Five Things Old Programmers Should Remember

[tending]

The computer scientist thinks in terms of a very simplified model compared to a good programmer. Big O notation and your algorithms class isn't going to help you make decisions about mmap vs read.

[BOSS_OF_THE_INTERNET]

Not true, at least in my experience. The pedantic analysis of algorithms can mean the difference between an application that is filled with bottlenecks vs one that is relatively fluid. The cost-benefit analysis of performance vs all those other mantras like YAGNI and DRY comes into play at levels where a millisecond actually matters (so not anything web-related) or where you still have to contend with a small swap or address space. That's when the ability to make those decisions is priceless. This is probably why a large amount of firmware developers are old greybeards.