Sponsor Appreciation, Cabling Confusion, Dividend Bling, & More

Please show your support for The Daily WTF by checking out the companies that have been kind enough to sponsor us. And, in doing so, I’m sure you’ll find some pretty cool products and services built by like-minded developers and IT professionals.

Microsoft/web - We teamed up with Microsoft/web to answer a burning question: with the dizzying array of languages, frameworks, tools, and technologies, what do you think about web development? Take the survey and let us know... there's a free TDWTF sticker in it for you!

Cushy CMS - a hosted CMS built from the ground up with ease of use in mind. It's incredibly simple to use: no PHP or ASP required. If you can add CSS classes to HTML tags then you can implement CushyCMS. And best of all, it's free. Spend a few minutes and try it out!

New Relic - makers of RPM, a pretty impressive Ruby on Rails application monitoring product that helps you keep your app humming. You get deep, real-time visibility into your app, so you always know what's up. Use it on as many applications and hosts as you like. For as long as you like. And they even offer a free version.

Data Springs - offers a whole bunch of DotNetNuke modules and SharePoint WebParts. In addition to their ever-growing list of complementary products, they can also help with just about any of your other DotNetNuke needs or integrations.

Splunk - Search, navigate, alert and report on all your IT data in real time. Logs, configurations, messages, traps and alerts, script, code, metrics and more. If a machine can generate it -- Splunk can eat it.

DiscountASP.NET - award-winning, developer-ready, and enterprise-class ASP.NET web hosting. They support all versions of ASP.NET (including MVC) and have a whole bunch of cool components you can use. Plans start for just $10/month.

Rails Kit - developers of the Software as a Service Rails Kit, which includes well-tested modules, controllers, and utilities to handle all the billing/account/merchant legwork for your RoR application.

Tall Components - makers of PDFKit.NET, a 100% managed .NET component for, reading, creating and manipulating PDF documents and PDF forms on the fly. You can also split, append, stamp, and encrypt PDF documents and forms. If you have to do anything with PDF, you should definitely download the free trial.

Peer 1 - provides award-winning Managed Hosting, Dedicated Hosting, Co-location, and Network services offered through 15 data center across North America. With over 10,000 businesses hosted on their legendary SuperNetwork™backbone, PEER 1 delivers one of the highest server performance and network outputs in the industry.

MindFusion - a great source for flow-charting and diagramming components for a variety of platforms including .NET, WPF, ActiveX and Swing

A Sane Approach to Database Design - the book that tells you how to build a smart database, with lots of examples of people who did it wrong. And although the irish girl has nothing to do with database design, I certainly appreciate keeping up the tradition.

Software Verification - software engineering tools for memory leak detection, code coverage, performance profiling, thread lock contention analysis and thread deadlock detection, flow tracing and application replay on the Windows Vista, 2003, XP, 2000 and NT platforms.

SlickEdit - makers of that very-impressive code editor and some pretty neat Eclipse and VisualStudio.NET tools and add-ins, some of which (Gadgets) are free. Check out this short video highlighting just one of SlickEdit's Visual Studio integration features.

SoftLayer - serious hosting provider with datacenters in three cities (Dallas, Seattle, DC) that has plans designed to scale from a single, dedicated server to your own virtual data center (complete with racks and all)

And now, back to our regularly scheduled program.

"This was in a document for creating cables for a Ethernet media converter," wrote Chris. "Would a table have been all that difficult?"

Such network able illustrations are best left to professionals. Like this diagram (sent in by Jon) from a NetGear switch manual. Err, wait...

"Woo hoo," D.A. writes, "my IBM stock paid dividends! Cha-ching!"

"Err," David Hunter wondered, "where is the change machine located?"

"I saw this at a Tucson McDonald's," David Daniel wrote, "I'm not sure what Drive Thru Parking is all about. Is it some form of dynamic parking?"

"These signs were right outside of the restrooms at Middle Tennessee State University," Chris noted, "I'm not sure if it's an act of Political Correctness, Accessibility, or Stupidity."

"Our repair shop got this computer in recently," writes Renato Ciuffo, "as for it's claim of being 'never obsolete', I'd beg to differ."

"I know I've seen a similar computer-generated sign in an Error'd or two," Paul Taylor said, "but hand-writing this out? That takes it to a whole new level."

"The sign does make a valid point," Patrick wrote, "you really should never stop warning children."

"This is from a Kroger in Troy, MI," wrote Mike. "Perhaps it's proof that Kroger is not lying when they say they are an equal opportunity employer?"

"I noticed this interesting image on the cover page of a shareholder's notice," Seb wrote. "Somehow, I can't see this going over very well for a company in the US."

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		Microsoft/web - We teamed up with Microsoft/web to answer a burning question: with the dizzying array of languages, frameworks, tools, and technologies, what do you think about web development? Take the survey and let us know... there's a free TDWTF sticker in it for you!
		Cushy CMS - a hosted CMS built from the ground up with ease of use in mind. It's incredibly simple to use: no PHP or ASP required. If you can add CSS classes to HTML tags then you can implement CushyCMS. And best of all, it's free. Spend a few minutes and try it out!
		New Relic - makers of RPM, a pretty impressive Ruby on Rails application monitoring product that helps you keep your app humming. You get deep, real-time visibility into your app, so you always know what's up. Use it on as many applications and hosts as you like. For as long as you like. And they even offer a free version.
		Data Springs - offers a whole bunch of DotNetNuke modules and SharePoint WebParts. In addition to their ever-growing list of complementary products, they can also help with just about any of your other DotNetNuke needs or integrations.
		Splunk - Search, navigate, alert and report on all your IT data in real time. Logs, configurations, messages, traps and alerts, script, code, metrics and more. If a machine can generate it -- Splunk can eat it.
		DiscountASP.NET - award-winning, developer-ready, and enterprise-class ASP.NET web hosting. They support all versions of ASP.NET (including MVC) and have a whole bunch of cool components you can use. Plans start for just $10/month.
		Rails Kit - developers of the Software as a Service Rails Kit, which includes well-tested modules, controllers, and utilities to handle all the billing/account/merchant legwork for your RoR application.
		Tall Components - makers of PDFKit.NET, a 100% managed .NET component for, reading, creating and manipulating PDF documents and PDF forms on the fly. You can also split, append, stamp, and encrypt PDF documents and forms. If you have to do anything with PDF, you should definitely download the free trial.
		Peer 1 - provides award-winning Managed Hosting, Dedicated Hosting, Co-location, and Network services offered through 15 data center across North America. With over 10,000 businesses hosted on their legendary SuperNetwork™backbone, PEER 1 delivers one of the highest server performance and network outputs in the industry.
		MindFusion - a great source for flow-charting and diagramming components for a variety of platforms including .NET, WPF, ActiveX and Swing
		A Sane Approach to Database Design - the book that tells you how to build a smart database, with lots of examples of people who did it wrong. And although the irish girl has nothing to do with database design, I certainly appreciate keeping up the tradition.
		Software Verification - software engineering tools for memory leak detection, code coverage, performance profiling, thread lock contention analysis and thread deadlock detection, flow tracing and application replay on the Windows Vista, 2003, XP, 2000 and NT platforms.
		SlickEdit - makers of that very-impressive code editor and some pretty neat Eclipse and VisualStudio.NET tools and add-ins, some of which (Gadgets) are free. Check out this short video highlighting just one of SlickEdit's Visual Studio integration features.
		SoftLayer - serious hosting provider with datacenters in three cities (Dallas, Seattle, DC) that has plans designed to scale from a single, dedicated server to your own virtual data center (complete with racks and all)