Quote

The psychological profiling [of a programmer] is mostly the ability to shift levels of abstraction, from low level to high level. To see something in the small and to see something in the large.

Donald Knuth

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Donald Knuth
Age: 86
Born: 1938
Born: January 10
Academic
Computer Scientist
Engineer
Historian Of Mathematics
Mathematician
Programmer
University Teacher
Writer
Milwaukee City
Wisconsin
Donald E. Knuth
Don Knuth
Donald Ervin Knuth
D.E.K.
DEK
Knuth
High
Shift
Ability
Mostly
Something
Psychological
Lows
Large
Profiling
Level
Programmer
Levels
Programmers
Small
Abstraction

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TeX has found at least one bug in every Pascal compiler it's been run on, I think, and at least two in every C compiler
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I remember that mathematicians were telling me in the 1960s that they would recognize computer science as a mature discipline when it had 1,000 deep algorithms. I think we've probably reached 500.
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The enjoyment of one's tools is an essential ingredient of successful work.
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By understanding a machine-oriented language, the programmer will tend to use a much more efficient method it is much closer to reality.
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A list is only as strong as its weakest link.
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I currently use Ubuntu Linux, on a standalone laptop - it has no Internet connection. I occasionally carry flash memory drives between this machine and the Macs that I use for network surfing and graphics but I trust my family jewels only to Linux.
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It is much more rewarding to do more with less.
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If you find that you're spending almost all your time on theory, start turning some attention to practical things it will improve your theories. If you find that you're spending almost all your time on practice, start turning some attention to theoretical things it will improve your practice.
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We should forget about small efficiencies, say about 97% of the time: premature optimization is the root of all evil.
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The best practice is inspired by theory.
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I try to learn certain areas of computer science exhaustively then I try to digest that knowledge into a form that is accessible to people who don't have time for such study.
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In fact, my main conclusion after spending ten years of my life working on the TEX project is that software is hard. It's harder than anything else I've ever had to do.
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AI has by now succeeded in doing essentially everything that requires 'thinking' but has failed to do most of what people and animals do 'without thinking'-that, somehow, is much harder.
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The designer of a new kind of system must participate fully in the implementation.
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Science is knowledge which we understand so well that we can teach it to a computer and if we don't fully understand something, it is an art to deal with it.
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Science is what we understand well enough to explain to a computer. Art is everything else we do.
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People think that computer science is the art of geniuses but the actual reality is the opposite, just many people doing things that build on each other, like a wall of mini stones.
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I define UNIX as 30 definitions of regular expressions living under one roof.
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A mathematical formula should never be owned by anybody! Mathematics belong to God.
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It would be nice if we could design a virtual reality in Hyperbolic Space, and meet each other there.
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