Quotes About Adaptation

There is no such thing as a best solution, be it a tool, a language, or an operating system. There can only be systems that are more appropriate in a particular set of circumstances.

Once they've agreed to the layout, you might throw it away and recode

You sketch out an overall shape, paint the underlying environment, then fill in the details. You constantly step back with a critical eye to view what you've done. Every now and then you'll throw a canvas away and start again.

expiring assets.[3] Your knowledge becomes out of date as new techniques, languages, and environments are developed.

Well, software doesn't quite work that way. Rather than construction, software is more like gardening—it is more organic than concrete. You plant many things in a garden according to an initial plan and conditions. Some thrive, others are destined to end up as compost.

There are no easy answers. There is no such thing as a best solution, be it a tool, a language, or an operating system. There can only be systems that are more appropriate in a particular set of circumstances.

The cross-pollination of ideas is important; try to apply the lessons you've learned to your current project.

Don't Think Outside the Box—Find the Box

There can only be systems that are more appropriate in a particular set of circumstances.

Like the craftsman, expect to add to your toolbox regularly. Always be on the lookout for better ways of doing things.

When an estimate turns out wrong, don't just shrug and walk away. Find out why it differed from your guess. Maybe you chose some parameters that didn't match the reality of the problem. Maybe your model was wrong. Whatever the reason, take some time to uncover what happened. If you do, your next estimate will be better.

Gain familiarity with the shell, and you'll find your productivity soaring.

knowledge isn't stable. It changes—often rapidly.

the United States military did not fight a decade-long war to preserve South Vietnam; rather, it fought a one-year war ten times over.

Take from the rest of us all that you can assimilate, that can become a part of you, but never still the small voice inside your head that whispers to you, I like it better my way.

The only constant we have is change.

Well"—Lewis announcing over coffee and honeyed flatbreads—"we are being given an opportunity for a different experience than the one we were expecting.

What could be more normal than to be out of place everywhere you go? What could be more American?

The garden was planted four hundred years ago, when the surrounding area was poplar. The woman makes a sweeping gesture, and he nods in appreciation. And now, Less says, it's unpoplar.

Ninety years old and chatttering, chattering away as if the cure for his inability to speak Japanese were the application of more Japanese.

Less takes one last look at the ancient castle of mud and straw, remade every year or so as the rains erode the walls, plastered and replastered so that nothing remains of the old ksar except its former pattern. Something like a living creature of which not a cell is left of the original.

What could be more normal than to be out of place everywhere you go?

What plant could flower under the cold sun of Reagan?

the grief...had never been over him, a clumsy foreign child. It had always been for themselves, so young then, learning that you could not tailor your hopes like a suit and expect them to fit forever