I think it is wise, and only honest, to warn you that my goal is immodest. It is not my purpose to "transfer knowledge" to you that, subsequently, you can forget again. My purpose is no less than to effectuate in each of you a noticeable, irreversable change. I want you to gain, for the rest of your lives, the insight that beautiful proofs are not "found" by trial anf error but are the result of a consciously applied design discipline. I want you to raise your quality standards. I mean, if 10 years from now, when you are doing something quick and dirty, you suddenly visualize that I am looking over your shoulders and say to yourself "Dijkstra would not have liked this", well, that would be enough immortality for me. -- E. W. Dijkstra

I'm always happy to trade performance for readability as long as the former isn't already scarce. -- Crayz (Commentor on blog.raganwald.com)

What we choose to fight is so tiny! What fights us is so great! ... When we win it's with small things, and the triumph itself makes us small. ... Winning does not tempt that man. This is how he grows: by being defeated, decisively, by constantly greater beings. -- Rainer Maria Rilke, The Man Watching.

Remember that you are humans in the first place and only after that programmers. -- Alexandru Vancea

Heureux l'étudiant qui comme la Rivière peut suivre son cours sans quitter son lit... -- Sebastien, sur commentcamarche.net

A society that puts equality -- in the sense of equality of outcome -- ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality nor freedom. The use of force to achieve equality will destroy freedom, and the force, introduced for good purposes, will end up in the hands of people who use it to promote their own interests. -- Milton Friedman (Thomas Sowell: A Conflict of Visions, p130)

If you're offered a seat on a rocket ship, don't ask what seat! Just get on. –Sheryl Sandberg

The best revenge is massive success. –Frank Sinatra

The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why. –Mark Twain

We become what we think about. –Earl Nightingale