Pattis Quotes & Sayings

The attempt is all the wedge that splits its knotty way betwixt the impossible and possible. — Alice Cary

When building a complex system, having crackerjack programmers (who can make any design work, even a bad one) can be a liability. The result, after lots of effort, is a working system that cannot be easily maintained or upgraded. Good -but not great- programmers would fail early, causing a realization that the system must be redesigned, and then reimplemented. The extra cost is paid once, early in the system's cycle (when it is cheap), instead of repeatedly paid late in the system's cycle (when it is more expensive). — Richard E. Pattis

She spoke about it with such emphasis (somewhat affected) that I could see at once that I was hearing the manifesto of her generation. Every generation has its own set of passions, loves, and interests, which it professes with a certain tenacity, to differentiate it from older generations and to confirm itself in its uniqueness. Submitting to a generation mentality (to this pride of the herd) has always repelled me. After Miss Broz had developed her provocative argument (I've now heard it at least fifty times from people her age) that all mankind is divided into those who give hitchhikers lifts (human people who love adventure) and those who don't (inhuman people who fear life), I jokingly called her a "dogmatist of the hitch." She answered sharply that she was neither dogmatist nor revisionist nor sectarian nor deviationist, that those were all words of ours, that we had invented them, that they belonged to us, and that they were completely alien to them. — Milan Kundera

On his office wall he had a note to himself: 'Money is necessary
but it isn't too important.' Money meant for him to keep on writing and to go his own way. — Walter Farley

When teaching a rapidly changing technology, perspective is more important than content. — Richard E. Pattis

No matter how boldly you stand against life's challenges, if the mind and body are weak you are basically defenseless. — Carlos Wallace

I guess teachers don't actually live and sleep at the school. — Brad Collins

When one hand itches, I scratch it with the other. Let this be a lesson in life. — Mohit Manke

Programming languages, like pizzas, come in only too sizes; too big and too small. — Richard E. Pattis

I'd rather watch SpongeBob with with Kimmy than talk to you. At least that stupid yellow sponge tries to make sense. — Lora Leigh

Be good to people only if you like anal sex.
That's how kind people are. — Honeya

Poems not only demand patience, they demand a kind of surrender. You must give yourself up to them. This is the real food for a poet: other poems, not meat loaf. — Mark Strand

Code should run as fast as necessary, but no faster; something important is always traded away to increase speed. — Richard E. Pattis

What you expect, it will find the way to appear. — Debasish Mridha

Everybody's worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there's a really easy way: stop participating in it. — Noam Chomsky

The structure of a software system provides the ecology in which code is born, matures, and dies. A well-designed habitat allows for the successful evolution of all the components needed in a software system. — Richard E. Pattis

If you cannot grok the overall structure of a program while taking a shower, you are not ready to code it. — Richard E. Pattis

The three most important aspects of debugging and real estate are the same: Location, Location, and Location. — Richard E. Pattis

It is good to be different, because difference is great; that's what this music is based on. But lose that energy between the audience and the players, and you have nothing. — Andrew Hill

Abruptly then it began to rain, I heard the swish of it behind me and turned in time to see it coming fast along the lane like a blown curtain, then it was against my face, a vehement chill glassy drenching. — John Banville

Globalization was a deep trend pushed by technology and right ideas, as much as anything else. — Jeffrey Sachs

A class, in Java, is where we teach objects how to behave. — Richard E. Pattis

Pausing even for lunch, they turned the car around and headed — Gay Hendricks

When debugging, novices insert corrective code; experts remove defective code. — Richard E. Pattis

The discipline of programming is most like sorcery. Both use precise language to instruct inanimate objects to do our bidding. Small mistakes in programs or spells can lead to completely unforseen behavior: e.g., see the story, "The Sorcerer's Apprentice". Neither study is easy: " ... her [Galinda's] early appetite for sorcery had waned once she'd heard what a grind it was to learn spells and, worse, to understand them." from the book "Wicked" by G. Maguire. — Richard E. Pattis