Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.
-- Albert Einstein

Simplicity is the soul of efficiency.
-- Austin Freeman, "The Eye of Osiris"

...it is simplicity that is difficult to make.
-- Bertholdt Brecht

Simple things should be simple and complex things should be possible.
-- Alan Kay

Perfection (in design) is achieved not when there is nothing more to add, but rather when there is nothing more to take away.
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

The key to performance is elegance, not battalions of special cases. The terrible temptation to tweak should be resisted unless the payoff is really noticeable.
-- Jon Bentley and Doug McIlroy

A language that doesn't have everything is actually easier to program in than some that do.
-- Dennis Ritchie

[...] the purpose of abstraction is not to be vague, but to create a new semantic level in which one can be absolutely precise.
-- Edsger W. Dijkstra, “The Humble Programmer” (1972)

Increasingly, people seem to misinterpret complexity as sophistication, which is baffling --- the incomprehensible should cause suspicion rather than admiration. Possibly this trend results from a mistaken belief that using a somewhat mysterious device confers an aura of power on the user.
-- Niklaus Wirth

The difference between a good and a poor architect is that the poor architect succumbs to every temptation and the good one resists it.
-- Ludwig Wittgenstein

Fools ignore complexity; pragmatists suffer it; experts avoid it; geniuses remove it.
-- Alan Perlis

The cheapest, fastest, and most reliable components of a computer system are those that aren't there.
-- Graham Bell

Good judgment comes from experience; experience comes from bad judgment.
-- Frederick Brooks

Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage - to move in the opposite direction.
-- Albert Einstein

To arrive at the simple is difficult.
-- Rashid Elisha

The structure of a system reflects the structure of the organization that built it.
-- R. Fairley

The unavoidable price of reliability is simplicity.
-- C.A.R. Hoare

Controlling complexity is the essence of computer programming.
-- Brian Kernighan

Complexity is a sign of technical immaturity. Simplicity of use is the real sign of a well design product whether it is an ATM or a Patriot missile.
-- Daniel T. Ling

Simplicity does not precede complexity, but follows it.
-- Alan J. Perlis

Computer Science is the first engineering discipline in which the complexity of the objects created is limited solely by the skill of the creator, and not by the strength of raw materials.
-- B. Reid

Technical skill is mastery of complexity, while creativity is mastery of simplicity.
-- E. Christopher Zeeman

Architect: Someone who knows the difference between that which could be done and that which should be done.
-- Larry McVoy

The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance, but the illusion of knowledge.
-- Daniel Boorstin

Simplicity is the peak of civilization.
-- Jessie Sampter

The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.
-- Hans Hofmann

The art of simplicity is a puzzle of complexity.
-- Doug Horton

There are two ways of constructing a software design. One way is to make it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies. And the other way is to make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies.
-- C.A.R. Hoare

Furious activity is no substitute for understanding.
-- H. H. Williams

The most important single aspect of software development is to be clear about what you are trying to build.
-- Bjarne Stroustrup

Simplicity is prerequisite for reliability.
-- Edsger W.Dijkstra

When I am working on a problem, I never think about beauty. I think only of how to solve the problem. But when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is wrong.
-- R. Buckminster Fuller

A charlatan makes obscure what is clear; a thinker makes clear what is obscure.
—Hugh Kingsmill

A designer can mull over complicated designs for months. Then suddenly the simple, elegant, beautiful solution occurs to him. When it happens to you, it feels as if God is talking! And maybe He is.
—Leo Frankowski

Unformed people delight in the gaudy and in novelty. Cooked people delight in the ordinary.
—Erik Naggum

One of the great skills in using any language is knowing what not to use, what not to say. … There's that simplicity thing again.
—Ron Jeffries

Perilous to us all are the devices of an art deeper than we possess ourselves.
—J. R. R. Tolkien

Out of intense complexities, intense simplicities emerge.
—Winston Churchill

Simplicity does not mean want or poverty. It does not mean the absence of any decor, or absolute nudity. It only means that the decor should belong intimately to the design proper, and that anything foreign to it should be taken away.
—Paul Jacques Grillo