Laziness, the greatest virtue of a programmer!

Camel BookLarry Wall, the author of Programming Perl, nicknamed “Camel Book“, has listed the following as the three essential virtues of a Great Programmer. And he has termed “Laziness” as the chief quality!

You can read what he has actually said:

  1. Laziness
  2. The quality that makes you go to great effort to reduce overall energy expenditure. It makes you write labor-saving programs that other people will find useful, and document what you wrote so you don’t have to answer so many questions about it. Hence, the first great virtue of a programmer.

  3. Impatience
  4. The anger you feel when the computer is being lazy. This makes you write programs that don’t just react to your needs, but actually anticipate them. Or at least that pretend to. Hence, the second great virtue of a programmer.

  5. Hubris
  6. Excessive pride, the sort of thing Zeus zaps you for. Also the quality that makes you write (and maintain) programs that other people won’t want to say bad things about. [Also, the thing that makes you write programs to do something that’s already been done, because you believe you can do it better.

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