Alan Perlis

1922–1990 · American computer scientist

Topics: programming, software design, software engineering, learning

• 75: The computing field is always in need of new cliches: Banality sooths our nerves.

  — Alan Perlis

• Both knowledge and wisdom extend man's reach. Knowledge led to computers, wisdom to chopsticks.

  — Alan Perlis

• 41: Some programming languages manage to absorb change, but withstand progress.

  — Alan Perlis

• 31: Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it.

  — Alan Perlis

• 95: Don't have good ideas if you aren't willing to be responsible for them.

  — Alan Perlis

• Computer science is a restless infant and its progress depends as much on shifts in point of view as on the orderly development of our current concepts.

  — Alan Perlis

• 11: If you have a procedure with 10 parameters, you probably missed some.

  — Alan Perlis

• There is an appreciated substance to the phrase "ALGOL-like" which is often used in arguments about programming, languages and computation. ALGOL appears to be a durable model, and even flourishes under surgery — be it explorative, plastic, or amputative.

  — Alan Perlis

• There are two ways to write error-free programs; only the third one works.

  — Alan Perlis

• 101 Dealing with failure is easy: Work hard to improve. Success is also easy to handle: You've solved the wrong problem. Work hard to improve.

  — Alan Perlis

• 1: One man's constant is another man's variable.

  — Alan Perlis

• The best book on programming for the layman is Alice in Wonderland, but that's because it's the best book on anything for the layman.

  — Alan Perlis

• This language [LISP] induces humorous arguments among programmers, often being damned and praised for the same feature.

  — Alan Perlis

• 57: It is easier to change the specification to fit the program than vice versa.

  — Alan Perlis

• Structured Programming supports the law of the excluded muddle.

  — Alan Perlis

• 79: A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one believe in God.

  — Alan Perlis

• Programmers should never be satisfied with languages which permit them to program everything, but to program nothing of interest easily.

  — Alan Perlis

• 8: A programming language is low level when its programs require attention to the irrelevant.

  — Alan Perlis

• 64: Often it is means that justify ends: Goals advance technique and technique survives even when goal structures crumble.

  — Alan Perlis

• 116: You think you know when you learn, are more sure when you can write, even more when you can teach, but certain when you can program.

  — Alan Perlis