The Emperor's Old Clothes
Context: [About PL/I] At first I hoped that such a technically unsound project would collapse but I soon realized it was doomed to success. Almost anything in software can be implemented, sold, and even used given enough determination. There is nothing a mere scientist can say that will stand against the flood of a hundred million dollars. But there is one quality that cannot be purchased in this way — and that is reliability. The price of reliability is the pursuit of the utmost simplicity. It is a price which the very rich find most hard to pay.
“Simplicity is prerequisite for reliability.”
1970s, How do we tell truths that might hurt? (1975)
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Edsger W. Dijkstra 68
Dutch computer scientist 1930–2002Related quotes
“What is simplicity? Simplicity is the shortest path to a solution.”
A Conversation with Ward Cunningham (2003), The Simplest Thing that Could Possibly Work
“… the only simplicity to be trusted is the simplicity to be found on the far side of complexity.”
“The shifts of fortune test the reliability of friends.”
Source: De Senectute, De Amicitia
“Nature may not be benign, but she is reliable.”
Source: The Wine of Violence (1981), Chapter 13 (p. 157)
Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 545.
“Reliable and transparent programs are usually not in the interest of the designer.”
Niklaus Wirth (1999) " A Digital Contrarian Retires http://www.modulaware.com/mdlt/mdlt79.htm". Beat Gerber eds., June 1999.