Competitive/Collaborative Programming Class

ICPC Computer Programming Contest Prep

Problem Solving in Computer Science

Spring 2026 -- CSC 2700 Section 01
1218 Patrick Taylor Hall, 6:30 PM - 8:20 PM



Class Home




Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist
--Pablo Picasso
There is nothing good or bad about knowledge itself; morality lies in the application of knowledge.
--Jon Erickson
The best way to predict the future is to invent it
--Alan Kay
A change in perspective is worth 80 IQ points
--Alan Kay
Good programmers write code that humans can understand.
--Martin Fowler
I'm not a great programmer; I'm just a good programmer with great habits.
--Kent Beck
The most disastrous thing that you can ever learn is your first programming language.
--Alan Kay
When they first built the University of California at Irvine they just put the buildings in. They did not put any sidewalks, they just planted grass. The next year, they came back and put the sidewalks where the trails were in the grass. Perl is just that kind of language. It is not designed from first principles. Perl is those sidewalks in the grass.
--Larry Wall
People who are really serious about software should make their own hardware
--Alan Kay
How do you expect to succeed if you do not know the rules?
--Anonymous
Any fool can write code that a computer can understand. Good programmers write code that humans can understand.
--Nartin Fowler
Programming isn't about what you know; it's about what you can figure out.
--Chris Pine
What is a university/college when the students lose interest?
--Isaac Traxler
Happiness should be a function without any parameters.
--Pranshu Midha
There ain't no rules around here. We are trying to accomplish something.
--Thomas Edison
Perl – The only language that looks the same before and after RSA encryption.
--Keith Bostic
Along every step of our journey through life, our mind is being programmed. If we are not programming it ourselves, someone else is doing it to us.
--Joseph Rain
It's got to be the going not the getting there that's good.
--Hary Chapin
Delivering good software today is often better than perfect software tomorrow, so finish things and ship.
--David Thomas
When in doubt, do something.
--Harry Chapin
The most important property of a program is whether it accomplishes the intention of its user.
--C.A.R. Hoare
So if an algorithm is an idealized recipe, a program is the detailed set of instructions for a cooking robot preparing a month of meals for an army while under enemy attack
--Kernighan Brian
With software there are only two possibilites: either the users control the programme or the programme controls the users. If the programme controls the users, and the developer controls the programme, then the programme is an instrument of unjust power.
--Richard Stallman
A language that doesn't affect the way you think about programming is not worth knowing.
--Unix Fortune
Some of the best programming is done on paper, really. Putting it into the computer is just a minor detail.
--Max Kanat-Alexander
Premature optimization is the root of all evil.
--Donald Knuth
Always code as if the guy who ends up maintaining your code will be a violent psychopath who knows where you live
--John Woods
Einstein repeatedly argued that there must be simplified explanations of nature, because God is not capricious or arbitrary. No such faith comforts the software engineer.
--Frederick P. Brooks Jr.
What kind of programmer is so divorced from reality that she thinks she'll get complex software right the first time?
--James Alan Gardner
You are not reading this book because a teacher assigned it to you, you are reading it because you have a desire to learn, and wanting to learn is the biggest advantage you can have.
--Cory Althoff