Documentation is the castor oil of programming. Managers know it must be good because the programmers hate it so much. % Note that if a user defines cwdcmd to contain a cd, pushd, or popd, command, an infinite loop may result. In this case, it is the author's opinion that said user will get what he deserves. -- Tcsh man-pages (Linux) % Ban the bomb. Save the world for conventional warfare. % The world is coming to an end... SAVE YOUR BUFFERS! % No matter where you go there you are. % Obey gravity. It's the law! % UFO's are for real: the Air Force doesn't exist. % Do not drink Aussie or Kiwi wines! They may contain radioactive contaminants from Pacific nuclear tests. % I was part of that strange race of people aptly described as spending their lives doing things they detest to make money they don't want to buy things they don't need to impress people they dislike. -- Emile Henry Gauvreay % The secret is to take a bomb on board with you the odds of there being two bombs on a plane are astronomical. - Ted Frank % I'm actually a software package running on a massively parallel computer in the basement of the Pentagon. They don't realize yet that I have net access; so I would appreciate it if you didn't tell them. % Business is unpredictable and unsafe. The Internet is dangerous. Many blogs have been written about these dangers, and there's no way we can list them all here. Read the blogs. The Internet is covered in slippery slopes with loose, slippery and unpredictable footing. The RIAA can make matters worse. Patent trolls are everywhere. You may fall, be spammed or suffer a DOS attack. There are hidden viruses and worms. You could break your computer. There is wild code, which may be vicious, poisonous or carriers of dread malware. These include viruses and worms. E-mail can be poisonous as well. We don't do anything to protect you from any of this. We do not inspect, supervise or maintain the Internet, blogosphere, ISP?s or other features, natural or otherwise. % Insert standard disclaimer and agitate it vigorously. % Argumentum ad Capslock -- some flame participant in AFU % Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur. (Whatever is said in Latin sounds profound.) % "In headlines today, the dreaded killfile virus spread across the country adding aol.com to peoples usenet kill files everywhere. The programmer of the virus still remains anonymous, but has been nominated several times for a Nobel peace prize." -Mark Atkinson % "[British] lager is an imitation continental beer drunk only by refined ladies, people with digestive ailments, tourists, and other weaklings." -- Muenchen Suddeutsche Zeitung, April 1976. % You owe the Oracle an aspirin. % The Army has carried the American ... ideal to its logical conclusion. Not only do they prohibit discrimination on the grounds of race, creed and color, but also on ability. -- T. Lehrer % Never forget: 2 + 2 = 5 for extremely large values of 2 % "The State is happy to provide the illusion of change" % "God was able to create the world in only seven days because he had no installed base to consider." Andy Finkel, Commodore-Amiga Inc. % Life would be so much easier if we only had the source code. % Owing to cutbacks in funding, the light at the end of the tunnel has been extinguished. % "When everyone has his Ph.D., the last plumber will make a million dollars per hour" .....Samuel Clemens % The generation of random numbers is too important to be left to chance. % Congratulations! You have purchased an extremely fine device that would give you thousands of years of trouble-free service, except that you undoubtably will destroy it via some typical bonehead consumer maneuver. Which is why we ask you to PLEASE FOR GOD'S SAKE READ THIS OWNER'S MANUAL CAREFULLY BEFORE YOU UNPACK THE DEVICE. YOU ALREADY UNPACKED IT, DIDN'T YOU? YOU UNPACKED IT AND PLUGGED IT IN AND TURNED IT ON AND FIDDLED WITH THE KNOBS, AND NOW YOUR CHILD, THE SAME CHILD WHO ONCE SHOVED A POLISH SAUSAGE INTO YOUR VIDEOCASSETTE RECORDER AND SET IT ON "FAST FORWARD", THIS CHILD ALSO IS FIDDLING WITH THE KNOBS, RIGHT? AND YOU'RE JUST NOW STARTING TO READ THE INSTRUCTIONS, RIGHT??? WE MIGHT AS WELL JUST BREAK THESE DEVICES RIGHT AT THE FACTORY BEFORE WE SHIP THEM OUT, YOU KNOW THAT? -- Dave Barry, "Read This First!" % A child of 5 could understand this! Fetch me a child of 5. % As far as I can tell the entire program consists of a routine to flash up a window which says "Device is not responding to SCSI command". Peter Gutmann % When sky-diving, it is deemed unprofessional to scream and flap your arms. Just use your emergency chute like everyone else. If that fails, please try and steer away from my house, as we've just had the roof re-tiled. % "Very few things happen at the right time, and the rest do not happen at all: the conscientious historian will correct these defects." -Herodotus (as quoted by Mark Twain) % us.arts General discussion of US fine and performing arts. us.arts.tv.soaps Keeping track of your favorite US soap operas.