Quote

When we had no computers, we had no programming problem either. When we had a few computers, we had a mild programming problem. Confronted with machines a million times as powerful, we are faced with a gigantic programming problem.

Edsger Dijkstra

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Edsger Dijkstra
Age: 72 †
Born: 1930
Born: May 11
Died: 2002
Died: August 5
Computer Scientist
Engineer
Mathematician
Physicist
Scientist
University Teacher
R'dam
Edsger Dijkstra
Edsger Wybe Dijkstra
Dijkstra
EWD
E.W. Dijkstra
Millions
Gigantic
Either
Confronted
Powerful
Computers
Times
Faced
Problem
Programming
Machines
Million
Computer
Mild

More quotes by Edsger Dijkstra

Image
The problems of the real world are primarily those you are left with when you refuse to apply their effective solutions.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
The ability of discerning high quality unavoidably implies the ability of identifying shortcomings.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
FORTRAN, the infantile disorder, by now nearly 20 years old, is hopelessly inadequate for whatever computer application you have in mind today: it is now too clumsy, too risky, and too expensive to use.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
Progress is possible only if we train ourselves to think about programs without thinking of them as pieces of executable code.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
Probably I am very naive, but I also think I prefer to remain so, at least for the time being and perhaps for the rest of my life.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
PL/1, the fatal disease, belongs more to the problem set than to the solution set.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
Aim for brevity while avoiding jargon.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
It is not the task of the University to offer what society asks for, but to give what society needs.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
I think of the company advertising Thought Processors or the college pretending that learning BASIC suffices or at least helps, whereas the teaching of BASIC should be rated as a criminal offence: it mutilates the mind beyond recovery.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
... as a slow-witted human being I have a very small head and I had better learn to live with it and to respect my limitations and give them full credit, rather than to try to ignore them, for the latter vain effort will be punished by failure.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
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 is not about tools. It is about how we use them, and what we find out when we do.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
There is very little point in trying to urge the world to mend its ways as long as that world is still convinced that its ways are perfectly adequate.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
Thank goodness we don't have only serious problems, but ridiculous ones as well.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
Elegance is not a dispensable luxury but a factor that decides between success and failure.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
Mentally mutilated potential programmers beyond hope of regeneration.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
If in physics there's something you don't understand, you can always hide behind the uncharted depths of nature. You can always blame God. You didn't make it so complex yourself. But if your program doesn't work, there is no one to hide behind. You cannot hide behind an obstinate nature. If it doesn't work, you've messed up.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
Experience does by no means automatically leads to wisdom and understanding.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
If debugging is the process of removing software bugs, then programming must be the process of putting them in.
Edsger Dijkstra
Image
The use of COBOL cripples the mind its teaching should, therefore, be regarded as a criminal offense.
Edsger Dijkstra