The Humble Programmer

I think I made a wrong assumption in my last post..I wanted myself to "walk fast", but cant do it whatsoever..Now I realise something..You cant be a good blogger overnight..So I have decided to try walking slow, though with some difficulty I am managing it..I read an interesting book today titled "The Humble Programmer" by the pioneer computer scientist Edsgar W Dijkstra..The way in which he has presented the book in simply excellent..The book reflects Dijkstra's own experiences being a programmer and what he thinks should the thought process be like in the development of programs and for that matter any technological project..

The book depicts many interesting experiences from his life..This is the one he mentions as the incident that changed his life..-"Full of misgivings I knocked on the door of Prof. van Wijngaarden's( his boss at Mathematical Centre in Amsterdam) office door asking him whether I could "speak to him for a moment";when I left his office after a number of hours I was another person. For after having listened to my problems patiently ,he agreed that up till that moment,there was not much of a programming discipline, but he then went on to explain quietly that computers were here to stay,that we were just at the beginning and could not I be one of the persons called to make programming a respectable discipline in the years to come? This was a turning point in my life. One moral of the above story is ,of course, that we must be very careful when we give advice to younger people: sometimes they follow it!"

Some of his personal experiences that he shares are quite interesting as he has presented them in a humerous manner..Thought of sharing it with you..Dijkstra was asked to change his profession name from "programmer" to "theortical physicist" by the authorities when he filled his marriage certificate..At that time programming was not considered a "profession" and few people knew what it meant too..Quite hard to believe that such a social setup ever existed ,considering the fact that most of the youth nowadays try making a living doing just "programming"..

The concluding statement is the most infallible one: "We shall do a much better programming job,provided that we approach the task with a full appreciation of its tremendous difficulty,provided that we stick to modest and elegant programming languages,provided that we respect the intrinsic limitations of the human mind and approach the task as Very Humble Programmers."

I find the book very inspiring..It has something about it that motivates you..That encourages you to think different and think beyond the present state of existence of things..It is the proof from a man who decided to take a path less travelled and found his way to glory..The most worthy message this book puts before you is a virtue named "humility"..The world calls for more and more "Humble Programmers"..