Tech quotes ....................................................... "One of the hardest things to teach in software engineering: it's literally all made up, functions are just GOTOs, the computer doesn't care what anything is called, almost all the 'structure' in our code is only there to make something convenient for another human to comprehend." Really nice long thread of comments. -- Jules Glegg 30 jan 2022 https://mobile.twitter.com/heyjulesfern/status/1487532312900222976 "A human [turns] information into intelligence or knowledge. ... No computer will ever ask a new question." -- Grace Hopper ("She taught computers ro talk") https://imgur.com/gallery/qfHxC8a Programming is the art of algorithm design and the craft of debugging errant code. -- Ellen Ullman Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it. -- Computer scientist Alan Perlis "Epigrams on Programming," 1982 Testing leads to failure, and failure leads to understanding. -- Burt Rutan coding https://mobile.twitter.com/CodeWisdom/status/1324037513284038656 tech John James Jacoby: "This, to me, is like starting out $15k in technical debt. It’s a garage full of fancy tools to work on your Schwinn. Are there times when you can do it and it makes sense? Natch. But 99% of the time, just build the darn plugin before you suffocate it with all this overhead." [Commenting on tweet announcing complex plugin boilerplate.] https://mobile.twitter.com/JJJ/status/1362527165980561410 19 feb 2021 John James Jacoby (@JJJ): "It’s OK for software to not change dramatically every year or two. Everything keeps changing, and almost none of it is actually better than it was before. Consider doing nothing instead." https://twitter.com/JJJ/status/1357179239494254593 4 feb 2021 The craft of programming begins with empathy, not formatting or languages or tools or algorithms or data structures. -- Kent Beck We sort of understood abstractly the idea that there are only two kinds of software projects: failures and future legacy horrors. -- Peter Weinberger pot or pan https://mobile.twitter.com/TatianaTMac/status/1253403365746159616 The first 90% of the code accounts for the first 90% of the development time. The remaining 10% of the code accounts for the other 90% of the development time. -- Tom Cargill How much of my passion for UX is driven by actual empathy for users vs. me projecting my own ADHD tendencies? - “Reduce the number of steps” - “Reuse common UI patterns” - “Shorten text and make docs skimmable” - “Make the most important stuff stand out” -- @webchick https://twitter.com/webchick/status/1507410563260813313 25 mar 2022 Deprecate yourself. Don’t be the go-to person for the code. Optimize it for people to find their way fixing bugs and adding features to the code. Free yourself to move on to the next project/company. Don’t own the code or you’ll never grow beyond that. -- Alex Ewerlöf [User requests feature already in product] Junior dev: "lol dumb user" Staff dev: "Closed - fixed" Senior dev: -- Vicky Harp Programming today is a race between software engineers stirring to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the universe is winning. -- Rick Cook Remember, a few hours of trial and error can save you several minutes of looking at the README. -- I Am Devloper @iamdevloper 7 nov 2018 Debugging is like being the detective in a crime movie where you are also the murderer. -- Filipe Fortes @fortes The best theory is inspired by practice. The best practice is inspired by theory. -- Donald Knuth Programming and writing code is everything that happens away from the keyboard; that part's just typing. -- I Am Devloper @iamdevloper 21 sep 2018 https://twitter.com/iamdevloper/status/1043149962048143361 90% of the bugs I produced were for one of the two reasons: 1. Doing multiple things at one place 2. Doing one thing at multiple places -- @pseudo_coder It is all people, all the way down. They are as cute as turtles, but don’t have hard shells. -- Ana Ulin https://anaulin.org/blog/things-nobody-told-me-about-being-a-software-engineer/ Tip: I've avoided *thousands* of bugs with this crazy coding trick that seems to work in every language: GO TO BED. YOU'RE TIRED. NO SHUT UP JUST SLEEP. @chrisvfritz 26 apr 2018 Falling in love with code means falling in love with problem solving and being a part of a forever ongoing conversation. -- Kathryn Barrett One of the best programming skills you can have is knowing when to walk away for a while. -- Oscar Godson 90% of the bugs I produced were for one of the two reasons: 1. Doing multiple things at one place 2. Doing one thing at multiple places -- @pseudo_coder [P]rogramming is never easy. You’re never doing the same thing twice, because code is infinitely reproducible and if you’ve already solved a problem and you encounter it again, you just use your