Some nodes i've found interesting

1. One man's constant is another man's variable. 

2. Functions delay binding; data structures induce binding. Moral: Str
+ucture data late in the programming process. 

3. Syntactic sugar causes cancer of the semicolon. 

4. Every program is a part of some other program and rarely fits. 

5. If a program manipulates a large amount of data, it does so in a sm
+all number of ways. 

6. Symmetry is a complexity-reducing concept (co-routines include subr
+outines); seek it everywhere. 

7. It is easier to write an incorrect program than understand a correc
+t one. 

8. A programming language is low level when its programs require atten
+tion to the irrelevant. 

9. It is better to have 100 functions operate on one data structure th
+an 10 functions on 10 data structures. 

10. Get into a rut early: Do the same process the same way. Accumulate
+ idioms. Standardize. The only difference(!) between Shakespeare and 
+you was the size of his idiom list - not the size of his vocabulary. 

11. If you have a procedure with ten parameters, you probably missed s
+ome. 

12. Recursion is the root of computation since it trades description f
+or time. 

13. If two people write exactly the same program, each should be put i
+nto microcode and then they certainly won't be the same. 

14. In the long run every program becomes rococo - then rubble. 

15. Everything should be built top-down, except the first time. 

16. Every program has (at least) two purposes: the one for which it wa
+s written, and another for which it wasn't. 

17. If a listener nods his head when you're explaining your program, w
+ake him up. 

18. A program without a loop and a structured variable isn't worth wri
+ting. 

19. A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming
+, is not worth knowing. 

20. Wherever there is modularity there is the potential for misunderst
+anding: Hiding information implies a need to check communication. 

21. Optimization hinders evolution. 

22. A good system can't have a weak command language. 

23. To understand a program you must become both the machine and the p
+rogram. 

24. Perhaps if we wrote programs from childhood on, as adults we'd be 
+able to read them. 

25. One can only display complex information in the mind. Like seeing,
+ movement or flow or alteration of view is more important than the st
+atic picture, no matter how lovely. 

26. There will always be things we wish to say in our programs that in
+ all known languages can only be said poorly. 

27. Once you understand how to write a program get someone else to wri
+te it. 

28. Around computers it is difficult to find the correct unit of time 
+to measure progress. Some cathedrals took a century to complete. Can 
+you imagine the grandeur and scope of a program that would take as lo
+ng? 

29. For systems, the analogue of a face-lift is to add to the control 
+graph an edge that creates a cycle, not just an additional node. 

30. In programming, everything we do is a special case of something mo
+re general -- and often we know it too quickly. 

31. Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it. 

32. Programmers are not to be measured by their ingenuity and their lo
+gic but by the completeness of their case analysis. 

33. The eleventh commandment was "Thou Shalt Compute" or "Thou Shalt N
+ot Compute" - I forget which. 

34. The string is a stark data structure and everywhere it is passed t
+here is much duplication of process. It is a perfect vehicle for hidi
+ng information. 

35. Everyone can be taught to sculpt: Michelangelo would have had to b
+e taught not to. So it is with great programmers. 

36. The use of a program to prove the 4-color theorem will not change 
+mathematics - it merely demonstrates that the theorem, a challenge fo
+r a century, is probably not important to mathematics. 

37. The most important computer is the one that rages in our skulls an
+d ever seeks that satisfactory external emulator. The standarization 
+of real computers would be a disaster - and so it probably won't happ
+en. 

38. Structured Programming supports the law of the excluded middle. 

39. Re graphics: A picture is worth 10K words - but only those to desc
+ribe the picture. Hardly any sets of 10K words can be adequately desc
+ribed with pictures. 

40. There are two ways to write error-free programs; only the third on
+e works. 

41. Some programming languages manage to absorb change, but withstand 
+progress. 

42. You can measure a programmer's perspective by noting his attitude 
+on the continuing vitality of FORTRAN. 

43. In software systems, it is often the early bird that makes the wor
+m. 

44.Sometimes I think the only universal in the computing field is the 
+fetch-execute cycle. 

45. The goal of computation is the emulation of our synthetic abilitie
+s, not the understanding of our analytic ones. 

46. Like punning, programming is a play on words. 

47. As Will Rogers would have said, "There is no such thing as a free 
+variable." 

48. The best book on programming for the layman is "Alice in Wonderlan
+d"; but that's because it's the best book on anything for the layman.
+ 

49. Giving up on assembly language was the apple in our Garden of Eden
+: Languages whose use squanders machine cycles are sinful. The LISP m
+achine now permits LISP programmers to abandon bra and fig-leaf. 

50. When we understand knowledge-based systems, it will be as before -
+- except our fingertips will have been singed. 

51. Bringing computers into the home won't change either one, but may 
+revitalize the corner saloon. 

52. Systems have sub-systems and sub-systems have sub- systems and so 
+on ad infinitum - which is why we're always starting over. 

53. So many good ideas are never heard from again once they embark in 
+a voyage on the semantic gulf. 

54. Beware of the Turing tar-pit in which everything is possible but n
+othing of interest is easy. 

55. A LISP programmer knows the value of everything, but the cost of n
+othing. 

56. Software is under a constant tension. Being symbolic it is arbitra
+rily perfectible; but also it is arbitrarily changeable. 

