Comment On For Security Purposes, Of Course

If you think back to the last job you regretted taking, there’s probably at least one non-defining moment that you wish you had paid more attention to. To any outsider, that harbingering moment – be it when the boss asked you to pick up his drycleaning (jokingly, of course) or when your coworker gave you the “First Day Hug” – would have immediately sounded the something-is-seriously-wrong alarm. But, blinded by optimism of the job opportunity, that moment – and many subsequent other moments – get simply written off as “quirks of the new job.” For Leigh, who had recently started as a development manager at a small software shop, that first non-defining moment was on her first day, when she met Shredder. [expand full text]
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Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:05 • by SoonerMatt (unregistered)
Hopefully she started looking after the first "No,no,no".

If not that's the real WTF.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:10 • by Si (unregistered)
Wow. I don't know what to say here.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:19 • by him (unregistered)
I assume the commas are there as some sort of phonetic pause.

If you thing back to the last job you [pause for a breath – dramatic music] regretted taking [pause]

Or maybe someone just can’t write.
I’m criticising someone typing ability – I wonder if Muphrys law will come into play.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry's_law

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:21 • by dkf
Paranoid stupidity vs. real security means a win for paranoia while leaving plenty to be paranoid about. Sheesh.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:22 • by Rob (unregistered)
The Article:
For Leigh, who had recently started as a development manager at a small software shop, that first non-defining moment was on her first day, when she met Shredder.

I call BS. There are no girls in IT outside of tech support and testing.

PS. Sorry to all the female developers in the world (both of you), I suspect you exist but I sure as hell have never met any of you!

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:29 • by Barf4Eva (unregistered)
222718 in reply to 222716
Rob:
The Article:
For Leigh, who had recently started as a development manager at a small software shop, that first non-defining moment was on her first day, when she met Shredder.

I call BS. There are no girls in IT outside of tech support and testing.

PS. Sorry to all the female developers in the world (both of you), I suspect you exist but I sure as hell have never met any of you!


Poor fella... You should work at my company, then. ;-)


SideNote: What really irks me about this article is how useless Shredder is initially made out to be, but when he gets called off to some other duty, Leigh's team gets swamped. I call BS on this particular aspect all by itself!

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:32 • by Barf4Eva (unregistered)
222719 in reply to 222718
Barf4Eva:
Rob:
The Article:
For Leigh, who had recently started as a development manager at a small software shop, that first non-defining moment was on her first day, when she met Shredder.

I call BS. There are no girls in IT outside of tech support and testing.

PS. Sorry to all the female developers in the world (both of you), I suspect you exist but I sure as hell have never met any of you!


Poor fella... You should work at my company, then. ;-)


SideNote: What really irks me about this article is how useless Shredder is initially made out to be, but when he gets called off to some other duty, Leigh's team gets swamped. I call BS on this particular aspect all by itself!


*the company I work FOR (yikes, I best rephrase so as not to lead astray.. yeah I won't be able to help out in any meaningful capacity with the ladies, I'm afraid. I'm a cube-lovin' sql nerd, not the big head honcho)

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:37 • by GCU Arbitrary
222722 in reply to 222714
him:
[...]
I’m criticising someone typing ability – I wonder if Muphrys law will come into play.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry's_law


I'm afraid so - assuming, of course, that you intended to criticise someoneS typing ability... ;¬)

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:38 • by Bob (unregistered)
222723 in reply to 222714
Hmmm, good wikipedia skills. You should try http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comma_(punctuation)

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:51 • by Ren
For some reason, I kept reading "security purposes" as "security purpoises". Would someone please think of the tortoises!

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:55 • by Ryuzaki (unregistered)
Hey, everyone knows people like Shredder are essential parts of the team. After all, someone needs to get the coffee every once in a while. It's a wonder they didn't fall apart after he was reassigned.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:56 • by RBoy (unregistered)
I'm left wonding what ever happened to the company in question. This whole thing sounds to me like someone is/was breaking a handfull of laws.

At least, that's my humble opto.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:56 • by Konamiman (unregistered)
Me too, once worked on a company with no internet access except on one computer detached from the intranet, "for security purposes". It seems that before I was hired, one of the computers were infected with a virus that came from a suspicious downloaded software.

