Abstraction is a form of data compression: absolutely necessary, because human short-term memory is so small, but the critically important aspect of abstraction is the algorithm that gets you from the name back to the "uncompressed" details. -- Bruce Wilder (blog post comment)

You will never become a Great Programmer until you acknowledge that you will always be a Terrible Programmer. You will remain a Great Programmer for only as long as you acknowledge that you are still a Terrible Programmer. -- Marc (http://kickin-the-darkness.blogspot.com/)

First learn computer science and all the theory. Next develop a programming style. Then forget all that and just hack. -- George Carrette

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

It was Edison who said ‘1% inspiration, 99% perspiration’. That may have been true a hundred years ago. These days it's ‘0.01% inspiration, 99.99% perspiration’, and the inspiration is the easy part. -- Linux Torvalds

If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything. -- Mark Twain

To live a creative life, we must lose our fear of being wrong. ~Anonymous

Success does not consist in never making mistakes but in never making the same one a second time. ~George Bernard Shaw

If you want to make a permanent change, stop focusing on the size of your problems and start focusing on the size of you! ~T. Harv Eker

Everything you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fear. –George Addair