John V. Guttag Quotes & Sayings

Texas sharpshooter fallacy: Imagine that you are driving down a country road in Texas. You see a barn that has six targets painted on it, and a bullet hole at the very center of each target. "Yes sir," says the owner of the barn, "I never miss." "That's right," says his spouse, "there ain't a man in the state of Texas who's more accurate with a paint brush." Got it? He fired the six shots, and then painted the targets around them. — John V. Guttag

The key to using abstraction effectively in programming is finding a notion of relevance that is appropriate for both the builder of an abstraction and the potential clients of the abstraction. That is the true art of programming. — John V. Guttag