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People who are more than casually interested in computers should have at least some idea of what the underlying hardware is like. Otherwise the programs they write will be pretty weird.

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
People
Interested
Hardware
Pretty
Underlying
Least
Computers
Idea
Programs
Write
Weird
Ideas
Otherwise
Writing
Program
Like
Computer
Casually

More quotes by Donald Knuth

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Beware of bugs in the above code I have only proved it correct, not tried it.
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I think people who write programs do have at least a glimmer of extra insight into the nature of God... because creating a program often means that you have to create a small universe
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My first program taught me a lot about the errors that I was going to be making in the future, and also about how to find errors. That's sort of the story of my life, making errors and trying to recover from them. I try to get things correct. I probably obsess about not making too many mistakes.
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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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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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The sun comes up just about as often as it goes down, in the long run, but this doesn't make its motion random.
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A mathematical formula should never be owned by anybody! Mathematics belong to God.
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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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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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We should forget about small efficiencies, say about 97% of the time: premature optimization is the root of all evil. Yet we should not pass up our opportunities in that critical 3%
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The most important thing in the programming language is the name. A language will not succeed without a good name. I have recently invented a very good name and now I am looking for a suitable language.
Donald Knuth
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I define UNIX as 30 definitions of regular expressions living under one roof.
Donald Knuth
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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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I have a hunch that the unknown sequences of DNA will decode into copyright notices and patent protections.
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It is much more rewarding to do more with less.
Donald Knuth
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My general working style is to write everything first with pencil and paper, sitting beside a big wastebasket. Then I use Emacs to enter the text into my machine.
Donald Knuth
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Any inaccuracies in this index may be explained by the fact that it has been prepared with the help of a computer.
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Computer programming is an art, because it applies accumulated knowledge to the world, because it requires skill and ingenuity, and especially because it produces objects of beauty. A programmer who subconsciously views himself as an artist will enjoy what he does and will do it better.
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The best practice is inspired by theory.
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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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