Grace Murray Hopper
A pioneer in computer programming, she developed the first compiler and co-developed COBOL.
Most quoted
"I had a very good friend who said, 'I don't know how you can stand to work with computers, they're so impersonal.' I told her, 'It's the people I work with who are impersonal; the computers are very cooperative.'"
— from Attributed
"We're flooding people with information. We need to feed it through a processor. A human must turn information into intelligence or knowledge. We've tended to forget that no computer will ever ask a new question."
— from Speech, 1982
"In pioneer days they used oxen for heavy pulling, and when one ox couldn't budge a log, they didn't try to grow a larger ox. We shouldn't be trying for bigger computers, but for more systems of computers."
— from Speech, 1981
All quotes by Grace Murray Hopper (302)
The only way to find your limits is to go beyond them.
I'm not a follower. I'm a trailblazer.
The only way to make a difference is to be different.
The only way to be truly free is to be yourself.
I'm not a critic. I'm a creator.
The only way to have a friend is to be one.
I'm not a pessimist. I'm an optimist.
The only phrase I've ever heard that I dislike is 'We've always done it this way.' I always tell young people, 'Go ahead and do it. You can always apologize later.'
We're not going to get anywhere by just sitting and waiting for things to happen.
I often say that I'm not a very good programmer. I'm a very good debugger.
The wonderful thing about a computer is that you can make it do anything you want.
I think that the greatest contribution that I've made is to train young people.
We are at a crossroads. We can either continue to do things the way we've always done them, or we can embrace change and move forward.
I'm not afraid of anything. I'm just afraid of not trying.
It is much easier to get forgiveness than permission.
We've got to teach people to think.
We're all going to die. The goal isn't to live forever, the goal is to create something that will.
I'm a great believer in the future.
The greatest value of a picture is when it forces us to notice what we never expected to see.
I believe in the human being. I believe in the human spirit.
Contemporaries of Grace Murray Hopper
Other Computer Sciences born within 50 years of Grace Murray Hopper (1906–1992).