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In English every word can be verbed. Would that it were so in our programming languages.

Alan Perlis

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Alan Perlis
Age: 67 †
Born: 1922
Born: April 1
Died: 1990
Died: February 7
Computer Scientist
Mathematician
University Teacher
Pittsburg
Pennsylvania
Alan Jay Perlis
Alan J. Perlis
English
Word
Language
Every
Would
Languages
Programming

More quotes by Alan Perlis

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It is better to have 100 functions operate on one data structure than to have 10 functions operate on 10 data structures.
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Any noun can be verbed.
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C programmers never die. They are just cast into void.
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In software systems it is often the early bird that makes the worm.
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I think it is inevitable that people program poorly. Training will not substantially help matters. We have to learn to live with it.
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Because of its vitality, the computing field is always in desperate need of new cliches: Banality soothes our nerves.
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In the long run, every program becomes rococo, and then rubble.
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When someone says, I want a programming language in which I need only say what I want done, give him a lollipop.
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We are on the verge: Today our program proved Fermat's next-to-last theorem.
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Once you understand how to write a program get someone else to write it.
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Learning French is trivial: the word for horse is cheval, and everything else follows in the same way.
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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, are more sure when you can write, even more when you can teach, but certain when you can program.
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Fools ignore complexity. Pragmatists suffer it. Some can avoid it. Geniuses remove it.
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To understand a program, you must become both the machine and the program.
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Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it.
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Motto for a research laboratory: what we work on today, others will first think of tomorrow.
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A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming is not worth knowing.
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In programming, as in everything else, to be in error is to be reborn.
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Dealing with failure is easy: Work hard to improve. Success is also easy to handle: You've solved the wrong problem. Work hard to improve.
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