All non-trivial abstractions, to some degree, are leaky. -- Joel Spolsky (The Law of Leaky Abstractions)

If we wish to count lines of code, we should not regard them as *lines produced* but as *lines spent*. -- Edsger Dijkstra

Work as intensely as you play and play as intensely as you work. -- Eric S. Raymond, How To Be A Hacker

Since programmers create programs out of nothing, imagination is our only limitation. Thus, in the world of programming, the hero is the one who has great vision. Paul Graham is one of our contemporary heroes. He has the ability to embrace the vision, and to express it plainly. His works are my favorites, especially the ones describing language design. He explains secrets of programming, languages, and human nature that can only be learned from the hacker experience. This book shows you his great vision, and tells you the truth about the nature of hacking. -- Yukihiro "Matz" Matsumoto, creator of Ruby

What I didn't understand was that the value of some new acquisition wasn't the difference between its retail price and what I paid for it. It was the value I derived from it. Stuff is an extremely illiquid asset. Unless you have some plan for selling that valuable thing you got so cheaply, what difference does it make what it's "worth?" The only way you're ever going to extract any value from it is to use it. And if you don't have any immediate use for it, you probably never will. -- Paul Graham

We tend to seek easy, single-factor explanations of success. For most important things, though, success actually requires avoiding many separate causes of failure. -- Jared Diamond

It is not what you do for your children, but what you have taught them to do for themselves, that will make them successful human beings. –Ann Landers

You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something - your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life. ~Steve Jobs

If you don’t design your own life plan, chances are you’ll fall into someone else’s plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much. ~ Jim Rohn

An unexamined life is not worth living. –Socrates