It wasn't a surprise when I learned that the computer that was infected was, guessed it, the owner's computer.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 11:59 • by bsaksida
No-No-No. I wont read this site for security purpose

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:00 • by Some Feminist (unregistered)
222733 in reply to 222716
Rob:
The Article:
For Leigh, who had recently started as a development manager at a small software shop, that first non-defining moment was on her first day, when she met Shredder.

I call BS. There are no girls in IT outside of tech support and testing.

PS. Sorry to all the female developers in the world (both of you), I suspect you exist but I sure as hell have never met any of you!


They are still in Beta. Unfortunately we've had problems with the trade dress; they are often judged on apperance rather than substance, to the frustration of both the developer and the client.

However, there is a promising program in R&D, codename "Fight Sexism" that we are hopeful will resolve issues related to stereotypes, which will in turn fix the trade dress issue.

Another idea they've been kicking around in R&D is teaching grade school girls about Ada Lovelace. Who knows what crazy thing they'll come up with next.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ada_Lovelace

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:00 • by Matthew H. (unregistered)
222734 in reply to 222714

I’m criticising someone typing ability – I wonder if Muphrys law will come into play.


Yes, I would say it did.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:02 • by Code Dependent
222735 in reply to 222714
him:
I’m criticising someone typing ability – I wonder if Muphrys law will come into play.
You did that on purpose.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:09 • by Anonymous (unregistered)
That's nothing.

National City Mortage (the mortgage arm of National City Bank) employs several de-staplers (whose sole task is to remove staples from papers), staplers (whose sole task it is to staple papers together, often the same papers that the de-staplers worked on just moments before), and copiers (whose sole task is to operate a copy machine).

Strangely enough, they use a third party for shredding.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:10 • by Leo (unregistered)
There are plenty of women developers, and women in other IT positions.

None of them are named "Leigh", of course; they're all named "Hien" or "Xue" or "Ping" or "Arpita" or "Parvati" or...

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:10 • by DaveyDaveDave
222738 in reply to 222722
GCU Arbitrary:
him:
[...]
I’m criticising someone typing ability – I wonder if Muphrys law will come into play.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry's_law


I'm afraid so - assuming, of course, that you intended to criticise someoneS typing ability... ;¬)


Um... someone's...

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:11 • by Code Dependent
222739 in reply to 222733
Some Feminist:
Another idea they've been kicking around in R&D is teaching grade school girls about Ada Lovelace. Who knows what crazy thing they'll come up with next.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ada_Lovelace
BBCode url tags, maybe.

No, wait, that's already... um... nevermind.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:20 • by Flatline
222740 in reply to 222718
Barf4Eva:

SideNote: What really irks me about this article is how useless Shredder is initially made out to be, but when he gets called off to some other duty, Leigh's team gets swamped. I call BS on this particular aspect all by itself!


Shredder is never made out to be useless, it's just stated that part of his job is the unecessary shredding of documents. The other aspect of his job isn't really covered in the article so it's hard to argue that when he is taken off the team that it SHOULDN'T make an impact on productivity.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:25 • by Someone You Know
I wonder what the owner said when they tried to get him to go to rehab.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:27 • by Richy C. (unregistered)
Girls in IT? Nah - you're right, there aren't any... Apart from the one I'm engaged to ( http://www.whatkatydid.org/ ) and the one I'm currently doing some freelance work for (who also just jumped past Everest to raise funds for Computer Clubs 4 Girls - http://www.cc4g.net )...

Of course, the more girls in IT the better!

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:29 • by mauhiz (unregistered)
Alex, please shred this comment. I don't want the Internet to read it (for security purpose)

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:30 • by adsfg (unregistered)
Well, to be fair, Iron Mountain can suck. One of the companies I used to worked for used them and IR lost a whole bunch of their inventory. Just up and up vanished.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:32 • by DoctorFriday
222747 in reply to 222733
Some Feminist:

Another idea they've been kicking around in R&D is teaching grade school girls about Ada Lovelace. Who knows what crazy thing they'll come up with next.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ada_Lovelace

I love how the wikipedia article goes straight from "Early Career" to "Death". Those grade school teachers might have a little bit of explaining to do:

http://www-groups.dcs.st-and.ac.uk/~history/Biographies/Lovelace.html:

Lovelace flirted with several of her male acquaintances and there were several scandals. Her husband made sure that over 100 of her letters to such friends were destroyed. There was also a problem with over indulgence in wine which became worse when drinking with her meals changed to drinking instead of meals. At one point she considered writing a scientific study of the effects of opium and wine gained from her own experiences. Gambling on horses was another passion in these years and she pawned some of her jewels to finance it. She owed £2000 in gambling debts when she died.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:38 • by KäseMeister (unregistered)
222748 in reply to 222741
Someone You Know:
I wonder what the owner said when they tried to get him to go to rehab.


