Grace Murray Hopper (December 9, 1906 January 1, 1992) was an American computer scientist and United States Navy officer. A pioneer in the field, she was one of the first programmers of the Harvard Mark I
computer, and developed the first compiler
for a computer programming language. She conceptualized the idea of machine-independent programming languages, which led to the development of COBOL
, one of the first modern programming languages.
To me programming is more than an important practical art. It is also a gigantic undertaking in the foundations of knowledge.
From then on, when anything went wrong with a computer, we said it had bugs in it.
A ship in port is safe; but that is not what ships are built for. Sail out to sea and do new things.
I handed my passport to the immigration officer, and he looked at it and looked at me and said, "What are you?"
In total desperation, I called over to the engineering building, and I said, "Please cut off a nanosecond and send it over to me."
At the end of about a week, I called back and said, "I need something to compare this to. Could I please have a microsecond?"
Life was simple before World War II. After that, we had systems.
Humans are allergic to change. They love to say, "We've always done it this way." I try to fight that. That's why I have a clock on my wall that runs counter-clockwise.