• Kef Schecter (unregistered)

    No, wait. TRWTF is that forums like this one are fussy about the exact format of quote tags, and will render it in source form if you get it wrong. sigh

  • OldCoder (unregistered) in reply to eddie pasterkak
    eddie pasterkak:
    "Matt found a style sheet buried in an include file. It's filename? crm_useless.css."

    Apostrophe's and they're use's.

    Indeed. Apostrophes can also indicate possession. The "filename" belonged to "it", so this usage is correct. Or at least, in OldCoder's view.
  • (cs) in reply to OldCoder
    OldCoder:
    Apostrophes can also indicate possession. The "filename" belonged to "it", so this usage is correct. Or at least, in OldCoder's view.
    Nope. Read the cartoon again. "It's" = "it is", and only "it is". So it reads like this:

    It is filename?

  • Aaron (unregistered)

    ...and those original table-loving web developers went on to code the world's blockbuster social networking site "MySpace".

  • Aaron (unregistered) in reply to Code Dependent

    CodeDependent (nice s/n :D) is correct.

    The only possessive form of "it" is the anomalous "its" -- using an apostrophe indicates "it is" only.

  • Matt (unregistered)

    This made my day - I'm Matt. When he heard that I "knew html" the Boss said "this will be an easy one, just fix the sizing" - the Dailywtf writers sorta tweaked my situation (not mad, reads better this way) - I'm actually a support manager by job title. This was "side work" to be done "as I had time". I'm no first timer, I taught myself HTML using NOTEPAD back in the early 90's and I use Dreamweaver as a timesaver - least I didn't use FrontPage (been there done that, decided it was stupid). That being said, I'm not a latest and greatest guru either. This actually got worse - other .inc files loaded .css files on mouse over events that repeated the entire menu script on each nav button.

  • jay (unregistered) in reply to Calm Mint

    [quote user="Calm Mint"][quote user="Calm Mint"]And, in case you forgot already, other people don't have your computer. So it looks like boiled vomit on the other nine billion computers on the planet. [/quote]

    A co-worker of mine once created a web page with all sorts of pretty illustrations and icons, all with image tags using "file:" references, like [image]. It looked great on her computer. Sadly, for some curious reason, most of our users didn't have the image files on their computers in a directory structure matching hers.

  • (cs) in reply to Calm Mint
    Calm Mint:
    ...boiled vomit...
    Roffle mayo! I'm going to steal that and pretend I made it up.
  • (cs) in reply to plink
    plink:
    What? Conformity to web standards were bad in the past? Say it ain't so!

    He found some file and a (backup?) folder and then the story just ends. It seems like the exact details of the wtf are a bit of a mystery.

    Was thinking the same thing. Guy takes on an entry-level web monkey job. Web site was done by art student hacks, and cost way too much. Newflash: web site sucks and there's a backup.

    Not really much WTFness here.

  • Josh (unregistered) in reply to Calm Mint
    Calm Mint:
    et cetera, et cetera, et cetera...

    I give up.

    I smell all sorts of bitterness. Graphic designer urinate in your cereal? Or on your contracts?

  • Kef Schecter (unregistered) in reply to OldCoder
    OldCoder:
    Apostrophes can also indicate possession. The "filename" belonged to "it", so this usage is correct. Or at least, in OldCoder's view.

    I'm afraid no dictionary will agree with you. "Its" is a special possessive pronoun, just like "his" and "her". If you accept "it's", you must also accept, for example, "he's" (or maybe "him's") in place of "his".

  • (cs) in reply to Calm Mint
    Calm Mint:
    ...on the other nine billion computers on the planet.

    Hmm.. According to my math, that's 1.5 computers for each living human on the face of the earth. Given that my family's ratio is currently 1:1 (5 people, 5 computers), somebody owes us a couple more. I'll have to store that stat for next time my wife complains we have too many computers...

  • SoonerMatt (unregistered) in reply to Kef Schecter
    Kef Schecter:
    OldCoder:
    Apostrophes can also indicate possession. The "filename" belonged to "it", so this usage is correct. Or at least, in OldCoder's view.

    I'm afraid no dictionary will agree with you. "Its" is a special possessive pronoun, just like "his" and "her". If you accept "it's", you must also accept, for example, "he's" (or maybe "him's") in place of "his".

    YoungCoder agrees with Kef.
  • Suomynona (unregistered) in reply to GalacticCowboy
    GalacticCowboy:
    Calm Mint:
    ...on the other nine billion computers on the planet.