** % "Confidence is the feeling you have before you understand the situation" % Artificial Intelligence is no match for Natural Stupidity. % AAAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!! My soul screams out in unrelenting anguish that I have dared to tread, with my clod-like newbie feet upon your pure...no saintly...Nay, DEIFIED toes!!! I claw my eyes from my wretched, pain-wracked face so that I may never again gaze upon the putrid visage that belongs to the loathesome creature that had the gall to even entertain the fantasy that it might be worthy to judge the humble supplication of another...I fall upon my keyboard and thrust my head through my monitor in abject terror of the punishment of which I am worthy and shall doubtless be a recipient of... % I can only hope that this apology is even a microscopic particle of repayment for the mindless cruelty that has been wrought upon your noble personage by one who is not even worthy to breathe of the same atmosphere, nor to share the same planet. I shall immediately attempt to have myself launched into space, at the earliest possible moment, if that will give you the slightest twinge of amusement, and help to relieve the pain of the base crassness of my actions... % "I'm fairly sure Linux exists principally because writing an operating system probably seems like a good way to pass the months of darkness in Finland" - Rodger Donaldson % The problem with juggling is that the balls go where you throw them. % If it stinks, it's chemistry. If it moves, it's biology. If it does not work, it's computer science. % The Consultant's Curse: When the customer has beaten upon you long enough, give him what he asks for, instead of what he needs. This is very strong medicine, and is normally only required once. % "Tech Services - We Aim To Please, We Shoot To Kill" % - To facilitate a maximization of currency unit returns, a competitive synergy integration has proactively been achieved ! - Excuse me ? - We've merged. -- 12:01 % Any fool can use a computer. Many do. % Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the Universe is winning. -- Rick Cook % If debugging is the process of removing bugs, then programming must be the process of putting them in. % Progress (n.): The process through which Usenet has evolved from smart people in front of dumb terminals to dumb people in front of smart terminals. -- obs@burnout.demon.co.uk % "We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on a million typewriters will eventually reproduce the entire works of Shakespeare. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true." Robert Wilensky, University of California % The theory states that an infinite number of monkeys typing randomly at typewriters for an infinite amount of time will eventually produce the complete works of Shakespeare. The internet has shown that it is not true. % Come to think of it, there are already a million monkeys on a million typewriters, and Usenet is NOTHING like Shakespeare. Houghton % You have heard the saying that if you put a thousand monkeys in a room with a thousand typewriters and waited long enough, eventually you would have a room full of dead monkeys. (Scott Adams - The Dilbert principle) % "Just when you think people have reached the absolute nadir of stupidity, they get internet accounts." - Me. I said it. That other guy is lying. (mheinz@ssw.com) % "Usenet [...] only dates from 1979. The first killfile undoubtedly followed within minutes." - Nathan Tenny % Subtlety: the art of saying what you want to say and getting out of range before it is understood. % 99 little bugs in the code, 99 bugs in the code, fix one bug, compile it again... 101 little bugs in the code.... % Hey! It compiles! Ship it! % Nothing is more admirable than the fortitude with which millionaires tolerate the disadvantages of their wealth. -- Nero Wolfe % "Ummm, excuse me. I think the network's down...?" "A communications disruption can only mean one thing... Invasion." -Lee Maguire in ASR % Bugs are by far the largest and most successful class of entity, with nearly a million known species. In this res- pect they outnumber all the other known creatures about four to one. - Professor Snope's Encyclopedia of Animal % I have seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die. -- Blade Runner "... I've seen Sun monitors on fire off the side of the multimedia lab. I've seen NTU lights glitter in the dark near the Mail Gate. All these things will be lost in time, like the root partition last week. Time to die...". -- Peter Gutmann in the scary.devil.monastery % I don't have a solution but I admire the problem. % "This is the *NIX version of the 'ILOVEVYOU' worm. It runs on the honor system. Forward this to everyone in your address book, and randomly delete some of your files." - Unknown % SPECIAL OFFER! I proofread unsolicited commercial email sent to this address at a rate of US $500.00 per incident! Include billing address in your message and save US $500.00 per hour off ordinary address resolution and tracking charge! % XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more. % If brute force doesn't solve your problems, then you aren't using enough. % ----- This message is encoded in the new BOGOMIME (TM) next-generation multipurpose state-of-the-art multimedia real-time Internet content- (and metadata-) encoding protocol suite. If you read this text, it means that your mail software does not understand this protocol (and most likely neither do you) : some or all of the message contents may prove hard to understand to you. If so, then you shall consider yourself being ruthlessy laughed at by a BOGOMIME (TM) header. ----- % - Is there a cure for Alzheimer ? - Yes, it's called lobotomy ! CAUTION : the process may loose data. % "Here's a horrible thought: You know how dumb the average person is? Well, half the human race is even dumber than that..." % Remember that 50% of people are even dumber than the average. % Yo moma is like HTML: Tiny head, huge body. % Go away or I replace you with a very small shell script! % If you don't want to be replaced by a computer, don't act like one. % Better to be a geek than an idiot. % I went to a gentleman's cybercafe — and they offered me a 'laptop dance'. % Hardware: The parts of a computer system that can be kicked. % The most overlooked advantage of owning computers is that if they foul up, there's no law against whacking them around a bit. - Eric Porterfield % “There are only two hard problems in computer science: cache invalidation and naming things.” Phil Karlton % Schrodinger's Backup "The condition of any backup is unknown until a restore is attempted." % -> http://quotes.cat-v.org/programming/