Thompson on the superiority of
ed to editors such as today's vi or emacs, as summarized by Peter Salus in A Quarter Century of UNIX (Addison-Wesley, 1994).http://web.archive.org/web/20080103071208/http://www.dcs.qmul.ac.uk/~george/history/
“
"I've seen [visual] editors like that, but I don't feel a need for them. I don't want to see the state of the file when I'm editing."
— Ken Thompson
What It Means
This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets ""I've seen [visual] editors like that, but I don't feel a need for them. I don't want to see the state of the file when I'm editing."" in the context of "Thompson on the superiority of ed to editors such as today's vi or emacs, as summarized by Peter Salus in A Quarter Century of UNIX (Addison-Wesley, 1994).http://web.archive.org/web/20080103071208/http://www.dcs.qmul.ac.uk/~george/history/" to mean that wisdom is timeless.
Source: Wikiquote: "Ken Thompson" (Quotes)
The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app
About Ken Thompson
Kenneth Lane Thompson (born 4 February 1943) is a computer scientist and winner of the 1983 Turing Award, together with Dennis Ritchie. He is notable for his work on the Unix operating system.
About Ken Thompson
Kenneth Lane Thompson (born 4 February 1943) is a computer scientist and winner of the 1983 Turing Award, together with Dennis Ritchie. He is notable for his work on the Unix operating system.
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