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Ellen Ullman Quotes

We build our computer (systems) the way we build our cities: over time, without a plan, on top of ruins

We build our computer (systems) the way we build our cities: over time, without a plan, on top of ruins

Ellen Ullman
Cities, Way, Ruins

To be a programmer is to develop a carefully managed relationship with error. There's no getting around it. You either make your accomodations with failure, or the work will become intolerable.

Ellen Ullman
Errors, Programmers
"The myth of order" by Ellen Ullman, www.wired.com. April 1, 1999.

The programmer, who needs clarity, who must talk all day to a machine that demands declarations, hunkers down into a low-grade annoyance. It is here that the stereotype of the programmer, sitting in a dim room, growling from behind Coke cans, has its origins. The disorder of the desk, the floor; the yellow Post-It notes everywhere; the whiteboards covered with scrawl: all this is the outward manifestation of the messiness of human thought. The messiness cannot go into the program; it piles up around the programmer.

Ellen Ullman
Yellow, Needs, Machines

The corollary of constant change is ignorance. This is not often talked about: we computer experts barely know what we're doing. We're good at fussing and figuring out. We function well in a sea of unknowns. Our experience has only prepared us to deal with confusion. A programmer who denies this is probably lying, or else is densely unaware of himself.

Ellen Ullman
Lying, Ignorance, Sea
Ellen Ullman (2012). “Close to the Machine: Technophilia and Its Discontents”, p.110, Macmillan

Software engineering is not about right and wrong but only better and worse

Ellen Ullman
Engineering, Software, Software Engineering

The messiness cannot go into the program; it piles up around the programmer.

Ellen Ullman
Program, Messiness, Programmers
Ellen Ullman (2012). “Close to the Machine: Technophilia and its Discontents”, p.24, Pushkin Press

But you can't stop knowing something, can you?

Ellen Ullman
Knowing, Knowing Something
Ellen Ullman (2012). “By Blood”, p.104, Pushkin Press

I've always written. I'm from an older generation of programmers [who] did not come out of engineering. [A]ll sorts of people were drawn in from the social sciences and humanities.

Ellen Ullman
Engineering, People, Humanity

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