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Newly published quotes on qotm, newest first.

• The purpose of abstracting is not to be vague, but to create a new semantic level in which one can be absolutely precise.

  — Edsger W. Dijkstra

• In the good old days physicists repeated each other's experiments, just to be sure. Today they stick to FORTRAN, so that they can share each other's programs, bugs included.

  — Edsger W. Dijkstra

• Using PL/1 must be like flying a plane with 7000 buttons, switches and handles to manipulate in the cockpit.

  — Edsger W. Dijkstra

• We reject: kings, presidents and voting. We believe in: rough consensus and running code.

  — David D. Clark

• Joe's law: Frameworks grow in complexity until nobody can use them.

  — Joe Armstrong

• Far too often, "software engineering" is neither engineering nor about software.

  — Bjarne Stroustrup

• There are only two kinds of languages: the ones people complain about and the ones nobody uses.

  — Bjarne Stroustrup

• Clearly, I reject the view that there is one way that is right for everyone and for every problem

  — Bjarne Stroustrup

• If you think it's simple, then you have misunderstood the problem.

  — Bjarne Stroustrup

• I have always wished for my computer to be as easy to use as my telephone; my wish has come true because I can no longer figure out how to use my telephone.

  — Bjarne Stroustrup

• People who think they know everything really annoy those of us who know we don't.

  — Bjarne Stroustrup

• C makes it easy to shoot yourself in the foot; C++ makes it harder, but when you do it blows your whole leg off.

  — Bjarne Stroustrup

• The advance of technology is based on making it fit in so that you don't really even notice it, so it's part of everyday life.

  — Bill Gates

• If your goal is to make the world a better place, one thing you can do is pick a specific challenge that you really care about. Then, learn as much as you can about it and try to volunteer your time to help an organization that is working in this area.

  — Bill Gates

• Data dominates. If you've chosen the right data structures and organized things well, the algorithms will almost always be self-evident. Data structures, not algorithms, are central to programming.

  — Rob Pike

• Machines are worshipped because they are beautiful and valued because they confer power; they are hated because they are hideous and loathed because they impose slavery.

  — Bertrand Russell

• The best thing about the sciences is their philosophical ingredient, like life for an organic body. If one dephilosophizes the sciences, what remains left? Earth, air, and water.

  — Novalis

• Making Linux GPL'd was definitely the best thing I ever did.

  — Linus Torvalds

• I am almost convinced (quite contrary to opinion I started with) that species are not (it is like confessing a murder) immutable.

  — Charles Darwin

• Books must follow sciences, and not sciences books.

  — Francis Bacon