Alan Perlis Quotes, Learning Quotes, Thinking Quotes

A good programming language is a conceptual universe for thinking about programming.

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Often it is the means that justify the ends: goals advance technique and technique survives even when goal structures crumble.

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In computing, turning the obvious into the useful is a living definition of the word "frustration".

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It is better to have 100 functions operate on one data structure than to have 10 functions operate on 10 data structures.

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It goes against the grain of modern education to teach children to program. What fun is there in making plans, acquiring discipline in organizing thoughts, devoting attention to detail and learning to be self-critical?

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Tags : Alan Perlis Quotes , Fun Quotes , Learning Quotes

I think that it's extraordinarily important that we in computer science keep fun in computing. When it started out, it was an awful lot of fun. Of course, the paying customers got shafted every now and then, and after a while we began to take their complaints seriously. We began to feel as if we really were responsible for the successful, error-free perfect use of these machines. I don't think we are. I think we're responsible for stretching them, setting them off in new directions, and keeping fun in the house. I hope the field of computer science never loses its sense of fun.

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A LISP programmer knows the value of everything, but the cost of nothing.

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A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming is not worth knowing.

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C programmers never die. They are just cast into void.

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Every program has (at least) two purposes: the one for which it was written and another for which it wasn't.

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One can only display complex information in the mind. Like seeing, movement or flow or alteration of view is more important than the static picture, no matter how lovely.

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Is it possible that software is not like anything else, that it is meant to be discarded: that the whole point is to always see it as a soap bubble?

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If you have a procedure with 10 parameters, you probably missed some.

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In English every word can be verbed.

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Motto for a research laboratory: what we work on today, others will first think of tomorrow.

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Every reader should ask himself periodically “Toward what end, toward what end?”—but do not ask it too often lest you pass up the fun of programming for the constipation of bittersweet philosophy.

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When a professor insists computer science is X but not Y, have compassion for his graduate students.

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In computing, the mean time to failure keeps getting shorter.

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Programmers are not to be measured by their ingenuity and their logic but by the completeness of their case analysis.

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If a listener nods his head when you're explaining your program, wake him up.

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Tags : Alan Perlis Quotes , Program Quotes , Explaining Quotes