It seems certain that much of the success of Unix follows from the readability, modifiability, and portability of its software.

UNIX is simple and coherent, but it takes a genius (or at any rate, a programmer) to understand and appreciate its simplicity.

C++ and Java, say, are presumably growing faster than plain C, but I bet C will still be around.

... with proper design, the features come cheaply. This approach is arduous, but continues to succeed.

At least for the people who send me mail about a new language that they're designing, the general advice is: do it to learn about how to write a compiler

My work was fairly theoretical. It was in recursive function theory. And in particular, hierarchies of functions in terms of computational complexity. I got involved in real computers and programming mainly by being - well, I was interested even as I came to graduate school.

I've done a reasonable amount of travelling, which I enjoyed, but not for too long at a time. I'm a home-body and get fatigued by it fairly soon, but enjoy thinking back on experiences when I've returned and then often wish I'd arranged a longer stay in the somewhat exotic place.