old solution. So by definition you’re kind of always on this frontier where you’re out of your depth. And one of the things you have to learn is to accept that feeling – of being constantly wrong. Which makes coding sound like a branch of Zen Buddhism. -- Quincy Larson, quoted by Andrew Smith, in Code to Joy https://www.1843magazine.com/features/code-to-joy A program is like a poem: you cannot write a poem without writing it. -- E. W. Dijkstra A life is like a poem: you cannot live a life without living it. [User requests feature already in product] Junior dev: "lol dumb user" Staff dev: "Closed - fixed" Senior dev: -- Vicky Harp Any code of your own that you haven't looked at for six or more months might as well have been written by someone else. -- Eagleson's law Programming isn’t about what you know; it’s about what you can figure out. -- Chris Pine You might not think that programmers are artists, but programming is an extremely creative profession. It's logic-based creativity. -- John Romero Periodic observation for the benefit of junior developers: You do not have to be embarrassed about not knowing a particular bit of syntax or API. Googling things efficiently is a core job skill. 15 years in I'll still look up "append to array javascript." -- Patrick McKenzie @patio11 24 apr 2018 “We are beginning from the wrong direction if we ask, ‘What kind of technology is going to help us fix this problem?’ rather than ‘How do we want to live?’” -- Moira Weigel @moiragweigel 29 apr 2018 of course, network-manager has a fatal flaw, namely it wasn't written by systemd people, so systemd people wrote systemd-networkd. This is why we can't have nice things -- whitequark @whitequark 29 apr 2018 Every great developer you know got there by solving problems they were unqualified to solve until they actually did it. -- Patrick McKenzie don't even need the "great" in there. -- jw Remember that no information flow is accidental. Every piece of data collected anywhere is the result of a programmer’s deliberate decision to copy something from one memory location to another. Data is not some fluid that just seeps around cyberspace of its own accord. -- Steve Wilson @Steve_Lockstep 28 apr 2018 To me programming is more than an important practical art. It is also a gigantic undertaking in the foundations of knowledge. -- Grace Hopper For every social problem that someone said couldn’t be solved using technology, there’s someone who has already done it. Then there’s the third person who points out the second has created an unchecked ethical nightmare. And oh boy, I haven’t even got to blockchain guy yet. -- John @qacona, Twitter, 29 mar 2018 There's nothing more permanent than a temporary hack. -- Kyle Simpson An evolving system increases its complexity unless work is done to reduce it. -- Meir Lehman Sometimes, the elegant implementation is just a function. Not a method. Not a class. Not a framework. Just a function. -- John Carmack It all died the day they moved "View Source" to a developer menu. -- @pinboard It’s hard enough to find an error in your code when you’re looking for it; it’s even harder when you’ve assumed your code is error-free. -- Steve McConnell M Tech: no one could ever solve this difficult architectural problem F Tech: have you tried, I don't know, talking to one another? M Tech: omg! you're so good at this! amazing! F Tech: so can I get a raise M Tech: for soft skills? pffft they're useless Security at the expense of usability comes at the expense of security. -- ?? Understand well as I may, my comprehension can only be an infinitesimal fraction of all I want to understand. -- Ada Lovelace Your problem is another's solution; Your solution will be their problem. -- Unknown The problem isn't how to innovate; it's how to get society to adopt the good ideas that already exist. -- Douglas Engelbart Solve with HTML. If you can’t, solve w/ CSS. If you can’t solve w/ CSS, make sure it needs solving. If yes, solve w/ JavaScript. -- https://mobile.twitter.com/adrianegger/status/915841149968973825 One person's constant is another person's variable. -- Susan Gerhart The only way to learn a new programming language is by writing programs in it. -- Dennis Ritchie Write code as if you had to support it for the rest of your life. -- Yuriy Zubarev Whenever you are tempmted to type soething into a print statements or a debugger expression, write it as a test instead. -- Martin Fowler One accurate measurement is worth a thousand expert opinions. -- Grace Hopper Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious and adding the meaningful. -- John Maeda Software is 'done' the same way housework is 'done' -- until you aren't living in that house any more, there's always more to do. -- Gillian Armstrong @virtualgill 22 oct 2017 Looking at code you wrote more