Each new user of a new system uncovers a new class of bugs.

Debugging is twice as hard as writing the code in the first place. Therefore, if you write the code as cleverly as possible, you are, by definition, not smart enough to debug it.

Do what you think is interesting, do something that you think is fun and worthwhile, because otherwise you won't do it well anyway.

Controlling complexity is the essence of computer programming.

The most effective debugging tool is still careful thought, coupled with judiciously placed print statements.

90% of the functionality delivered now is better than 100% delivered never.

C is a razor-sharp tool, with which one can create an elegant and efficient program or a bloody mess.

Don't document bad code - rewrite it.

... it is a fundamental principle of testing that you must know in advance the answer each test case is supposed to produce. If you don't, you are not testing; you are experimenting.

Believe the terrain, not the map

If you had done something twice, you are likely to do it again.

Again and again I asked for permission. May I? Here? And here? Is this too much? Too little? Can you hear me? This is my heart.

...only in relatively recent times have people decided that "because I want to" is sufficient reason for annoying others.

I look back on my life like a good day's work it is done and I am satisfied with it.

There is no accounting for tastes.

If you want to be on top, you've got to have broad shoulders, because as fast as you get there, the faster they try to knock you down.

Sing will all the voices of the mountain, paint with all the colors of the wind

I was a songwriter; that was the torch I carried. This is an honorable profession. This is what I do.

The public think the politicians don't know or care about their lives; and the politicians feel misunderstood.

A diary is an assassin's cloak which we wear when we stab a comrade in the back with a pen.