Rasmus Lerdorf Quotes

Learning to write programs stretches your mind, and helps you think better, creates a way of thinking about things that I think is helpful in all domains.

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.

I'm thinking of going to programming school. Learn how to sit down at any computer and learn to do anything on it. That's all I have left and have interest in.

I was a programmer.

I grew up as a computer scientist, and I've always been fascinated by algorithms.

I don't like programming. It's tedious.

It's [programming] the only job I can think of where I get to be both an engineer and an artist. There's an incredible, rigorous, technical element to it, which I like because you have to do very precise thinking. On the other hand, it has a wildly creative side where the boundaries of imagination are the only real limitation.

I think everyone should get a little exposure to computer science because it really forces you to think in a slightly different way, and it's a skill that you can apply in life in general, whether you end up in computer science or not.

Learning to program has no more to do with designing interactive software than learning to touch type has to do with writing poetry

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.

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.

Learn when and how to use different data structures and their algorithms in your own code. This is harder as a student, as the problem assignments you'll work through just won't impart this knowledge. That's fine.

I am a programmer.

'Programming' is a four-letter word.

All of my friends who have younger siblings who are going to college or high school - my number one piece of advice is: You should learn how to program.

I started to write a new editor not too long ago and had it about half done after two days.

It always helps to be a good programmer. It is important to like computers and to be able to think of things people would want to do with their computers.

Writing software is a very intense, very personal thing. You have to have time to work your way through it, to understand it. Then debug it.

People think that computer science is the art of geniuses but the actual reality is the opposite, just many people doing things that build on eachother, like a wall of mini stones.

The manuals we got from IBM would show examples of programs and I knew I could do a heck of a lot better than that. So I thought I might have some talent.

I've been programming computers since elementary school, where they taught us, and I stuck with computer science through high school and college.

Many days I don't write any code at all, and some days I spend all day writing code.

You might not think that programmers are artists, but programming is an extremely creative profession. It's logic-based creativity.

After graduating in 1973 I went into the programming field.