Josh Bloch, the author of Effective Java says there are three optimization quotes that everyone should know:
- More computing sins are committed in the name of efficiency (without necessarily achieving it) than for any other single reason – including blind stupidity.
— William A. Wulf
- We should forget about small efficiencies, say about 97% of the time: premature optimization is the root of all evil.
— Donald E. Knuth
- We follow two rules in the matter of optimization:
Rule 1. Don’t do it.
Rule 2 (for experts only). Don’t do it yet – that is, not until you have a perfectly clear and unoptimized solution.
— M. A. Jackson
I recently found a fourth one on Scott Fahlman’s site:
- Nothing is less productive than to make more efficient what should not be done at all.
— Peter Drucker
