“A crude measure of the simplicity of an engineering tool is the length of the manual required to give a full and complete account of how to use it and avoid misusing it.”
Tony Hoare
Programming is an Engineering Profession (Primary source)
This paper argues that programming should evolve from a craft into a true engineering profession. Tony Hoare draws analogies between programmers and traditional craftsmen who are skilled but lack a strong theoretical foundation.
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“The price of reliability is the pursuit of the utmost simplicity.”
— Tony Hoare Primary source“There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies, and the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies.”
— Tony Hoare Primary source“What is the central core of the subject [computer science]? What is it that distinguishes it from the separate subjects with which it is related? What is the linking thread which gathers these disparate branches into a single discipline? My answer to these questions is simple—it is the art of programming a computer.”
— Tony Hoare Primary source“Here is a language so far ahead of its time that it was not only an improvement on its predecessors but also on nearly all its successors.”
— Tony Hoare Primary source“Nature is full of infinite causes that have never occured in experience.”
— Leonardo da Vinci Primary source“I have thought a sufficient measure of civilization is the influence of good women.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson Primary source“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”
— Leonardo da Vinci Disputed“Money is a tool to be put to work.”
— A.P. Møller Disputed