than two weeks ago is like looking at code you are seeing for the fist time. -- Dan Hurvitz For Perlin, this view of the self imposes an ethical obligation on technological development. It’s why he has taken to calling the Holodeck -- the fictional virtual-reality platform from Star Trek -- “other people.” He said, “I think we shouldn’t just go off and develop technologies: We should understand what is this interaction between people that we’re trying to support -- specifically, not just information passing but emotional affirmation, our views of each other, our ability to relate to each other -- all of those are central to any communication technology.” -- Ken Perlin http://nautil.us/blog/-the-self-is-other-people A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming is not worth knowing. -- Alan J. Perlis First do it, then do it right, then do it better. -- Addy Osmani Helen 侯-Sandí @helenhousandi 27 dec 2017 May your 2018 be filled with wondering wtf you were thinking with your 2017 code, which is how it should be because you are always learning and growing and the technology is changing! We must be careful not to believe things simply because we want them to be true. No one can fool you as easily as you can fool yourself! -- Richard Feynman I would rather have questions that can't be answered than answers that can't be questioned! -- Richard Feynman Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart. -- Ranier Maria Rilke There's one technique that you must use if you want people to listen to you: listen to them. -- The Pragmatic Programmer Whenever you are tempted to type something into a print statement or a debugger expression, write it as a test instead. -- Martin Fowler One accurate measurement is worth a thousand expert opinions. -- Grace Hopper Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious and adding the meaningful. -- John Maeda What I cannot build, I do not understand. -- Richard Feynman The whole point of getting things done is knowing what to leave undone. -- Oswald Chambers -- Gillian Armstrong @virtualgill 22 october 2017 Software is ‘done’ the same way housework is ‘done’ - until you aren’t living in that house anymore there’s always more to do. Looking at code you wrote more than two weeks ago is like looking at code you are seeing for the first time. -- Dan Hurvitz The most effective debugging tool is still careful thought, coupled with judiciously placed print statements. -- Brian W. Kernighan Sometimes it's better to leave something alone, to pause, and that's very true of programming. -- Joyce Wheeler The important things are always simple. The simple things are always hard. The easy way is always mined. — Murphy Laws of War (and Infosec) -- @thegrugq 24 sep 2017 Levels of programmer enlightenment: - my software is shit - all software is shit - everything is shit. -- Ivan-Assen Ivanov @ivanassen 23 sep 2017 "Data about the world around us should belong to the Commons. Data about people should belong to people." -- @aral Everything changes. Everything. What you know today may be wrong tomorrow. Adapt. Learn. Grow. -- ipstenu (((Mika E))) @Ipstenu 21 sep 2017 Always call out the positive in code reviews. I only started doing this embarrassingly recently. -- Xavier Shay @xshay https://twitter.com/xshay/status/1123347245053562880 When debugging, novices insert corrective code; experts remove defective code. -- Richard Pattis People think that computer science is the art of geniuses, but the actual reality is the opposite -- just many people doing things that build on each other, like a wall of mani stones. -- Donald Knuth There are two ways to write error-free programs; only the third works. -- Alan J. Perlis In proramming, as in everything else, to be in error is to be reborn. -- Alan J. Perlis You're explointing a vulnerability in human psychology ... The inventors, creators -- it's me, it's Mark [Zuckerberg], it's Kevein Systrom on Instagram, it's all of these people -- understood this consciously. And we did it anyway. --Sean Parker, ex-president of Facebook https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2017/11/14/facebooks-ex-president-we-exploited-vulnerability-in-human-psychology/ Sean Parker unloads on Facebook "exploiting" human weakness https://www.axios.com/sean-parker-unloads-on-facebook-2508036343.html A good programmer is someone who always looks both ways before crossing a one-way street. -- Doug Linder The object-oriented version of spaghetti code is, of course, 'lasagna code'. Too many layers -- Robert Waltman The eight fallacies of distributed computing 1. The network is reliable 2. Latency is zero 3. Bandwidth is infinite 4. The network is secure 5. Topology doesn't change 6. There is one administrator 7. Transport cost is zero 8. The network is homogenous -- Peter Deutsch