| # | Law | Category | One-Line |
|---|---|---|---|
| L1 | Amdahl’s Law | Mathematical | Speedup is bounded by the sequential fraction |
| L2 | Moore’s Law (limits) | Mathematical | Single-core gains have stalled; hardware won’t save you |
| L3 | CAP Theorem | Mathematical | Consistency and availability cannot both hold during a partition |
| L4 | Little’s Law | Mathematical | L = λW — queue depth = arrival rate × time in system |
| L5 | Metcalfe’s Law | Mathematical | Network value grows as n² of connected nodes |
| L6 | Brooks’s Law | Human | Adding engineers to a late project makes it later |
| L7 | Hofstadter’s Law | Human | Always takes longer than expected, even accounting for this |
| L8 | Parkinson’s Law | Human | Work expands to fill the time available |
| L9 | Goodhart’s Law | Human | A metric becomes useless once it becomes a target |
| L10 | Conway’s Law | Design | Systems mirror the org’s communication structure |
| L11 | Gall’s Law | Design | Complex working systems evolved from simple working systems |
| L12 | Postel’s Law | Design | Conservative in what you send; liberal in what you accept |
| L13 | Leaky Abstractions | Design | All non-trivial abstractions leak implementation details |
| L14 | Hyrum’s Law | Design | All observable behaviour will be depended on |
| L15 | Pareto Principle | Statistical | 80% of effects come from 20% of causes |
| L16 | Linus’s Law | Statistical | Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow |
Mathematical = physics; design within them. Human/Statistical = tendencies; mitigate them. Design = advice; apply with judgment.