Every program has (at least) two purposes: the one for which it was written and another for which it wasn’t.
ALAN PERLISLike seeing, movement or flow or alteration of view is more important than the static picture, no matter how lovely.
More Alan Perlis Quotes
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A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in God.
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Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it.
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The best book on programming for the layman is Alice in Wonderland, but that’s because it’s the best book on anything for the layman.
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If your computer speaks English, it was probably made in Japan.
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A language that doesn’t affect the way you think about programming is not worth knowing.
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A picture is worth 10K words – but only those to describe the picture.
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That it is meant to be discarded: that the whole point is to always see it as a soap bubble?
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Some programming languages manage to absorb change, but withstand progress.
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You’ve solved the wrong problem. Work hard to improve.
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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.
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In man-machine symbiosis, it is man who must adjust: The machines can’t.
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It is easier to change the specification to fit the program than vice versa.
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One man’s constant is another man’s variable.
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Computer Science is embarrassed by the computer.
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We began to feel as if we really were responsible for the successful, error-free perfect use of these machines.
ALAN PERLIS