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I've never been a good estimator of how long things are going to take.
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
Take
Going
Long
Good
Things
Never
More quotes by Donald Knuth
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%
Donald Knuth
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.
Donald Knuth
Random numbers should not be generated with a method chosen at random
Donald Knuth
There's ways to amuse yourself while doing things and thats how I look at efficency.
Donald Knuth
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.
Donald Knuth
It is much more rewarding to do more with less.
Donald Knuth
I can’t go to a restaurant and order food because I keep looking at the fonts on the menu.
Donald Knuth
An algorithm must be seen to be believed.
Donald Knuth
Programming is legitimate and necessary academic endeavour.
Donald Knuth
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
Donald Knuth
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
A list is only as strong as its weakest link.
Donald Knuth
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.
Donald Knuth
The enjoyment of one's tools is an essential ingredient of successful work.
Donald Knuth
Computers are good at following instructions, but not at reading your mind.
Donald Knuth
The manuals we got from IBM would show examples of programs and I knew I could do a heck of a lot better than that. So I thought I might have some talent.
Donald Knuth
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
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.
Donald Knuth
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.
Donald Knuth
I define UNIX as 30 definitions of regular expressions living under one roof.
Donald Knuth