|
Interviewer: "Is studying computer science the best way to prepare to be a programmer?" ************************************* Bill Gates: "No, the best way to prepare is to write programs, and to study great programs that other people have written. In my case, I went to the garbage cans at the Computer Science Center and I fished out listings of their operating system." ************************************* DEBUGGING : Removing the needles from the haystack. ************************************* Endless Loop: n., see Loop, Endless. Loop, Endless: n., see Endless Loop. - Random Shack Data Processing Dictionary ************************************* "It is practically impossible to teach good programming style to studentsthat have had prior exposure to BASIC; as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hopeof regeneration." -Dijkstra ************************************* "The three most dangerous things in the world are a programmer with a soldering iron, a hardware type with a program patch and a user with anidea." - _The Wizardry Compiled_ by Rick Cook ************************************* "The primary purpose of the DATA statement is to give names to constants;instead of referring to pi as 3.141592653589793 at every appearance, the variable PIcan be given that value with a DATA statement and used instead of the longer form of theconstant. This also simplifies modifying the program, should the value of pi change." - FORTRAN manual for Xerox computers ************************************* "C makes it easy to shoot yourself in the foot. C++ makes it harder, but when you do, it blows away your whole leg." - Bjarne Stroustrup ************************************* In C we had to code our own bugs. In C++ we can inherit them. ************************************* "Programming graphics in X is like finding sqrt(pi) using Roman numerals." - Henry Spencer ************************************* "Never put off until run time what you can do at compile time." - David Gries, in "Compiler Construction for Digital Computers", circa 1969. ************************************* BASIC programmers never die, they GOSUB and don't RETURN. ************************************* Real programmers are surprised when the odometers in their cars don't turnfrom 99,999 to A0000. ************************************* FORTRAN is not a language. It's a way of turning a multi-million dollar mainframe into a $50 programmable scientific calculator. ************************************* C is almost a real language. Even the name sounds like it's gone through an optimizing compiler. Get rid of all of those stupid brackets and we'lltalk. ************************************* Any sufficiently advanced bug is indistinguishable from a feature. ************************************* Programming is 10% science, 25% ingenuity and 65% getting the ingenuity towork with the science. ************************************* Science is to computer science as hydrodynamics is to plumbing. ************************************* We don't really understand it, so we'll give it to the programmers. ************************************* COBOL programmers understand why women hate periods. ************************************* Computer interfaces and user interfaces are as different as night and 1. ************************************* The human mind ordinarily operates at only ten 10% of its capacity, the rest is overhead for the operating system. ************************************* A computer scientist is someone who fixes things that aren't broken. ************************************* The computer is mightier than the pen, the sword, and usually the programmer. ************************************* Programming is an art form that fights back. ************************************* After a number of decimal places, who cares? ************************************* "Virtual" means never knowing where your next byte is coming from. ************************************* If at first you don't succeed, you must be a programmer. ************************************* "It's 5:50 a.m., Do you know where your stack pointer is?" ************************************* If God had intended humans to program, we would be born with serial I/O ports. ************************************* There are two ways to write error-free programs; only the third one works. ************************************* You never finish a program, you just stop working on it. ************************************* Deliver yesterday, code today, think tomorrow. ************************************* PL/1, "the fatal disease", belongs more to the problem set than to the solutionset. ************************************* Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of APL, I shall fear no evil, for I can string six primitive monadic and dyadic operators together. ************************************* You can't make a program without broken egos. |