Simple, clear purpose and principles give rise to complex, intelligent
behavior. Complex rules and regulations give rise to simple, stupid
behavior.
-- Dee Hock, Birth of the Chaordic Age
Everybody makes their own fun. If you don't make it yourself, it ain't
fun -- it's entertainment.
-- David Mamet (as relayed by Joss Whedon)
Give up control. You never really had it anyway.
-- How to fail: 25 secrets learned through failure
A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in
God.
-- Alan J. Perlis (Epigrams in programming)
It's no trick for talented people to be interesting, but it's a gift to
be interested. We want an organization filled with interested people.
-- Randy S. Nelson (dean of Pixar University)
Remember that you are humans in the first place and only after that
programmers.
-- Alexandru Vancea
Give up control. You never really had it anyway.
-- How to fail: 25 secrets learned through failure
I feel it is everybodies obligation to reach for the best in themselves
and use that for the interest of mankind.
-- Corneluis (comment on 'Are you going to change the world? (Really?)')
Ce n’est que par les beaux sentiments qu’on parvient à la fortune !
-- Charles Baudelaire, Conseils aux jeunes littérateurs.
The trouble with the world is that the stupid are always cocksure and
the intelligent are always filled with doubt.
-- Bertrand Russell
A witty saying proves nothing
-- Voltaire
Work as intensely as you play and play as intensely as you work.
-- Eric S. Raymond, How To Be A Hacker
The function of wisdom is to discriminate between good and evil.
-- Cicero
Functional programming is to algorithms as the ubiquitous little black
dress is to women's fashion.
-- Mark Tarver (of "The bipolar Lisp programmer" fame)
The use of COBOL cripples the mind; its teaching should therefore be
regarded as a criminal offense.
-- E.W. Dijkstra
What Paul does, and does very well, is to take ideas and concepts that
are beautiful in the abstract, and brings them down to a real world
level. That's a rare talent to find in writing these days.
-- Jeff "hemos" Bates, Director, OSDN; Co-evolver, Slashdot
The job of a leader today is not to create followers. It’s to create
more leaders.
-- Ralph Nader
Never do the impossible. People will expect you to do it forever after.
-- pigsandfishes.com
Sound methodology can empower and liberate the creative mind; it cannot inflame
or inspire the drudge.
-- Frederick P. Brooks, No Sliver Bullet.
While I’ve always appreciated beautiful code, I share Jonathan’s concern
about studying it too much. I think studying beauty in music and
painting has led us to modern classical music and painting that the
majority of us just don’t get. Beauty can be seen when it emerges, but
isn’t something to strive for in isolation of a larger context. In the
software world, the larger context would be the utility of the software
to the end user.
-- [A comment on a blog]
Hire people smarter than you. Work with people smarter than you.
Listen to them. Let them lead you. Take the blame for all failures,
give away the credit for all successes.
-- How to fail: 25 secrets learned through failure
Thus, programs must be written for people to read, and only incidentally
for machines to execute.
-- Alan J. Perlis
Good coders code, great reuse.
-- http://www.catonmat.net
You think you know when you learn, are more sure when you can write,
even more when you can teach, but certain when you can program.
-- Alan J. Perlis (Epigrams in programming)
I invented the term Object-Oriented, and I can tell you I did not have
C++ in mind.
-- Alan Kay
Measure everything you can about the product, and you'll start seeing
patterns.
-- Max Levchin, PayPal founder, Talk at StartupSchool2007
Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent.
-- Eleanor Roosevelt
I have never met a man so ignorant that I couldn't learn something from
him.
-- Galileo Galilei
Revolutions come from standing on the shoulders of giants and facing in
a better direction.
-- Alan Kay
What I didn't understand was that the value of some new acquisition
wasn't the difference between its retail price and what I paid for it.
It was the value I derived from it. Stuff is an extremely illiquid
asset. Unless you have some plan for selling that valuable thing you got
so cheaply, what difference does it make what it's "worth?" The only way
you're ever going to extract any value from it is to use it. And if you
don't have any immediate use for it, you probably never will.
-- Paul Graham
Experience is what you get when you don't get what you want.
-- Cited by Randy Pausch
Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler.
-- Albert Einstein
I feel it is everybodies obligation to reach for the best in themselves
and use that for the interest of mankind.
-- Corneluis (comment on 'Are you going to change the world? (Really?)')
The important thing is not to stop questioning.
-- Albert Einstein
Saying that Java is nice because it works on all OSes is like saying
that anal sex is nice because it works on all genders.
-- Alanna
Things which matter most must never be at the mercy of things which
matter least.
-- Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749-1832)
Wear your best for your execution and stand dignified. Your last
recourse against randomness is how you act — if you can’t control
outcomes, you can control the elegance of your behaviour. You will
always have the last word.
-- Nassim Taleb
Only make new mistakes.
-- Phil Dourado
The best programmers are not marginally better than merely good ones.
They are an order-of-magnitude better, measured by whatever standard:
conceptual creativity, speed, ingenuity of design, or problem-solving
ability.
-- Randall E. Stross
Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from
religious conviction.
-- Blaise Pascal (attributed)
Photography is painting with light.
-- Eric Hamilton
A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming, is
not worth knowing.
-- Alan Perlis
That is the inevitable human response. We’re reluctant to believe that
great discoveries are in the air. We want to believe that great
discoveries are in our heads—and to each party in the multiple the
presence of the other party is invariably cause for suspicion.
-- Malcolm Gladwell, Who says big ideas are rare?
