Joe Pasqua"If you're thinking without writing, you only think you're thinking" — Leslie Lamport
Even though this is a quote from a Computer Scientist, I think it is broadly applicable.
Indirection:
It is sometimes said that there is no problem in computer science that cannot be solved with another level of indirection.
— Edsger Dijkstra
It is sometimes said there there is no performance problem in computer science that cannot be solved by removing a level of indirection.
— Embedded Systems Engineers
“Documentation is a love letter that you write to your future self.” — Damian Conway
This is so, so true. And if you really want to be kind to your future self, write down not only what you did, but why.
Debugging Week, Day 5 (of 5)
If debugging is the process of removing bugs. Then programming must be the process of putting them in. — Edsger Dijkstra
Debugging week, Day 4, delayed
The most effective debugging tool is still careful thought, coupled with judiciously placed print statements. — Brian Kernighan (“Unix for Beginners” 1979)
Debugging week, Day 3
“Debugging is anticipated with distaste, performed with reluctance, and bragged about forever."
I stand guilty as charged.
[Anyone know for sure whose quote that is?]
Debugging is like being the detective in a crime movie where you are also the murderer. — Filipe Fortes
And speaking of off-by-one errors:
“There are two ways to write error-free programs; only the third works.” — Alan Perlis
“There are only two hard things in Computer Science: cache invalidation and naming things” — Phil Karlton (https://www.karlton.org/karlton/)
Common variant: “There are only two hard things in Computer Science: cache invalidation, naming things and off-by-1 errors”
I worked with Phil at Xerox and though he liked thinking of himself as a Curmudgeon, he was always happy to help us younglings along the way.
“As soon as we started programming, we found out to our surprise that it wasn't as easy to get programs right as we had thought. Debugging had to be discovered. I can remember the exact instant when I realized that a large part of my life from then on was going to be spent in finding mistakes in my own programs.” — Maurice Wilkes
Yup.