Elegance is usually used to describe the tastefulness of one’s style or appearance, and it also has the connotations of simplicity, clarity and effectiveness.

Matthew Fuller's essay explores the essence of how true "elegance" is achieved in programming. Alluding to a variety of thinkers, the distilled message of the piece is that efficiency is key. 

 Fuller offers a definition of elegance by four criteria proposed by Donald Knuth, establishing a groundwork with which to approach an evaluation of programming:

1. The leanness of the code
2. The clarity with which the problem is defined
3. Spareness of use of resources such as time and processor cycles 
4. Implementation in the most suitable language on the most suitable system for its execution 

The balance between these four elements is important because ”too much emphasis on one of the criteria leads to chunkiness or overcomplicating” (Fuller87). Since there isn’t any fixed answer to achieve elegance the balance between programers and software is also crucial. While programmers use powerful softwares to simplified their task these programmers should also actively consider a more efficient way to achieve elegance. Only the combination of the machine's utility and human intelligent is able to create harmony in programming.  Fuller recognizes the politics surrounding "elegance" but stands by its ability to stand as a rubric with which to measure a specific program, even in cases where programmers may be tempted to conserve elegance in favor of cutting costs or improving user interactivity. 

  Expanding the idea of elegance into a broader picture, Fuller invokes Gregory Chaitin and his emphasis on stability at the level of software. He asserts that elegance (i.e. efficiency) cannot be absolutely defined mathematically due to the impossibility of "stating the tersest formula" following a certain threshold, and that it should rather be evaluated in a more dynamic and intuitive fashion.

 Fuller offers a condition of elegance as charting a new trajectory through possible condition of failure. Managing one's own abilities with the inherent constraints of the programming context and material qualities of software is crucial. He also posits an exploratory spirit that finds connections outside of the typical constraints. 

Efficiency, or acting with regards to an economy of means, is a major contributing factor to developing elegance. The result of a push for simplicity and efficiency is a more elegant product, and although small details of functionality may be sacrificed, it is made up for with "the capacity to make leaps from one set of material qualities and constraints to another."

 Citing Steve Wolfram's "computational universe", Emile Borel's complete table of French phrases, and Turing's algorithmic computations, Fuller ponders the implications of an ironic computational universe. In conclusion, he proposes that "elegance exists in the precision madness of axioms that cross categories, in software that observes terseness and clarity of design, and in the leaping cracks and shudders that zigzag scales and domains together."

Written by Luke Leifeste 

Additions by Colin Hong

Additions by Tian Qiu