To understand a program, you must become both the machine and the program.
ALAN PERLISWhat fun is there in making plans, acquiring discipline in organizing thoughts, devoting attention to detail and learning to be self-critical?
More Alan Perlis Quotes
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Optimization hinders evolution.
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We began to feel as if we really were responsible for the successful, error-free perfect use of these machines.
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“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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I think that it’s extraordinarily important that we in computer science keep fun in computing.
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FORTRAN is not a flower but a weed – it is hardy, occasionally blooms, and grows in every computer.
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Like seeing, movement or flow or alteration of view is more important than the static picture, no matter how lovely.
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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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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.
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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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Because of its vitality, the computing field is always in desperate need of new cliches.
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In computing, turning the obvious into the useful is a living definition of the word “frustration”.
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In man-machine symbiosis, it is man who must adjust: The machines can’t.
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Work hard to improve. Success is also easy to handle.
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Optimization hinders evolution.
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Once you understand how to write a program get someone else to write it.
ALAN PERLIS






