Software Development Quotes

• Considering the current sad state of our computer programs, software development is clearly still a black art, and cannot yet be called an engineering discipline.

  William J. Clinton

  Art, Technology, Engineering

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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

  Learning, Simplicity, Important

  Bjarne Stroustrup (2000). “The C++ Programming Language”, Addison-Wesley Professional

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• In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.

  Yogi Berra

  Leadership, Funny Inspirational, Reality

  "Biography / Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the Universe is winning.

  Rick Cook

  Winning, Technology, Race

  "The Wizardry Compiled". Book by Rick Cook, 1989.

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• Any fool can write code that a computer can understand. Good programmers write code that humans can understand.

  Martin Fowler

  Inspirational, Funny, Humorous

  Jay Fields, Shane Harvie, Martin Fowler, Kent Beck (2009). “Refactoring: Ruby Edition”, p.36, Pearson Education

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• There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies. The first method is far more difficult.

  Tony Hoare

  Witty, Humorous, Simple

  "The Emperor's Old Clothes". Communications of the ACM 24 (2), (pp. 75-83), February 1981.

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• Hofstadter's Law: It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter's Law

  Douglas Hofstadter

  Law, Research, Favourite

  Godel, Escher, Bach ch. 5 (1979)

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  Measuring programming progress by lines of code is like measuring aircraft building progress by weight.

  Bill Gates

  Success, Trust, Leadership

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• When I am working on a problem, I never think about beauty but when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong.

  R. Buckminster Fuller

  Beauty, Beautiful, Niece

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• Debugging is twice as hard as writing the code in the first place. Therefore, if you write the code as cleverly as possible, you are, by definition, not smart enough to debug it.

  Brian Kernighan

  Inspirational, Funny, Smart

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• The trouble with programmers is that you can never tell what a programmer is doing until it's too late.

  Seymour Cray

  Technology, Too Late, Coders

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• If debugging is the process of removing software bugs, then programming must be the process of putting them in.

  Edsger Dijkstra

  Funny, Debugging, Bugs

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• The task of the software development team is to engineer the illusion of simplicity.

  Grady Booch

  Team, Simplicity, Tasks

  Grady Booch, Robert Maksimchuk, Michael Engle, Jim Conallen, Kelli Houston (2007). “Object-Oriented Analysis and Design with Applications”, p.40, Pearson Education

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• Design adds value faster than it adds cost.

  Joel Spolsky

  Design, Coders, Add

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• Linux is only free if your time has no value.

  Jamie Zawinski

  Time, Funny Inspirational, Linux

  Interview for themes.org, www.jwz.org. June 1998.

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• To understand recursion, one must first understand recursion.

  Stephen Hawking

  Firsts, Programming, Recursion

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• One bad programmer can easily create two new jobs a year.

  David Parnas

  Jobs, Years, Two

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• Testing by itself does not improve software quality. Test results are an indicator of quality, but in and of themselves, they don't improve it. Trying to improve software quality by increasing the amount of testing is like trying to lose weight by weighing yourself more often. What you eat before you step onto the scale determines how much you will weigh, and the software development techniques you use determine how many errors testing will find. If you want to lose weight, don't buy a new scale; change your diet. If you want to improve your software, don't test more; develop better.

  Steve McConnell

  Errors, Code Quality, Simplicity

  Steve McConnell (2004). “Code Complete”, p.501, Pearson Education

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• When debugging, novices insert corrective code; experts remove defective code.

  Richard E. Pattis

  Quality, Experts, Debugging

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• No matter how slick the demo is in rehearsal, when you do it in front of a live audience the probability of a flawless presentation is inversely proportional to the number of people watching, raised to the power of the amount of money involved.

  Mark Gibbs

  Technology, Numbers, People

  "The myth of the digital lifestyle" by Mark Gibbs, www.networkworld.com. January 9, 2006.

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• My definition of an expert in any field is a person who knows enough about what's really going on to be scared.

  P. J. Plauger

  Experts, Definitions, Fields

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• Nine people can't make a baby in a month.

  Fred Brooks

  Baby, People, Nine

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• It should be noted that no ethically-trained software engineer would ever consent to write a DestroyBaghdad procedure. Basic professional ethics would instead require him to write a DestroyCity procedure, to which Baghdad could be given as a parameter.

  Nathaniel Borenstein

  Writing, Baghdad, Ethics

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• Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex... It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.

  E. F. Schumacher

  Inspirational, Motivational, Courage

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• It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.

  Albert Einstein

  Courage, Moving, Simple

  "Small is Beautiful". The Radical Humanist, Vol. 37, No. 5, (p. 22), August 1973.

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