When a professor insists computer science is X but not Y, have compassion for his graduate students.
ALAN PERLISYou can measure a programmer’s perspective by noting his attitude on the continuing vitality of FORTRAN.
More Alan Perlis Quotes
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I hope the field of computer science never loses its sense of fun.
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In man-machine symbiosis, it is man who must adjust: The machines can’t.
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You think you KNOW when you learn.
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Once you understand how to write a program get someone else to write it.
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There are two ways to write error-free programs; only the third one works.
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In computing, the mean time to failure keeps getting shorter.
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In software systems it is often the early bird that makes the worm.
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Don’t have good ideas if you aren’t willing to be responsible for them.
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It is easier to change the specification to fit the program than vice versa.
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Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it.
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One can’t proceed from the informal to the formal by formal means.
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Every reader should ask himself periodically.
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One man’s constant is another man’s variable.
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Is it possible that software is not like anything else.
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To understand a program, you must become both the machine and the program.
ALAN PERLIS