Thursday, December 27, 2007

Quotes: 5 different views on computers and programs

Oldies but goldies: Gathering famous quotes on computers, programs, users and programmers. Have fun!

The users view on computers and programs:

Homer Simpson: "The Internet? Is that thing still around?"
Ted Nelson: "Any fool can use a computer. Many do."
Jeremy S. Anderson: "There are two major products that come out of Berkeley: LSD and UNIX. We don't believe this to be a coincidence."
Dennie van Tassel: "I've finally learned what 'upward compatible' means. It means we get to keep all our old mistakes."

The programmers view on computers and programs:

Anonymous: "The best thing about a boolean is even if you are wrong, you are only off by a bit."
Stan Kelly-Bootle: "Should array indices start at 0 or 1? My compromise of 0.5 was rejected without, I thought, proper consideration."
Robert Sewell: "If Java had true garbage collection, most programs would delete themselves upon execution."
Alan J. Perlis: "There are two ways to write error-free programs; only the third one works."

The meta view on computers and programs:

Edsger W. Dijkstra: "The question of whether computers can think is like the question of whether submarines can swim."
Bjarne Stroustrup: "There's an old story about the person who wished his computer were as easy to use as his telephone. That wish has come true, since I no longer know how to use my telephone."
Dave Barry: "Computers are getting smarter all the time. Scientists tell us that soon they will be able to talk to us. (And by 'they', I mean 'computers'. I doubt scientists will ever be able to talk to us.)"
Oktal: "I think Microsoft named .Net so it wouldn't show up in a Unix directory listing."

The worlds view on Computers and programms:

Seymour Cray: "The trouble with programmers is that you can never tell what a programmer is doing until it's too late."
Eagleson's Law: "Any code of your own that you haven't looked at for six or more months might as well have been written by someone else."
Edsger W. Dijkstra: "If debugging is the process of removing bugs, then programming must be the process of putting them in."
Paul Ehrlich: "To err is human, but to really foul things up you need a computer."

The artists view on computers and programs:

Pablo Picasso: "Computers are useless. They can only give you answers."

More quotes to read at "Quotes for large software projects".

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