Some people suggest that machines would be friendlier if input could be in a natural language. But natural language is probably the worst kind of input because it can be quite ambiguous. The process of retrieving information from the computer would be so time-consuming that you would be better off spending that time getting the information directly from an expert. -- Gary Kildall (inventor of CP/M, one of the first OS for the micro).

Fools ignore complexity. Pragmatists suffer it. Some can avoid it. Geniuses remove it. -- Alan J. Perlis (Epigrams in programming)

Don't worry about what anybody else is going to do. The best way to predict the future is to invent it. -- Alan Kay

A guideline in the process of stepwise refinement should be the principle to decompose decisions as much as possible, to untangle aspects which are only seemingly interdependent, and to defer those decisions which concern details of representation as long as possible. -- Niklaus Wirth

Ce n'est que par les relations qu'on entretient entre nos différentes connaissances qu'elles nous restent accessibles. -- Shnuup, sur l'hypertexte (SELFHTML -> Introduction -> Definitions sur l'hypertexte)

I guess, when you're drunk, every woman looks beautiful and every language looks (like) a Lisp :) -- Lament, #[email protected]

Happiness is a butterfly, which when pursued, is always beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you. ~Nathaniel Hawthorne

Every strike brings me closer to the next home run. –Babe Ruth

Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great. ~John D. Rockefeller

I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have. ~Thomas Jefferson