Remember that you are humans in the first place and only after that
programmers.
-- Alexandru Vancea
No art, however minor, demands less than total dedication if you want to
excel in it.
-- Alberti
Give up control. You never really had it anyway.
-- How to fail: 25 secrets learned through failure
Let me try to get this straight: Lisp is a language for describing
algorithms. This was JohnMcCarthy's original purpose, anyway: to build
something more convenient than a Turing machine. Lisp is not about file,
socket or GUI programming - Lisp is about expressive power. (For
example, you can design multiple object systems for Lisp, in Lisp. Or
implement the now-fashionable AOP. Or do arbitrary transformations on
parsed source code.) If you don't value expressive power, Lisp ain't for
you. I, personally, would prefer Lisp to not become mainstream: this
would necessarily involve a dumbing down.
-- VladimirSlepnev
Lisp programmers know the value of everything but the cost of nothing.
-- Alan J. Perlis
A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in
God.
-- Alan J. Perlis (Epigrams in programming)
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again
and expecting different results.
-- Benjamin Franklin
You can have premature generalization as well as premature optimization.
-- Bjarne Stroustrup
Premature optimization is the root of all evil (or at least most of it)
in programming.
-- Donald Knuth
You have to write for your audience. I would never write (1..5).map
&'*2' in Java when I could write
ListFactoryFactory.getListFactoryFromResource(
new ResourceName('com.javax.magnitudes.integers').
setLowerBound(1).setUpperBound(5).setStep(1).applyFunctor(
new Functor () { public void eval (x) { return x * 2; } }))
I'm simplifying, of course, I've left out the security and logging
wrappers.
-- Reginald Braithwait
Resume writing is just like dating, or applying for a bank loan, in that
nobody wants you if you're desperate.
-- Steve Yegge.
The Work Begins Anew, The Hope Rises Again, And The Dream Lives On.
-- Ted Kennedy
Act from reason, and failure makes you rethink and study harder.
Act from faith, and failure makes you blame someone and push harder.
-- Erik Naggum
Don't have good ideas if you aren't willing to be responsible for them.
-- Alan Perlis
Well, if you talk about programming to a group of programmers who use
the same language, they can become almost evangelistic about the
language. They form a tight-knit community, hold to certain beliefs, and
follow certain rules in their programming. It’s like a church with a
programming language for a Bible.
-- Gary Kildall (inventor of CP/M, one of the first OS for the micro).
1 - Creativity and innovation always build on the past.
2 - The past always tries to control the creativity that builds on it.
3 - Free societies enable the future by limiting the past.
4 - Ours is less and less a free society.
-- Lawrence Lessig, Free Culture.
I was talking recently to a friend who teaches at MIT. His field is hot
now and every year he is inundated by applications from would-be
graduate students. "A lot of them seem smart," he said. "What I can't
tell is whether they have any kind of taste."
-- Paul Graham
Well then. How could you possibly live without automated refactoring
tools? How else could you coordinate the caterpillar-like motions of all
Java’s identical tiny legs, its thousands of similar parts?
I’ll tell you how:
Ruby is a butterfly.
-- Stevey, Refactoring Trilogy, Part 1.
And if you go too far up, abstraction-wise, you run out of oxygen.
Sometimes smart thinkers just don't know when to stop, and they create
these absurd, all-encompassing, high-level pictures of the universe that
are all good and fine, but don't actually mean anything at all.
-- Joel Spolsky
While I’ve always appreciated beautiful code, I share Jonathan’s concern
about studying it too much. I think studying beauty in music and
painting has led us to modern classical music and painting that the
majority of us just don’t get. Beauty can be seen when it emerges, but
isn’t something to strive for in isolation of a larger context. In the
software world, the larger context would be the utility of the software
to the end user.
-- [A comment on a blog]
That is one of the most distinctive differences between school and the
real world: there is no reward for putting in a good effort. In fact,
the whole concept of a "good effort" is a fake idea adults invented to
encourage kids. It is not found in nature.
-- Paul Graham
Ce n'est que par les relations qu'on entretient entre nos différentes
connaissances qu'elles nous restent accessibles.
-- Shnuup, sur l'hypertexte (SELFHTML -> Introduction -> Definitions sur l'hypertexte)
Never do the impossible. People will expect you to do it forever after.
-- pigsandfishes.com
Two people should stay together if together they are better people than
they would be individually.
-- ?
If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.
-- Mark Twain
If I tell you I'm good, you would probably think I'm boasting. If I tell
you I'm no good, you know I'm lying.
-- Bruce Lee
In general, we can think of data as defined by some collection of
selectors and constructors, together with specified conditions that
these procedures must fulfill in order to be a valid representation.
-- SICP, What is meant by data?
Code is poetry.
-- wordpress.org
A person won't become proficient at something until he or she has done
it many times. In other words., if you want someone to be really good at
building a software system, he or she will have to have built 10 or more
systems of that type.
-- Philip Greenspun
We now come to the decisive step of mathematical abstraction: we forget
about what the symbols stand for. ...[The mathematician] need not be
idle; there are many operations which he may carry out with these
symbols, without ever having to look at the things they stand for.
-- Hermann Weyl, The Mathematical Way of Thinking
If debugging is the process of removing bugs, then programming must be
the process of putting them in.
-- Edsger W. Dijkstra
Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people
always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can
become great.
-- Mark Twain
Rules of Optimization:
Rule 1: Don’t do it.
Rule 2 (for experts only): Don’t do it yet.
-- M.A. Jackson