Optimized quoting (was Re: Speed?)

[Aahz]

In article <btqlm8$s6d$1 at wheel2.two14.net>,
Martin Maney  <maney at pobox.com> wrote:
>Aahz <aahz at pythoncraft.com> wrote:
>> In article <m3brpi72rb.fsf at pc150.maths.bris.ac.uk>,
>> Michael Hudson  <mwh at python.net> wrote:
>>>aahz at pythoncraft.com (Aahz) writes:
>>>>
>>>> "Premature optimization is the root of all evil in programming."
>>>> --C.A.R. Hoare (often misattributed to Knuth, who was himself quoting Hoare)
>>>
>>>Cite?
>
>> http://www.haskell.org/pipermail/haskell-cafe/2001-January/001461.html
>> Anybody have a copy of _Literate Programming_ to check?
>
>Surely someone else must have checked this before now.  Perhaps the
>reply went astray, or isn't threaded properly so that I don't see it.
>Anyway.  Yes, Knuth says, in a parenthetical aside on page 276, "But I
>also knew, and forgot, Hoare's dictum that premature optimization is
>the root of all evil in programming."
>
>Which fails to answer the quite reasonable wish for a cite attributing
>the phrase, rather than the concept, to Hoare.  (a distinction Cally
>likes to troll in her .sig, as you know.)

Well, I tried sending e-mail to Hoare; he hasn't responded.  Knuth
doesn't do e-mail, and I'm not sure whether I should bother sending him
snail mail.  If anyone else feels like doing it (and I suppose he's more
likely to respond if multiple people do), here's his address:

    Prof. Donald E. Knuth
    Computer Science Department
    Gates Building 4B
    Stanford University
    Stanford, CA 94305-9045 USA
-- 
Aahz (aahz at pythoncraft.com)           <*>         http://www.pythoncraft.com/

A: No.
Q: Is top-posting okay?