12 Quotes by David Parnas

One bad programmer can easily create two new jobs a year.

Copy and paste is a design error.

Artificial intelligence has the same relation to intelligence as artificial flowers have to flowers.

I have found that the reason a lot of people are interested in artificial intelligence is the same reason a lot of people are interested in artificial limbs: they are missing one.

Complexity is not a goal. I don’t want to be remembered as an engineer of complex systems.

Find the simplest model that is not a lie is the key to better software design.

Requirements in mathematical language are no use unless they are easier to read than the code.

My judgment is that research in ‘Star Wars’ is going to fail, and I believe this so strongly that I’m willing to stake my professional reputation on this. I don’t believe anybody is going to build this thing.

As a rule, software systems do not work well until they have been used, and have failed repeatedly, in real applications.