Quotes & Sayings About Software Engineering

Life would be much easier if I had the source code. — Anonymous

If it is not written down, it does not exist. — Philippe Kruchten

The perfect kind of architecture decision is the one which never has to be made — Robert C. Martin

If it hurts, do it more frequently, and bring the pain forward. — Jez Humble

The way to be successful in the software world is to come up with breakthrough software, and so whether it's Microsoft Office or Windows, its pushing that forward. New ideas, surprising the marketplace, so good engineering and good business are one in the same. — Bill Gates

Software Engineering might be science; but that's not what I do. I'm a hacker, not an engineer. — Jamie Zawinski

The required techniques of effective reasoning are pretty formal, but as long as programming is done by people that don't master them, the software crisis will remain with us and will be considered an incurable disease. And you know what incurable diseases do: they invite the quacks and charlatans in, who in this case take the form of Software Engineering gurus. — Edsger Dijkstra

Considering the current sad state of our computer programs, software development is clearly still a black art, and cannot yet be called an engineering discipline. — William J. Clinton

Software Engineering is that part of Computer Science which is too difficult for the Computer Scientist. — Friedrich L. Bauer

Improve performance through process improvements introduced with minimal resistance. Deliver with high quality. Deliver a predictable lead time by controlling the quantity of work-in-progress. Give team members a better life through an improved work/life balance. Provide slack in the system by balancing demand against throughput. Provide a simple prioritization mechanism that delays commitment and keeps options open. Provide a transparent scheme for seeing improvement opportunities, thereby enabling change to a more collaborative culture that encourages continuous improvement. Strive for a process that enables predictable results, business agility, good governance, and the development of what the Software Engineering Institute calls a high-maturity organization. — David J. Anderson

Programmers are not mathematicians, no matter how much we wish and wish for it. — Richard P. Gabriel

Generally, the craft of programming is the factoring of a set of requirements into a a set of functions and data structures. — Douglas Crockford

By claiming that they can contribute to software engineering, the soft scientists make themselves even more ridiculous. (Not less dangerous, alas!) In spite of its name, software engineering requires (cruelly) hard science for its support. — Edsger W. Dijkstra

[Software engineering is the] establishment and use of sound engineering principles to obtain economically software that is reliable and works on real machines efficiently. — Friedrich L. Bauer

We have a company, Geometric Software, which is into engineering services software. We have a company called Nature's Basket, which is into gourmet retailing. Both are specialized companies. — Adi Godrej

Data scientist (noun): Person who is better at statistics than any software engineer and better at software engineering than any statistician. - Josh Wills — Rachel Schutt

There is a lot of interest in the arts, music, theatre, filmmaking, engineering, architecture and software design. I think we have now transitioned the modern-day version of the entrepreneur into the creative economy. — John Baldacci

... what society overwhelmingly asks for is snake oil. Of course, the snake oil has the most impressive names - otherwise you would be selling nothing - like "Structured Analysis and Design", "Software Engineering", "Maturity Models", "Management Information Systems", "Integrated Project Support Environments" "Object Orientation" and "Business Process Re-engineering". — Edsger Dijkstra

To focus on the visible at the expense of the essential is irresponsible. — Bertrand Meyer

The business we're in is more sociological than technological, more dependent on workers' abilities to communicate with each other than their abilities to communicate with machines. — Tom DeMarco

You must excuse my gruff conduct," the watchdog said, after they'd been driving for some time, "but you see it's traditional for watchdogs to be ferocious. — Norton Juster

Truth can only be found in one place: the code. — Robert C. Martin

Indeed, the woes of Software Engineering are not due to lack of tools, or proper management, but largely due to lack of sufficient technical competence. — Niklaus Wirth

Building on our successful partnership, we can now bring together the best of Microsoft's software engineering with the best of Nokia's product engineering, award-winning design, and global sales, marketing and manufacturing, — Stephen Elop

Indeed, the ratio of time spent reading versus writing is well over 10 to 1. We are constantly reading old code as part of the effort to write new code. ...[Therefore,] making it easy to read makes it easier to write. — Robert C. Martin

The conclusion is simple: if a 200-man project has 25 managers who are the most competent and experienced programmers,
fire the 175 troops and put the managers back to programming. — Frederick P. Brooks Jr.