In softare, we rarely have meaningful requirements. Even if we do, the only measure of success that matters is whether our solution solves the customer's shifting idea of what their problem is. -- Jeff Atwood A distributed system is one in which the failure of a computer you didn't even know existed can render your own computer unusable. -- Leslie Lamport Writing software as if we are the only person that ever has to comprehend it is one of the biggest mistakes and false assumptions that can be made. -- Karolina Szczur Programming is not about typing, it's about thinking. -- Rich Hicky It's all talk until the code runs. -- Ward Cunningham If you're a new programmer, i just want you to know me and all of my colleagues with years of experience search Web for the most basic things _daily_. -- @oliviacpu - 14 dec 2017 The trick is to fix the problem you have, rather than the problem you want. -- Bram Cohen Even if you don't intend anybody else to read your code, there's still a very good chance that somebody will have to stare at your code and figure out what it does. That person is probably going to be you, twelve months from now. -- Raymond Chen (or a lot sooner than that!) -- tmx The strength of JavaScript is that you can do anything. The weakness is that you will. -- Reg Braithwaite Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. -- ... Falling in love with code means falling in love with problem solving and being a part of a forever ongoing conversation. -- Kathryn Barett Beauty is more important in computing than anywhere else in technology because software is so complicated. Beauty is the ultimate dfence against complexity. -- David Gelernter What gets chosen is usually whatever is easiest to quantify, rather than the fairest. http://m.nautil.us/issue/55/trust/are-algorithms-building-the-new-infrastructure-of-racism By understanding a machine-oriented language, the programmer will tend to use a much more efficient method; it is much closer to reality. -- Donald Knuth No matter how much you learn. When you're hired you'll be learning an alien build. How the software is put together depends on opinions of the programmer who wrote it. Language is only a tool. -- JavaScript Teacher @js_tut 24 jun 2019 So you think you are self-taught. But are you self-thought? Is what you think really your own thoughts? Or were you gradually persuaded into them? Have you ever wondered why you think what you think? Some things only seem right. How can you be sure you're on the right path? -- JavaScript Teacher - @js_tut 1 jul 2019 on Twitter In many ways, where you are now depends on what you were thinking before you got there. By working patiently and intelligently on your thoughts you can remake your life, and eventually transform your circumstances. Change can start by becoming aware of your thought-world. -- JavaScript Teacher - @js_tut 1 jul 2019 on Twitter If the definition of insanity is to do the same thing again and again while expecting a different result, and the only way to become an expert in something is to do it over and over again until you get the best possible outcome, then the only path to mastery is through insanity. -- Shower Thoughts @TheWeirdWorld Code means different things to different people. Whether it is HTML, CSS, JavaScript or C++. Back-end or front-end. Don't let someone shame, or make you feel inferior, about the thing you love doing the most. Every person matters, everyone has something helpful to contribute. -- JavaScript Teacher - @js_tut 2 jul 2019 on Twitter It works on my machine. -- Anonymous Don't patch bugs out, rewrite them out. -- Anonymous I'm not a great programmer; I'm just a good programmer with great habits. -- Kent Beck Junior dev: "why isn't this working?" Senior dev: "oh, you just need to do X, Y, and Z" Junior dev: (wow they're so smart) Senior dev: (wow I made that mistake so many times) -- David K. @DavidKPiano 23 jul 2019 https://twitter.com/DavidKPiano/status/1153392440474263553 Wisdom is a collection of mistakes made. -- Erik Rasmussen @erikras 23 jul 2019 https://twitter.com/erikras/status/1153393121671204864 Junior dev: "why isn't this working?" Senior dev: "oh, you just need to do X, Y, and Z" Junior dev: "really ! I see. So what about W ?" Senior dev: "interesting, I've never seen like this, let's try together !" -- Olivier Duquesne @oduquesne 23 jul l2019 https://twitter.com/oduquesne/status/1153914771097436161 We all keep hearing about the importance of empathy but practising it is also key to all projects and communities both #OpenSource and #innersource. -- Alolita Sharma @alolita https://twitter.com/alolita/status/1154910221925416960 Gentle reminder: Taking a break is a legit debugging technique that mostly always works. -- @ScribblingOn Don't solve problems with software that should be solved