+1

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:44 • by shadowman
222749 in reply to 222741
Someone You Know:
I wonder what the owner said when they tried to get him to go to rehab.


You win the thread.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:47 • by Zach (unregistered)
222751 in reply to 222747
Hey, if we can celebrate Columbus, we can most definitely celebrate Ada. Besides, the heavy drinking aspect appeals to a lot of college students.

also: I like how the one guy messed up "someone's", using "someone" instead, but nobody yet has pointed out that he used "Muphry" instead of "Murphy" -- twice.

as for the article.............. haha, $850 security blanket. Nothing quite beats the combination of paranoid and stupid.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 12:58 • by scruffy (unregistered)
Oh god this reminds me of a couple of places.

Most recently I went for a contract, The "Ah Ha" moment for me was when they hired me as a linux dev, and on the first day I had to sit through the "Viral GPL will wreck our IP" argument.

Earlier, during the induction, (WTF itself, who inducts contractors?) the head of HR had gone off on a massive bitch-fest about an invisbile line around the building, that you could be fired for crossing. And how somebody had established a "corporate policy" (Amongst a massive 80 people.) that all emails be sent in one font _and_ font size, and all printed matter be the same font, but a different size. She moaned about no-one being able to change it back, then she ranted about security meaures... as if I'd never worked on a list-x site before.

Still the receiptionists wonderfully low neck-line. (Very nearly a navel line, if we're honest.) Nearly swung it for me. But I couldn't quite face a two hour commute AND an 07:00 start...

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:05 • by Code Dependent
222754 in reply to 222747
DoctorFriday:
Those grade school teachers might have a little bit of explaining to do:
I wonder whether those "scandals" were so scandalous because of her gender? At any rate, perhaps she was simply following the example set for her:

Augusta Ada King, Countess of Lovelace... born Augusta Ada Byron, was the only legitimate child of Lord Byron.

Byron's fame rests not only on his writings but also on his life, which featured extravagant living, numerous love affairs, debts, separation, and marital exploits.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:06 • by Mogri (unregistered)
222755 in reply to 222751
Zach:
also: I like how the one guy messed up "someone's", using "someone" instead, but nobody yet has pointed out that he used "Muphry" instead of "Murphy" -- twice.


Completely missed the point.

(captcha: genitus. so close, and yet so far...)

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:08 • by Code Dependent
222756 in reply to 222751
Zach:
I like how the one guy messed up "someone's", using "someone" instead, but nobody yet has pointed out that he used "Muphry" instead of "Murphy" -- twice.
It's always a good idea to check out posted links before ridiculing someone. However, the missing apostrophe is unforgivable.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry's_law

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:08 • by mark (unregistered)
222757 in reply to 222727
Ren:
For some reason, I kept reading "security purposes" as "security purpoises". Would someone please think of the tortoises!


So this guy who works in an aquarium
Get summoned by his boss
Who is looking very worried.

And she says to him,
"I've just walked by the dolphin tank,
And they're feeling very amorous -
They're doing all sort of things to each other.
And the trouble is in less than an hour,
We've got three busloads of second graders are coming.
We can't have them watching those naughty dolphins
Behaving as if they were in a porno flick.

"Now there is only thing that acts as an anti-aphrodisiac for dolphins,
And that's the meat of baby seagulls.
So I want you to go down to the seashores,
And catch us baby seagulls,
Put them in this bag,
And hurry on back.

"But be careful -
A lion escaped from the zoo this morning.
And although he was heavilly sedated,
He still just might be dangerous.
O.K., get going,
And make it snappy."

So the guy takes a shortcut through the forest to the seashore.
He fills the bag with baby seagulls.
And he's walking back to the forest,
When he sees lion,
And it is lying, across the path,
Directly in front of him.

It's too late to run away,
And the feline does seem so placid.
So summoning up all his courage,
He steps across the lion.

Nothing happens.
And so with much relief, the guy begins to resume his journey
When none of the sudden, the policeman steps aside out of the forest.
He graps the guy by the eye,
And says to him,
"You're under arrest!"
The guy can't beleave it. He says,
"Tell me officer, what's the charge?"
And the policeman says,

Transporting young gulls across the staid lion for immoral porpoises!

