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Just think, IBM and DEC in the same room, and we did it.

Ken Thompson

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Ken Thompson
Age: 81
Born: 1943
Born: February 4
Computer Designer
Computer Scientist
Programmer
New Orleans
Louisiana
Kenneth Lane Thompson
Kenneth L. Thompson
ken
Rooms
Think
Thinking
Room

More quotes by Ken Thompson

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I view Linux as something that's not Microsoft - a backlash against Microsoft, no more and no less.
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SCCS, the source motel! Programs check in and never check out!
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I don't think there are many people up in research who have strong ideas about things that they haven't really had experience with.
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In fact, we started off with two or three different shells and the shell had life of its own.
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The X server has to be the biggest program I've ever seen that doesn't do anything for you.
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So maybe I can go back to being a Gardeners' World addict again.
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There's a lot of power in executing data - generating data and executing data.
Ken Thompson
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You can't trust code that you did not totally create yourself.
Ken Thompson
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I wanted to separate data from programs, because data and instructions are very different.
Ken Thompson
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I wanted to have virtual memory, at least as it's coupled with file systems.
Ken Thompson
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No amount of source-level verification or scrutiny will protect you from using untrusted code.
Ken Thompson
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I wanted to avoid, special IO for terminals.
Ken Thompson
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In college, before video games, we would amuse ourselves by posing programming exercises.
Ken Thompson
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I think the major good idea in Unix was its clean and simple interface: open, close, read, and write.
Ken Thompson
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It's always good to take an orthogonal view of something. It develops ideas.
Ken Thompson
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We have persistent objects, they're called files.
Ken Thompson
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One is that the perfect garden can be created overnight, which it can't.
Ken Thompson
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If you want to go somewhere, goto is the best way to get there.
Ken Thompson
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I also enjoy writing my regular column for Organic Gardening magazine, so I may do more of that sort of thing in the future, if anybody wants it!
Ken Thompson
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The average gardener probably knows little about what is going on in his or her garden.
Ken Thompson