with talking. -- Tanya Reilly @whereistanya If at first you don't succeed, call it version 1.0 -- Unknown Squirrels don't remember where they bury their nuts; they remember how they choose places to bury nuts, and look there. this is also my strategy for parking garages -- Adrienne Porter Felt @__apf__ 9 aug 2019 https://twitter.com/__apf__/status/1159709863477301248 Replying to @__apf__ Many humans, myself included, seem to have an easier time storing processes in memory, rather than events, names or other discrete information. -- Jackson Callaway @verinaut 9 aug 2019 It's funny how you can spend all day working on a problem, but then actually fix it in the morning in under 10 minutes. -- JavaScript Teacher @js_tut 22 aug 2019 Be curious. Read widely. Try new things. I think a lot of what people call intelligence boils down to curiosity. -- Aaron Swartz There's one technique that you must use if you want people to listen to you: listen to them. -- The Pragmatic Programmer Andrew Hunt and David Thomas If you ask how long it takes to learn how to code then it is possible you're simply not interested enough in it. Because when you love doing something even after you've done it you would have kept going infinitely. -- JavaScript Teacher @js_tut https://twitter.com/js_tut/status/1180098484806066177 Sometimes the problem is to discover what the problem is. -- Gordon Glegg Debugging is all about trying to identify at which point the code failed. This means if your code is logically clean, you will spend less time on debugging down the road. -- @js_tut After many years of teaching people and trying to teach people, I have realised that a lot of things (shortcuts) I personally use to be productive actually make it harder for others to learn. If the choice is between ease of use and light weight, I would suggest the first one. -- @Mate_Desktop Just. Write. Code. -- @js_tut https://twitter.com/js_tut/status/1183495622340632577 Each moment is an opportunity to write code and get better. The problem isn't in "best" book, tutorial or course. It's up to you to practice & keep going. You either move forward or stagnate. Don't lose that sense of perpetual reward. Or spiral down into the void between. -- @js_tut https://twitter.com/js_tut/status/1183483858634924035 Don't pursue what something is /called. Full stack, Front-end, Back-end, Framework, Library, Pursue understanding how something /works. -- @js_tut 28 dec 2019 Ctrl + At + Del Control yourself Alter your thoughts Delete negativity -- https://mstdn.social/@Pentiger (posted image of this -- don't know if it is source.) You can search for fulfillment everywhere in the world. But the only place you can find it is in the very moment that you are living right now. If you are trying to find it anywhere else, you are chasing a mirage. -- @CrazyPolymath https://twitter.com/CrazyPolymath/status/1312995031037353992 5 oct 2020 1. Keep your systems flexible for changes 2. Start imperfectly 3. Perfect it on the way Instead of preferring perfection at the beginning, aim for perfection AFTER you start. -- @CrazyPolymath https://twitter.com/CrazyPolymath/status/1312601028613730305 4 oct 2020 (This is how i have always worked -- tmx) Don't do what the Buddha said; Do what the Buddha did. But to do what Buddha did, one must have those seeds of desire that Buddha had. But the seeds of desire can't be replicated. Hence, there's no use of imitating Buddha. Live YOUR life, find YOUR truth. -- @CrazyPolymath https://twitter.com/CrazyPolymath/status/1310950098168360960 29 sep 2020 In search of truth, your biggest enemy is your ego. If your mind is already filled with ideas that you are unwilling to give up, then there's no place for the new perspectives to sprout. The slightest tendency to defend your ideas will skew your view of reality. -- @CrazyPolymath https://twitter.com/CrazyPolymath/status/1307887006081458176 21 sep 2020 A primary cause of complexity is that software vendors uncritically adopt almost any feature that users want. -- Niklaus Wirth People think that computer science is the art of geniuses but the actual reality is the opposite, just many people doing things that build on each other, like a wall of mini stones. -- Donald Knuth Coding is a lot like meditation. I think I have stumbled upon something that could turn regular coders into 10x coders, if not 50x coders. -- Michael Krakovskiy @deadprogrammer [image of description of zen prefect (keisaku) whacking meditators to keep them awake.] https://t.co/VAwsxuzWkD https://mobile.twitter.com/deadprogrammer/status/960007924616695808 Programming languages may be different but they all sought out to solve a problem. The syntax may differ but it’s the logic that matters. -- @_trevormiles_ _______________________________________________________ begin 2017 -- 0 --