Best Edsger Dijkstra Sayings
- Are you quite sure that all those bells and whistles, all those wonderful facilities of your so called powerful programming languages, belong to the solution… All
- … what society overwhelmingly asks for is snake oil. Of course, the snake oil has the most impressive names — otherwise you would be selling… Analysis
- In this respect a program is like a poem: you cannot write a poem without writing it. Yet people talk about programming as if it… Always Refer
- Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes, biology is about microscopes or chemistry is about beakers and test tubes. Science… Astronomy
- Too few people recognize that the high technology so celebrated today is essentially a mathematical technology. Celebrated
- PL/1, the fatal disease, belongs more to the problem set than to the solution set. Belongs
- It is practically impossible to teach good programming to students that have had a prior exposure to BASIC: as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated… Basic
- Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes. Astronomy
- Simplicity is prerequisite for reliability. Inspirational
- Program testing can be used to show the presence of bugs, but never to show their absence! Absence
- The competent programmer is fully aware of the limited size of his own skull. He therefore approaches his task with full humility, and avoids clever… Approach
- The ability of discerning high quality unavoidably implies the ability of identifying shortcomings. Ability
- Object-oriented programming is an exceptionally bad idea which could only have originated in California. Bad
- Programming is one of the most difficult branches of applied mathematics; the poorer mathematicians had better remain pure mathematicians. Applied
- APL is a mistake, carried through to perfection. It is the language of the future for the programming techniques of the past: it creates a… Bums
- Mathematicians are like managers - they want improvement without change. Change
- The traditional mathematician recognizes and appreciates mathematical elegance when he sees it. I propose to go one step further, and to consider elegance an essential… Appreciate
- The question of whether computers can think is like the question of whether submarines can swim. Computer
- Besides a mathematical inclination, an exceptionally good mastery of one's native tongue is the most vital asset of a competent programmer. Asset
- Raise your quality standards as high as you can live with, avoid wasting your time on routine problems, and always try to work as closely… Abilities
- The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than the question of whether a submarine can swim. Computer
- If 10 years from now, when you are doing something quick and dirty, you suddenly visualize that I am looking over your shoulders and say… Dirty
- The students that, like the wild animal being prepared for its tricks in the circus called life, expects only training as sketched above, will be… Animal