
Bumper-Sticker Computer Science (1985) [pdf] - mattrepl
http://www.bowdoin.edu/~ltoma/teaching/cs340/spring05/coursestuff/Bentley_BumperSticker.pdf
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japhyr
"The sooner you start to code, the longer the program will take."

I certainly benefit from regular reminders of this.

~~~
agumonkey
I'm a little stumped by that, I'm all for repl oriented development, ~zero
round trip time etc etc but I have to admit that when you thought the problem
through in your head long before writing any, then the right code will fall
through. So are instantaneous cycles good or bad ?

~~~
apricot
_So are instantaneous cycles good or bad ?_

Three pounds of flax.

~~~
contingencies
(price of)

 _To the extent that [Agile software development] is [an excuse for not
thinking], it 's a bad thing._ \- Leslie Lamport

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contingencies
I went through each quote carefully while adding some missing ones to my
fortune clone/database at
[https://github.com/globalcitizen/taoup](https://github.com/globalcitizen/taoup)
and noticed two things versus modern sources: (1) The weight lent to
optimization related concerns seems higher than today. (2) Comprehension of
the non-electronic context of programming seems higher than today.

I think these are probably valid cultural reflections, potentially ascribable
in part to the (edited, time-lapse) nature of paper-publishing versus
electronic.

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cafard
I've always been fond of Thompson's rule for first-time telescope makers: "It
is faster to make a four-inch mirror then a six-inch mirror than to make a
six-inch mirror."

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51Cards
With regards to the Linux kernel bug in another thread today...

"The first step in fixing a broken program is getting it to fail repeatably"
\- Tom Duff / Bell Labs

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japhyr
> Don't make the user provide information that the system already knows.

I wish the IRS followed this advice.

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ot
If this was published now, it would be "Computer Science in a Tweet"

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neduma
It was published 1985. Wonder if anyone is not applicable now?

~~~
shill
"Allocate four digits for the year part of a date: a new millennium is
coming."

Nobody starts projects using two digit years anymore, right? And most of the
existing software that did was patched and or replaced for Y2K.

Also the part about a new millennium coming is temporarily not applicable.

~~~
fizbin
Heh. That's my dad's quote - I remember seeing that page tacked to his office
cubicle wall back in the 90s when Unisys still employed programmers who had
office cubicles.

