Eric S. Raymond - Code Quotes

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All OO languages show some tendency to suck programmers into the trap of excessive layering. Object frameworks and object browsers are not a substitute for good design or documentation, but they often get treated as one. Too many layers destroy transparency: It becomes too difficult to see down through them and mentally model what the code is actually doing. The Rules of Simplicity, Clarity, and Transparency get violated wholesale, and the result is code full of obscure bugs and continuing maintenance problems.

Eric S. Raymond

Smart data structures and dumb code works a lot better than the other way around.

Eric S. Raymond

Ugly programs are like ugly suspension bridges: they're much more liable to collapse than pretty ones, because the way humans (especially engineer-humans) perceive beauty is intimately related to our ability to process and understand complexity. A language that makes it hard to write elegant code makes it hard to write good code.

Eric S. Raymond

Treating your users as co-developers is your least-hassle route to rapid code improvement and effective debugging.

Eric S. Raymond