I've known people who have not mastered their tools who are good programmers, but not a tool master who remained a mediocre programmer.

Listening, Testing, Coding, Designing. That's all there is to software. Anyone who tells you different is selling something.

I don't like the feeling, but I've got to say that a little fear makes me a more focused, more responsible programmer.

Of the four project development variables - scope, cost, time and quality - quality isn't really a free variable. The only possible values are "excellent" and "insanely excellent", depending on whether lives are at stake.

Learning research tells us that the time lag from experiment to feedback is critical.

How good the design is doesn't matter near as much as whether the design is getting better or worse. If it is getting better, day by day, I can live with it forever. If it is getting worse, I will die.

If you're having trouble succeeding, fail.