57. It is easier to change the specification to fit the program than v
+ice versa. 

58. Fools ignore complexity. Pragmatists suffer it. Some can avoid it.
+ Geniuses remove it. 

59. In English every word can be verbed. Would that it were so in our 
+programming languages. 

60. In seeking the unattainable, simplicity only gets in the way. 

61. In programming, as in everything else, to be in error is to be reb
+orn. 

62. In computing, invariants are ephemeral. 

63. When we write programs that "learn", it turns out that we do and t
+hey don't. 

64. Often it is the means that justify the ends: Goals advance techniq
+ue and technique survives even when goal structures crumble. 

65. Make no mistake about it: Computers process numbers - not symbols.
+ We measure our understanding (and control) by the extent to which we
+ can arithmetize an activity. 

66. Making something variable is easy. Controlling duration of constan
+cy is the trick. 

67. Think of all the psychic energy expended in seeking a fundamental 
+distinction between "algorithm" and "program". 

68. If we believe in data structures, we must believe in independent (
+hence simultaneous) processing. For why else would we collect items w
+ithin a structure? Why do we tolerate languages that give us the one 
+without the other? 

69. In a 5 year period we get one superb programming language. Only we
+ can't control when the 5 year period will be. 

70. Over the centuries the Indians developed sign language for communi
+cating phenomena of interest. Programmers from different tribes (FORT
+RAN, LISP, ALGOL, SNOBOL, etc.) could use one that doesn't require th
+em to carry a blackboard on their ponies. 

71. Documentation is like term insurance: It satisfies because almost 
+no one who subscribes to it depends on its benefits. 

72. An adequate bootstrap is a contradiction in terms. 

73. It is not a language's weakness but its strengths that control the
+ gradient of its change: Alas, a language never escapes its embryonic
+ sac. 

74. Is it possible that software is not like anything else, that it is
+ meant to be discarded: that the whole point is to see it as a soap b
+ubble? 

75. Because of its vitality, the computing field is always in desperat
+e need of new cliches: Banality soothes our nerves. 

76. It is the user who should parameterize procedures, not their creat
+ors. 

77. The cybernetic exchange between man, computer and algorithm is lik
+e a game of musical chairs: The frantic search for balance always lea
+ves one of the three standing ill at ease. 

78. If your computer speaks English, it was probably made in Japan. 

79. A year spent in artificial intelligence is enough to make one beli
+eve in God. 

80. Prolonged contact with the computer turns mathematicians into cler
+ks and vice versa. 

81. In computing, turning the obvious into the useful is a living defi
+nition of the word "frustration". 

82. We are on the verge: Today our program proved Fermat's next-to-las
+t theorem. 

83. What is the difference between a Turing machine and the modern com
+puter? It's the same as that between Hillary's ascent of Everest and 
+the establishment of a Hilton hotel on its peak. 

84. Motto for a research laboratory: What we work on today, others wil
+l first think of tomorrow. 

85. Though the Chinese should adore APL, it's FORTRAN they put their m
+oney on. 

86. We kid ourselves if we think that the ratio of procedure to data i
+n an active data-base system can be made arbitrarily small or even ke
+pt small. 

87. We have the mini and the micro computer. In what semantic niche wo
+uld the pico computer fall? 

88. It is not the computer's fault that Maxwell's equations are not ad
+equate to design the electric motor. 

89. One does not learn computing by using a hand calculator, but one c
+an forget arithmetic. 

90. Computation has made the tree flower. 

91. The computer reminds one of Lon Chaney -- it is the machine of a t
+housand faces. 

92. The computer is the ultimate polluter: its feces are indistinguish
+- able from the food it produces. 

93. When someone says "I want a programming language in which I need o
+nly say what I wish done," give him a lollipop. 

94. Interfaces keep things tidy, but don't accelerate growth: Function
+s do. 

95. Don't have good ideas if you aren't willing to be responsible for 
+them. 

96. Computers don't introduce order anywhere as much as they expose op
+portunities. 

97. When a professor insists computer science is X but not Y, have com
+passion for his graduate students. 

98. In computing, the mean time to failure keeps getting shorter. 

99. In man-machine symbiosis, it is man who must adjust: The machines 
+can't. 

100. We will never run out of things to program as long as there is a 
+single program around. 

101. Dealing with failure is easy: Work hard to improve. Success is al
+so easy to handle: You've solved the wrong problem. Work hard to impr
+ove. 

102. One can't proceed from the informal to the formal by formal means
+. 

103. Purely applicative languages are poorly applicable. 

104. The proof of a system's value is its existence. 

105. You can't communicate complexity, only an awareness of it. 

106. It's difficult to extract sense from strings, but they're the onl
+y communication coin we can count on. 

107. The debate rages on: is PL/I Bachtrian or Dromedary? 

108. Whenever two programmers meet to criticize their programs, both a
+re silent. 

109. Think of it! With VLSI we can pack 100 ENIACS in 1 sq. cm. 

110. Editing is a rewording activity. 

111. Why did the Roman Empire collapse? What is Latin for office autom
+ation? 

112. Computer Science is embarrassed by the computer. 

113. The only constructive theory connecting neuroscience and psycholo
+gy will arise from the study of software. 

114. Within a computer natural language is unnatural. 

115. Most people find the concept of programming obvious, but the doin
+g impossible. 

116. You think you know when you can learn, are more sure when you can
+ write, even more when you can teach, but certain when you can progra
+m. 

117. It goes against the grain of modern education to teach children t
+o program. What fun is there in making plans, acquiring discipline in
+ organizing thoughts, devoting attention to detail and learning to be
+ self-critical? 

118. If you can imagine a society in which the computer- robot is the 
+only menial, you can imagine anything. 

119. Programming is an unnatural act. 

120. Adapting old programs to fit new machines usually means adapting 
+new machines to behave like old ones.
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