Grace Hopper
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Grace Hopper (1906–1992), Rear Admiral in the U.S. Navy, and an early computer programmer. Developer of the first compiler for a computer programming language.
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- It's easier to ask forgiveness than it is to get permission.
- Cover of the July 1986 issue of the U.S. Navy's Chips Ahoy magazine
- Life was simple before World War II. After that, we had systems.
- Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) Newsletter, March/April, 1987, No. 167 (editor/author is Philip Schieber)
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- A ship in port is safe; but that is not what ships are built for. Sail out to sea and do new things.
- I've always been more interested in the future than in the past.
- Nobody believed that I had a running compiler and nobody would touch it. They told me computers could only do arithmetic.
- The wonderful thing about standards is that there are so many of them to choose from.
- Possibly quoted in Computer Networks, 1st. ed (1981), by Andrew Tanenbaum, p. 168, without attribution.
- The most dangerous phrase in the language is, "We've always done it this way."
- To me programming is more than an important practical art. It is also a gigantic undertaking in the foundations of knowledge.
- At the end of about a week, I called back and said, "I need something to compare this to. Could I please have a microsecond?"
- I handed my passport to the immigration officer, and he looked at it and looked at me and said, "What are you?"
- From then on, when anything went wrong with a computer, we said it had bugs in it.
- If it's a good idea, go ahead and do it. It's much easier to apologize than it is to get permission.
- In total desperation, I called over to the engineering building, and I said, "Please cut off a nanosecond and send it over to me."
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Quote about Grace Hopper
- On COBOL: "But Grace, then anyone will be able to write programs!"
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