摘自《大教堂和市集》（The Cathedral and the Bazaar）的名言

摘自《大教堂和市集》（The Cathedral and the Bazaar）

 

You often don't really understand the problem until after the first time you implement a solution.

在你第一次完成一个东西之前，你常常不真正明白关键的所在。（重构啊，重构）

 

Interestingly enough, you will quickly find that if you are completely and self-deprecatingly truthful about how much you owe other people, the world at large will treat you as though you did every bit of the invention yourself and are just beingbecomingly modest about your innate genius.

有意思的是，如果你完全坦诚和谦虚地承认你欠了别人多少，你很快就会发现外面的世界会把你放在这样一个地位上——好像你自己做了发明的每一部分、只不过对你生来的天才一味谦虚而已。

 

Smart data structures and dumb code works a lot better than the other way around。

聪明的数据结构和愚蠢的代码要比反过来好的多

 

When you hit a wall in development—when you find yourself hard put to think past the next patch—it's often time to ask not whether you've got the right answer, but whether you're asking the right question. Perhaps the problem needs to be reframed.

当你在开发中碰到死胡同时——当你绞尽脑汁要超越下一个补丁的时候——一般来讲你该问的不是你的答案对不对，而是你的问题对不对。或许你的问题需要重新定义。(在什么情况下你应该考虑你的方向是否正确)

 

Often, the most striking and innovative solutions come from realizing that your concept of the problem was wrong.

最有突破和创新的方案常常来自于意识到你把问题的模型弄错了。（如果你发现了方向的错误并改正后会有那些收获）

 

Perfection (in design) is achieved not when there is nothing more to add, but rather when there is nothing more to take away.

设计达到完美的时候，不是增加得不能再增加了、而是减少得不能再减少了。（完美的标准-“也可以说是功能定位”也许一直是你没有想明白的问题）

 

The ``utility function'' Linux hackers are maximizing is not classically economic, but is the intangible of their own ego satisfaction and reputation among other hackers. (One may call their motivation ``altruistic'', but this ignores the fact that altruism is itself a form of ego satisfaction for the altruist). Voluntary cultures that work this way are not actually uncommon; one other in which I have long participated is science fiction fandom, which unlike hackerdom has long explicitly recognized ``egoboo'' (egoboosting, or the enhancement of one's reputation among other fans) as the basic drive behind volunteer activity.

Linux黑客们最大化的这个“功效方程”不是经典经济学上的，而是他们自我的满足和在其他黑客中的声望这些摸不到的东西。（有人或许可以把他们的 动机叫作“利他性的”，但这忽略了利他主义自身对利他主义者就是一种自我满足的形式这一事实。）这样运作的自愿者文化其实不是不寻常的；我已经长期参与的另一个就是科幻粉丝族。不像黑客族，他们早就明白的认识到了“egoboo”（egoboosting，或在其他粉丝中增强个人的声望）是志愿者活动背后的基本动力。

 

Human beings generally take pleasure in a task when it falls in a sort of optimal-challenge zone; not so easy as to be boring, not too hard to achieve. A happy programmer is one who is neither underutilized nor weighed down with illformulated goals and stressful process friction. Enjoyment predicts efficiency.

人们一般在一项任务处于一种适当难度范围的时 候享有乐趣；不要太简单了至于无聊，不要太难了不好实现。一个快乐程序员是一个既没有被浪费也没有被错误制定的目标和烦人过程摩擦所压倒的人。乐趣通往效 率。

 

It may well turn out that one of the most important effects of open source's success will be to teach us that play is the most economically efficient mode of creative work.

结果很可能是，开源的成功带来的一个最重要的影响会是教育我们乐趣是创造性工作的经济上最有效的模式。（这句话好像是索尼的前总裁也说过-《索尼褪色,绩效考核之过?》）