Never in the annals of software engineering was so much owed by so many to so few lines of code — Martin Fowler

Code reuse is the Holy Grail of Software Engineering. — Douglas Crockford

Software is definitely engineering. It's different in that we take on novel tasks every time. It's not like building a certain bridge that is virtually identical to some previous bridge or some previous building. — Bill Gates

The most dangerous belief for any software company today is that the solution to their adoption problem lies in better software engineering. — Stephen O'Grady

Inadequate use of usability engineering methods in software development projects have been estimated to cost the US economy about $30 billion per year in lost productivity. — Jakob Nielsen

Software will get to be somewhat more mature, ah, but it will never be as predictable as most areas of engineering. — Bill Gates

The ideal architect should be a man of letters, a skillful draftsman, a mathematician, familiar with historical studies, a diligent student of philosophy, acquainted with music, not ignorant of medicine, learned in the responses of jurisconsults, familiar with astronomy and astronomical calculations. — Vitruvius

The bearing of a child takes nine months, no matter how many women are assigned. — Frederick P. Brooks Jr.

Software engineering has this in common with having children: the labor before the birth is painful and difficult, but the labor after the birth is where you actually spend most of your effort. Yet — Betsy Beyer

Today I am more convinced than ever. Conceptual integrity is central to product quality. Having a system architect is the most important single step toward conceptual integrity. These principles are by no means limited to software systems, but to the design of any complex construct, whether a computer, an airplane, a Strategic Defense Initiative, a Global Positioning System. After teaching a software engineering laboratory more than 20 times, I came to insist that student teams as small as four people choose a manager and a separate architect. Defining distinct roles in such small teams may be a little extreme, but I have observed it to work well and to contribute to design success even for small teams. — Frederick P. Brooks Jr.

The engineering is long gone in most PC companies. In the consumer electronics companies, they don't understand the software parts of it. And so you really can't make the products that you can make at Apple anywhere else right now. Apple's the only company that has everything under one roof. — Steve Jobs

The science and engineering of programming just isn't good enough to produce flawless software, and that isn't going to change anytime soon. The — Bruce Schneier

Software architecture is the set of design decisions which, if made incorrectly, may cause your project to be cancelled. — Eoin Woods

To make an embarrassing admission, I like video games. That's what got me into software engineering when I was a kid. I wanted to make money so I could buy a better computer to play better video games - nothing like saving the world. — Elon Musk

The first step toward the management of disease was replacement of demon theories and humours theories by the germ theory. That very step, the beginning of hope, in itself dashed all hopes of magical solutions. It told workers that progress would be made stepwise, at great effort, and that a persistent, unremitting care would have to be paid to a discipline of cleanliness. So it is with software engineering today. — Fred Brooks

A good estimate is an estimate that provides a clear enough view of the project reality to allow the project leadership to make good decisions about how to control the project to hit its targets. — Steve McConnell

Software development is neither a scientific nor an engineering task. It is an act of reality construction that is political and artistic. — David West

Software engineering is not about right and wrong but only better and worse — Ellen Ullman

One can expect the human race to continue attempting systems just within or just beyond our reach; and software systems are perhaps the most intricate and complex of man's handiworks. The management of this complex craft will demand our best use of new languages and systems, our best adaptation of proven engineering management methods, liberal doses of common sense, and a God-given humility to recognize our fallibility and limitations. — Fred Brooks

I use minimal software to make my music - a wav editor and a calculator for my beats to make sure everything falls on mathematical precision. If you were just mapping this out visually, it works by math. I guess it's slightly engineering influenced. — Girl Talk

Software is a great combination between artistry and engineering. — Bill Gates

The cheapest, fastest, and most reliable components are those that aren't there. — Gordon Bell

Don't comment bad code - rewrite it. — Brian W. Kernighan