    Hmm.. According to my math, that's 1.5 computers for each living human on the face of the earth. Given that my family's ratio is currently 1:1 (5 people, 5 computers), somebody owes us a couple more. I'll have to store that stat for next time my wife complains we have too many computers...

    I am one person and have three computers. (two personal one work). That’s a 3:1 ratio to help balance you out!

  • Matt (unregistered)

    The final stage of this wound up being - I just updated the navigation script and removed the x,y coordinates for rendering the drop menu. Let the damn browser decide where it should be.

    One line of script commented. Done. Boss happy.

    (bangs head, entire site is still nested in tables 757 pixels wide)

    And I'm heading back to work for my actual job of cat herding a support team thats scattered all over the world.

  • Duke of New York (unregistered) in reply to plink
    plink:
    What? Conformity to web standards were bad in the past? Say it ain't so!

    He found some file and a (backup?) folder and then the story just ends. It seems like the exact details of the wtf are a bit of a mystery.

    You must be new here. The writers get complaints whenever anyone suspects them of embellishing the story to be, you know, meaningful.

  • bigbird (unregistered) in reply to Kef Schecter
    Kef Schecter:
    OldCoder:
    Apostrophes can also indicate possession. The "filename" belonged to "it", so this usage is correct. Or at least, in OldCoder's view.

    I'm afraid no dictionary will agree with you. "Its" is a special possessive pronoun, just like "his" and "her". If you accept "it's", you must also accept, for example, "he's" (or maybe "him's") in place of "his".

    • Off topic * It's/its etc is easy, but should it be: One's got to get ones facts straight or One's got get one's facts straight

    Personally I think the former is clearer

  • (cs) in reply to Code Dependent
    Code Dependent:
    OldCoder:
    Apostrophes can also indicate possession. The "filename" belonged to "it", so this usage is correct. Or at least, in OldCoder's view.
    Nope. Read the cartoon again. "It's" = "it is", and only "it is". So it reads like this:

    It is filename?

    Not quite. Read the cartoon again. There is - it's hard to see and I overlooked it at first, too, so I thought Bob got it wrong - a side note mentioning the other expansion of it's. But "It has filename?" sounds more like lolspeak than English, only the it would be "It can haz filename?" shudder

  • (cs) in reply to bigbird
    bigbird:
    * Off topic * It's/its etc is easy, but should it be: One's got to get ones facts straight or One's got to get one's facts straight

    Personally I think the former is clearer

    In the former, I trip over the fact that ones is a plural. How's "Get yer bleeding facts straight!" for clarity?
  • Chris (unregistered) in reply to GalacticCowboy
    GalacticCowboy:
    Calm Mint:
    ...on the other nine billion computers on the planet.

    Hmm.. According to my math, that's 1.5 computers for each living human on the face of the earth. Given that my family's ratio is currently 1:1 (5 people, 5 computers), somebody owes us a couple more. I'll have to store that stat for next time my wife complains we have too many computers...

    I have 4 computers (router, game rig / workstation, laptop, media PC). I also have a G1 (Google Android phone), which is very much a computer. So, I have 5 computers just in my apartment right now, any of which might access content on any given website.

    Plus, I am also in charge of around 12 servers spread over a couple data centers (and yes, I use links2 on them occasionally). Not every "computer" is a personal computer that you sit down and use with a Windows/Mac/KDE/Gnome GUI.

  • (cs) in reply to Calm Mint
    Calm Mint:
    OK definitely TRWTF. The A HREF tag is for navigation.

    To be honest, although you make some good points there, the fact that you seem to think there's a tag in HTML called "A HREF" pretty much eliminates any credibility you might otherwise have had on any web design issue.

  • (cs) in reply to bigbird
    bigbird:
    * Off topic * It's/its etc is easy, but should it be: One's got to get ones facts straight or One's got get one's facts straight

    Personally I think the former is clearer

    The first one is simply wrong, but they're both horrible English. The "has got" structure should be replaced with "must" or "should".
  • trollstroll (unregistered) in reply to MrsPost

    I haven't really been even as decided to use even go want to do look more like.

  • Wizard Stan (unregistered)

    The problem with its vs it's is that it runs afoul of the plural/possessive rule. Your brain tries to write a possessive "it", and remembers the rule "for plurals, just add the S; for possessive, add apostrophe S". This rule was drilled into me (and possibly everyone else) back in grade school. Kinda like "i before e except after c". There's more to both rules, of course, but by the time you get to the exceptions, these rules have been ingrained so deeply in your mind that it's hard to change them, especially in casual writing. It's made especially difficult by the fact that "it's" and "its" sound the exact same. We write "his" not "hims" because we say "his". I am willing to bet there are some people out there that write "her's" as well for the exact same reason: the mind knows a rule but has forgotten the exceptions. TRWTF is the education system for teaching these "rules"?

