The phenomena surrounding computers are diverse and yield a surprisingly rich base for launching metaphors at individual and group activities. The epigrams that follow attempt to capture some of the dimensions of this traffic in imagery that sharpens, focuses, clarifies, enlarges and beclouds our view of this most remarkable of all mans' artifacts, the computer.
- One man's constant is another man's variable.
- Functions delay binding: data structures induce binding. Moral: Structure data late in the programming process.
- Syntactic sugar causes cancer of the semi-colons.
- Recursion is the root of computation since it trades description for time.
- Optimization hinders evolution.
- A good system can't have a weak command language.
- Once you understand how to write a program get someone else to write it.
- Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it.
- Like punning, programming is a play on words.
- In programming, as in everything else, to be in error is to be reborn.
Complete list
# posted by SV @ 9/02/2003 10:43:00 AM