Quotes from G. Pascal Zachary

The veterans would spend so much time tutoring the novices that they would lose track of their work. And by the time the new hires learned enough really to help, the group would have missed the deadline anyway. "For the same reason," Perazzoli said, "your wife's not going to have a baby in three months if you give her two more people." Even

Having grown rapidly, many PC software companies were stretched to the limit simply building their programs. With customers clamoring for new products, testing inevitably had to take a backseat. In addition, though it was eroding, there remained a pejorative attitude toward testing: "Let the customer test the program." That saved the builder money and time, but it frustrated buyers, who came to view the first release of a program as a gamble. Microsoft

If a code writer considered himself a master craftsman, a tester saw himself as a marauder, probing for weak points in code, then cruelly exploiting them. The dominant technique was uncomplicated: Stress a program until it broke.

The best testers were masters at deducing the chain of events leading to a failure. They provided code writers with a virtual road map to fix their bug. The worst testers offered little more than a description of the hangup and a half-baked hypothesis of the cause. Manheim

His short attention span was both endearing and aggravating. His mind would wander so much that those who really needed to speak with him tried to isolate him from distractions. "To talk to Gordon you had to take him in the car, drive and not let him turn on the radio," one said.

The practice of writing code in C++ continually upset Cutler because it created so much confusion and inefficiency.

Code writing was a solitary pursuit, but designing and fitting together diverse pieces demanded cooperation and compromise.

One team member, who had formerly worked at AT&T's Bell Labs, recalled only writing specifications for prototype products during his entire time with the company. Invariably after finishing the specs, the project was cancelled. Coming away empty handed so often made him feel sad. After

Myrhvold, for instance, drank at least a six-pack a day of Diet Pepsi. He was, friends joked, "living proof there's no lethal dose for NutraSweet." Navigating

Since he brought an exacting and grim seriousness to his tasks in the best of times, he found this same demeanor effective in the worst of times.

The best testers were masters at deducing the chain of events leading to a failure. They provided code writers with a virtual road map to fix their bug.

In most projects, the first system built is barely usable. It may be too slow, too big, awkward to use, or all three." Cutler

Poor performance was a common failing of most new programs. The annals of software amply showed this; nearly every landmark system, from IBM's 360 to the various flavors of Unix to Microsoft's Windows, was released in an immature state and evolved over time to win broader acceptance. Indeed, people expected the first commercial release of a new program to contain flaws of all sorts.

Better to release the first version sooner with less. His was a less-now, more-later ethic. Robert

The programmer seemed to be a throwback to an earlier age of handicrafts, when each maker put a distinctive stamp on what were functionally the same products. Well rewarded, the programmer's work was judged harshly.

Wood felt his professors were out of touch with reality and, while "very smart people in their limited field,... they had no business judging whether I did something good or bad." The

A computer is a merciless critic," Joseph Weizenbaum, a pioneering computer scientist, has observed. Designers are ranked by peers, but code writers ultimately are measured by a machine. The

Even seasoned code writers could not dismiss the possibility of being trapped in something akin to an infinite loop, wherein fixes spawned their own bugs. It had happened to others. The history of software was littered with projects, large and small, that had been abandoned in disgust, destroying careers.

By the summer of 1988, Bill Gates was the leading representative of a new breed of tycoon: the software superrich. Just as oil created a kind of royalty in the last century, "wildcat" programmers had emerged among the wealthiest self-made men in America. Paul Allen, who had left Microsoft because of illness, was worth megamillions. So were the founders of other leading software companies. At the age of thirty-three, Gates was the youngest billionaire in the United States.

If they [program managers] had to go through this grueling experience of trying to ship this thing," Cutler said, "I think they'd have a little different outlook on how much work we can do, how much we can take on. As it stands they have this endless list of shit. The list is always twice as long as what we can do." In

As software pundit Fred Brooks once observed, "How does a project get to be a year late?... One day at a time." In

Gates had a notion that only solid code writers should manage and all managers of code writers should keep writing code.

Before the computer, the animals, mortal though not sentient, seemed our nearest neighbors in the known universe. Computers, with their interactivity, their psychology, with whatever fragments of intelligence they have, now bid for this place." While

On a computer there is no consolation in discovering you're almost right. Almost means you're still just wrong.