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:15 • by P (unregistered)
222758 in reply to 222749
shadowman:
Someone You Know:
I wonder what the owner said when they tried to get him to go to rehab.


You win the thread.


The random "featured comment" selector doesn't seem to have selected this one :)

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:17 • by Code Dependent
222760 in reply to 222757
mark:
Transporting young gulls across the staid lion for immoral porpoises!
I first saw this in Readers' Digest about 25 years ago. In that version, the gulls were used as part of a recipe that would make dolphins and porpoises live virtually indefinitely, leading to the conclusion, "Transporting gulls across a staid lion for an immortal porpoise".

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:25 • by jDeepBeep (unregistered)
222763 in reply to 222730
RBoy:
I'm left wonding what ever happened to the company in question. This whole thing sounds to me like someone is/was breaking a handfull of laws.

At least, that's my humble opto.


Well, we could safely say they weren't PCI compliant.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:26 • by hymie! (unregistered)
222764 in reply to 222757
mark:
So this guy who works in an aquarium
Get summoned by his boss
Who is looking very worried.


It's considered polite to credit the author when you post somebody else's work.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:30 • by FUrPorpoise (unregistered)
222765 in reply to 222757
mark:

Transporting young gulls across the staid lion for immoral porpoises!

Wow, I was expecting a great punchline after having to read all of that. What a disappointment.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:46 • by jvanderb
222768 in reply to 222741
Someone You Know:
I wonder what the owner said when they tried to get him to go to rehab.



Oh, no-no-no-no, that wouldn't work. They might steal the voices in my head. They can't be trusted!

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 13:47 • by Jon (unregistered)
Another Ahh haaa moment should come shortly after seeing about 100 table names in the company's flagship system titled AACC_TableForSomething AAACC_TableForSomethingElse ... or if you see a "password field" and then a "password2" field.

Have fun with that :)

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 14:05 • by cparker
222772 in reply to 222758
P:
shadowman:
Someone You Know:
I wonder what the owner said when they tried to get him to go to rehab.


You win the thread.


The random "featured comment" selector doesn't seem to have selected this one :)

*wink wink, nudge nudge*

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 14:06 • by genitus (unregistered)
222773 in reply to 222737
Leo:
they're all named "Hien" or "Xue" or "Ping" or "Arpita" or "Parvati" or...

You must work in my old department. In that group of 11 developers, 6 were female: Hien, Xue, Ping, Arpita, and Parvati, and Olga.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 14:09 • by amischiefr
222774 in reply to 222737
Leo:
There are plenty of women developers, and women in other IT positions.

None of them are named "Leigh", of course; they're all named "Hien" or "Xue" or "Ping" or "Arpita" or "Parvati" or...

Oh man you had me rolling :) Soooooo true...

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 14:13 • by amischiefr
222776 in reply to 222742
Richy C.:
Girls in IT? Nah - you're right, there aren't any... Apart from the one I'm engaged to ( http://www.whatkatydid.org/ ) and the one I'm currently doing some freelance work for (who also just jumped past Everest to raise funds for Computer Clubs 4 Girls - http://www.cc4g.net )...

Of course, the more girls in IT the better!

Web designers don't count. My 13 year old cousin does web design ffs.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 14:23 • by Jeff Rife (unregistered)
222777 in reply to 222742
Richy C.:
Apart from the one I'm engaged to ( http://www.whatkatydid.org/ )

Unfortunately, a website that requires Javascript for the most basic functions and then still fails in Firefox 3.0.1 with Javascript enabled is a good example of many of the "girls in IT".

Of course, it's also a good example of most of the lack of quality in IT that keeps TDWTF in business.

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 14:26 • by BobB
Heh... Now to start shredding comments!
For security purposes...
Crinkle cut baby!
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Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 14:26 • by Michael (unregistered)
My moment was when our CIO told me: "Solaris is alright, but you have to reboot it every day or it will run out of memory."

Re: For Security Purposes, Of Course

2008-10-14 14:31 • by operagost
222782 in reply to 222745
adsfg:
Well, to be fair, Iron Mountain can suck. One of the companies I used to worked for used them and IR lost a whole bunch of their inventory. Just up and up vanished.

I guess they got their archival and shredding businesses mixed up.
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