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The most important single aspect of software development is to be clear about what you are trying to build.

Bjarne Stroustrup

I would encourage nonproprietary standards for tools and libraries.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Library Standard Tools
Some software is actually pretty good, by any standard. Think of the Mars Rovers, Google, and the Human Genome Project. Now, that’s quality software!
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Google Quality Thinking
Always think about how a piece of code should be used: good interfaces are the essence of good code.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Clever Dirty Thinking
For this reason restricting language features with the intent of eliminating programmer errors is at best dangerous.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Dangerous Language Program Think
I like doing research that has an impact. If I went to a company to make what they call ‘real money,’ I’d be just trying to make a system work as fast as possible to meet the product and serice deadlines.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Company Impact Possible Real Trying
Anybody who comes to you and says he has a perfect language is either naive or a salesman.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Language Perfect Salesman
C++ is designed to allow you to express ideas, but if you don’t have ideas or don’t have any clue about how to express them, C++ doesn’t offer much help.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Clue Helping Ideas
With the increasing importance of standards for system-level objects such as COM and CORBA, it is particularly important that the C++ bindings to those be clean, well documented, and simple to use.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Important Language Simple Use
C++ is my favorite garbage collected language because it generates so little garbage
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Garbage Language Littles
Proof by analogy is fraud.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Analogies Fraud Proof
“Legacy code” often differs from its suggested alternative by actually working and scaling.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Alternatives Code Legacy
I find languages that support just one programming paradigm constraining
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Language Programming Support
I do keep the main points straight in my head most of the time, and I do know where to find the details when I need them.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Details Find Head Need
Nobody should call themselves a professional if they only knew one language.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Language Person Professional Should
[Corporate programming] is often done to the point where the individual is completely submerged in corporate “culture” with no outlet for unique talents and skills.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Outlet Practice Skills Unique
It is easy to study the rules of overloading and of templates without noticing that together they are one of the keys to elegant and efficient type-safe containers.
BJARNE STROUSTRUP

Efficient Keys Safe Together

The most important single aspect of software development is to be clear about what you are trying to build.

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The most important single aspect of software development is to be clear about what you are trying to build.

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