The Art of UNIX Programming Quotes

“CSV (fields separated by commas, double quotes used to escape commas, no continuation lines) is rarely found under Unix.”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“Rule of Optimization: Prototype before polishing. Get it working before you optimize it.”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“Python language is one example. As we noted above, it is also heavily used for mathematical and scientific papers, and will probably dominate that niche for some years yet. 18.3.3”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“Transparency is therefore more than an esthetic triumph; it is a victory that will be reflected in lower costs throughout the software’s life cycle. 6.2.2”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“Use # as an introducer for comments. It is good to have a way to embed annotations and comments in data files. It’s best if they’re actually part of the file structure, and so will be preserved by tools that know its format. For comments that are not preserved during parsing, # is the conventional start character.”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“There is a flip side to this. In the Unix world, libraries which are delivered as libraries should come with exerciser programs.”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“Make each program do one thing well. To do a new job, build afresh rather than complicate old programs by adding new features.”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“Top-down tends to be good practice when three preconditions are true: (a) you can specify in advance precisely what the program is to do, (b) the specification is unlikely to change significantly during implementation, and (c) you have a lot of freedom in choosing, at a low level, how the program is to get that job done.”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“Write flexible and open programs”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Prototype software before polishing it”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Write abstract programs that generate code instead of writing code by hand”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Value developer time over machine time”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Write programs which fail in a way that is easy to diagnose”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Avoid unnecessary output”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Build on potential users' expected knowledge”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Make data complicated when required, not the program”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Write robust programs”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Write transparent programs”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Write small programs”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Write simple programs”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Separate mechanisms from policy”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Use composition”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Write readable programs”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“Build modular programs”
― Eric S. Raymond, The Art of UNIX Programming

“One of the many consequences of the exponential power-versus-time curve in computing, and the corresponding pace of software development, is that 50% of what one knows becomes obsolete over every 18 months.”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“The nightmare scenario is one in which corporate monopolism and statist power-seeking, always natural allies, feed back into each other and create rationales for increasing regulation, repression, and criminalization of digital speech.”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“Web pages get bogged down in the dispute over whether the reader or author should control the appearance.”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“When the superior programmer refrains from coding, his force is felt for a thousand miles.”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“Tools that look glossy but shatter under stress are not good long-term value. Unix”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The

“One of the main lessons of Zen is that we ordinarily see the world through a haze of preconceptions and fixed ideas that proceed from our desires. To achieve enlightenment, we must follow the Zen teaching not merely to let go of desire and attachment, but to experience reality exactly as it is—without the preconceptions and the fixed ideas getting in the way. This”
― Eric S. Raymond, Art of UNIX Programming, The