Prof. Djkstra, one of the luminaries in the world of Theoretical Computer Science passed away on August 6th.

I got the enclosed notable Djstra-isms from http://www.lwn.net. In his honour I suggest the following command should be run by us all

mkdir junk; mv `grep -ril "goto" .` junk

For a number of years I have been familiar with the observation that the quality of programmers is a decreasing function of the density of go to statements in the programs they produce.

     --Go To Statement Considered Harmful, CACM, March 1968.

Simplicity is prerequisite for reliability.

The use of anthropomorphic terminology when dealing with computing systems is a symptom of professional immaturity.

The use of COBOL cripples the mind; its teaching should, therefore, be regarded as a criminal offence.

     --How do we tell truths that might hurt?, June 1975.

Today a usual technique is to make a program and then to test it. But: program testing can be a very effective way to show the presence of bugs, but it is hopelessly inadequate for showing their absence.

The competent programmer is fully aware of the strictly lmited size of his own skull; therefore he approaches the programming task in full humility, and among other things he avoids clever tricks like the plague.

      -- The Humble Programmer