Donald Knuth

"I think of algorithms as a language for expressing ideas."

"The aspects that the programmer must constantly think about are the same things as the poet must constantly think about."

"A person who finds no satisfaction in oneself will lose motivation in trying."

"The most important principle I've learned is that the most important things are never about the output."

"One of the most valuable things you can do is to study the error messages that your programs produce."

"Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it."

"The real problem is that programmers have spent far too much time worrying about efficiency in the wrong places."

"Structured programming is the art of writing programs so that they are easy to understand."

"With great power comes great responsibility in the digital age."

"The process of preparing programs for a digital computer is especially attractive because it combines fascinating intellectual challenges with the practical satisfaction of useful work."

"I would strongly recommend the study of algorithms to any student of computer science."

"The real tragedy is that there is not enough time to learn everything we need to know."

"An algorithm must be seen to be believed."

"Understanding what a computer scientist does requires understanding what an algorithm is."

"The most important thing in the programming language is the way it helps you think about programming."

"I am not at all in favor of clever tricks."

"Life is too short to waste time writing a program twice."

"Every programmer is a poet in some sense."

"The computer programmers of tomorrow should be the computer users of today."

"Computers are useless. They can only give you answers."

"The real problem is that I don't have enough time to write all the algorithms I want to write."

"Luck is where preparation meets opportunity."

"When you make a thing, a thing that is made obeys physical laws, not conventions."

"A programmer should think of themselves as a mathematician who is solving practical problems."

"The most important quality in a programmer is the ability to learn."

"I think the main thing is that programming is ultimately about communicating with other people."

"Reading books is important because the quality of what you read determines the quality of your thinking."

"The errors we ignore today become the failures of tomorrow."

"Technology is best when it brings people together."

"The best way to predict the future is to invent it."