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The World's Best Living Programmers

Posted by timothy on from the yeah-but-do-you-have-his-rookie-card? dept.

itwbennett (1594911) writes "How do you measure success? If it's by Stack Overflow reputation, Google engineer Jon Skeet is the world's best programmer. If it's winning programming competitions, Gennady Korotkevich or Petr Mitrechev might be your pick. But what about Linus Torvalds? Or Richard Stallman? Or Donald Knuth? ITworld's Phil Johnson has rounded up a list of what just might be the world's top 14 programmers alive today."

11 of 285 comments (clear)

  1. No exhaustive.. by tobe · · Score: 5, Funny

    .. since I'm not in it.

    1. Re:No exhaustive.. by jeremyp · · Score: 3, Funny

      Nobody from the OpenSSL project then...

      --
      All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
    2. Re:No exhaustive.. by jellomizer · · Score: 3, Funny

      Now these guys may not be the best programmers out there. As programming is different for every type of job.

      Someone who can compile a nice compiler may not be able to make an OS as well. Or an OS developer may not be able to make a clean User interface for a web site.

      There are so many details out there that makes a comparison near impossible. What this list captures are the Most popular programmers. Who's popularity is often due to their personality that makes their program popular.

      We as programmers tend to come up with new innovative solutions to problems all the time, and often all this work isn't noticed by anyone, because it works so well that no one ever notices.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
  2. Not sure about that by maweki · · Score: 5, Funny

    I think I have to contest that. Last semester I got straight As in both "Principles of programming languages" as well as "Algorithm Engineering".

    1. Re:Not sure about that by mwvdlee · · Score: 3, Funny

      It's hard to take your anti-school stance seriously while you keep misspelling "you".

      --
      Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
  3. They got one thing right by Minwee · · Score: 5, Funny

    I noticed that the guy who wrote their slideshow code wasn't on the list.

  4. Re:I once interviewed the 'No.3 Clipper Programmer by Minwee · · Score: 4, Funny

    The problem is that you were interviewing him for a job working with "Clipper", which he had almost no experience in.

    If you had asked about adjusting the settings on his "#3 Clipper", which allowed him to produce anything from centimetre long shag to a 1 mm buzz cut, then you would have been amazed at how much he knew.

  5. Knuth by RDW · · Score: 3, Funny

    ITworld's Phil Johnson has rounded up a list of what just might be the world's top 14 programmers alive today.

    In the unpublished final volume of The Art of Computer Programming, Knuth describes an algorithm that can provide a complete emulation of any of the other 13.

  6. Re:Jon Skeet doesn't belong on such a list by jeremyp · · Score: 1, Funny

    *I'm* Jon Skeet and so's my wife.

    --
    All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
  7. How can you take this list seriously? by MalleusEBHC · · Score: 4, Funny

    Forget the arguments about who should or should not be on the list. I can't take seriously a list of the best programmers when they picked 14 and not a power of 2.

  8. Re:A better list than expected by nine-times · · Score: 4, Funny

    It doesn't happen very often anymore, but for many years I kept hearing people say things like, "The story of Bill Gates shows what's so great about our country. The guy started out poor, he had absolutely nothing, but he was pretty much the best programmer in the world. Using nothing but his programming skills, he managed to become the richest guy in the world. It's a great success story."

    Yeah, Bill Gates got rich by being a brilliant programmer, and Steve Jobs got rich by being a really nice guy. Meanwhile, Ballmer just skated by on his good looks, social graces, and beautiful head of hair.