
The manuscripts of Edsger W. Dijkstra (2014) - miobrien
https://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/
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kartayyar
I had the good fortune of listening to Dijstra speak a few times.

The first time I attended one of his talks, I thought it would be a brilliant
though highly theoretical presentation. What amazed me the most was just how
funny he was - and given how soft spoken he was. When you read about Dijkstra
in the third person, that entire part of his personality is lost.

His talks tended to drift and meander, though at the end of his talks, he gave
a small sermon which is very applicable to just about any programming
endeavour:

"If you find yourself doing something and thinking Dijkstra would not have
liked this, that would be immortality enough for me."

He's been quoted for saying that multiple times, though that was the first
time I heard it, and by virtue of listening to it first hand, it's burnt into
my head.

~~~
mrg3_2013
Thanks for sharing the quote. I haven't heard of that before.

“I mean, they say you die twice. One time when you stop breathing and a second
time, a bit later on, when somebody says your name for the last time.” —
Banksy

May the Dijkstra's in us leave forever.

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tomcam
Don't be afraid to dive into any of these papers. He's one of the most
accessible of the computing greats.

