Niklaus Wirth Quotes

The critical thing in developing software is not the program, it's the design. It is translating understanding of user needs into something that can be realized as a computer program.

If you write your own tools, you can sort of see new things, design new things.

Program construction consists of a sequence of refinement steps.

I will, in fact, claim that the difference between a bad programmer and a good one is whether he considers his code or his data structures more important. Bad programmers worry about the code. Good programmers worry about data structures and their relationships.

Know how to solve every problem that has been solved.

The art of programming is the art of organizing complexity.

If you've never programmed a computer, you should. There's nothing like it in the whole world. When you program a computer, it does exactly what you tell it to do. It's like designing a machine — any machine, like a car, like a faucet, like a gas-hinge for a door — using math and instructions. It's awesome in the truest sense: it can fill you with awe.

The most fundamental problem in software development is complexity. There is only one basic way of dealing with complexity: divide and conquer

In a dilemma, it is helpful to change any variable, then reexamine the problem.

A desperation to escape a problem is the wrong way. A passion to understand it is the right way

I think being a producer makes you a problem solver, so you kind of go, "Well there's a problem. What do we do? How do we solve it?"

Problems are good, as long as you solve them quickly.

Programming is not a science. Programming is a craft.

A good programming language is a conceptual universe for thinking about programming.

You jump right over anything in the past, and you don't analyze problems.

Software is definitely engineering. It's different in that we take on novel tasks every time. It's not like building a certain bridge that is virtually identical to some previous bridge or some previous building.

The hardest part of the software task is arriving at a complete and consistent specification, and much of the essence of building a program is in fact the debugging of the specification.

Whether you want to uncover the secrets of the universe, or you just want to pursue a career in the 21st century, basic computer programming is an essential skill to learn

It would've been amazing [to work as programmer]. You're good at numbers, you're good with people, you like to wear shorts in the summertime.

When somebody has learned how to program a computer ... You're joining a group of people who can do incredible things. They can make the computer do anything they can imagine.

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. It is the art of designing efficient and elegant methods of getting a computer to solve problems, theoretical or practical, small or large, simple or complex. It is the art of translating this design into an effective and accurate computer program.

To me programming is more than an important practical art. It is also a gigantic undertaking in the foundations of knowledge.

Programming today is the opposite of diamond mining. In diamond mining you dig up a lot of dirt to find a small bit of value. With programming you start with the value, the real intention, and bury it in a bunch of dirt.

It is better to do the right problem the wrong way than the wrong problem the right way.

It doesn’t take time to change once you understand the problem...Somebody hands you a rattlesnake, it doesn’t take long to drop it, does it?