  • (cs) in reply to Anonymous
    Anonymous:
    Thank God for standards. These days, you can be guaranteed that if you create a fully standards compliant website it will display perfectly in any browser. Except Microsoft Internet Explorer of course. 60% market share you say? Shit!

    I remember this same troll from five years ago, except then it said "95%". My how things have changed.

  • Lego (unregistered) in reply to Chris
    Chris:
    GalacticCowboy:
    Calm Mint:
    ...on the other nine billion computers on the planet.

    Hmm.. According to my math, that's 1.5 computers for each living human on the face of the earth. Given that my family's ratio is currently 1:1 (5 people, 5 computers), somebody owes us a couple more. I'll have to store that stat for next time my wife complains we have too many computers...

    I have 4 computers (router, game rig / workstation, laptop, media PC). I also have a G1 (Google Android phone), which is very much a computer. So, I have 5 computers just in my apartment right now, any of which might access content on any given website.

    Plus, I am also in charge of around 12 servers spread over a couple data centers (and yes, I use links2 on them occasionally). Not every "computer" is a personal computer that you sit down and use with a Windows/Mac/KDE/Gnome GUI.

    Have you got a: VCR / DVD player / DVR / Cable TV box / MP3 player / Microwave Oven / Cell Phone / Car built after 1995 / ...

    Then you have a computer. It is quite likely you have many.

    -Lego

  • (cs) in reply to Chris
    Chris:
    GalacticCowboy:
    Calm Mint:
    ...on the other nine billion computers on the planet.
    Hmm.. According to my math, that's 1.5 computers for each living human on the face of the earth. Given that my family's ratio is currently 1:1 (5 people, 5 computers), somebody owes us a couple more. I'll have to store that stat for next time my wife complains we have too many computers...
    I have 4 computers (router, game rig / workstation, laptop, media PC). I also have a G1 (Google Android phone), which is very much a computer. So, I have 5 computers just in my apartment right now, any of which might access content on any given website.

    Plus, I am also in charge of around 12 servers spread over a couple data centers.

    By chance do any of your boxes use VMs? I do, and I count those as computers as well in my view of 9billion, but I don't know that I would count the router per-se... Granted, if it has a nice firmware on it, it probably should be...

    So, hardware wise I have my work-desktop, 2 laptops, and my phone. (I use a cheap-o router) So by myself it's a 4:1 ratio. (I smell a pattern here - who else has four for themselves?)

    The family averages out to about 1.1:1, and the office (between desktop and server, physical only) is 1.2:1, but if we count virtual machines, the office is ~1.6:1, and the house is ~1.2:1.

  • (cs) in reply to Lego
    Lego:
    Chris:
    GalacticCowboy:
    Calm Mint:
    ...on the other nine billion computers on the planet.

    Hmm.. According to my math, that's 1.5 computers for each living human on the face of the earth. Given that my family's ratio is currently 1:1 (5 people, 5 computers), somebody owes us a couple more. I'll have to store that stat for next time my wife complains we have too many computers...

    I have 4 computers (router, game rig / workstation, laptop, media PC). I also have a G1 (Google Android phone), which is very much a computer. So, I have 5 computers just in my apartment right now, any of which might access content on any given website.

    Plus, I am also in charge of around 12 servers spread over a couple data centers (and yes, I use links2 on them occasionally). Not every "computer" is a personal computer that you sit down and use with a Windows/Mac/KDE/Gnome GUI.

    Have you got a: VCR / DVD player / DVR / Cable TV box / MP3 player / Microwave Oven / Cell Phone / Car built after 1995 / ...

    Then you have a computer. It is quite likely you have many.

    -Lego

    Yeah, but every site looks like crap on my microwave, whether the site was developed according to standards or not...

  • (cs) in reply to Suomynona

    Don't forget the many computers which are owned, not by persons, but companies.

  • Brent (unregistered) in reply to Kef Schecter
    Kef Schecter:
    OldCoder:
    Apostrophes can also indicate possession. The "filename" belonged to "it", so this usage is correct. Or at least, in OldCoder's view.

    I'm afraid no dictionary will agree with you. "Its" is a special possessive pronoun, just like "his" and "her". If you accept "it's", you must also accept, for example, "he's" (or maybe "him's") in place of "his".

    It's all part of the English 5.5alpha spec.

    It's, he's (which can still be pronounced as "his", but that may become deprecated in future versions), and her's. You's and they's are currently in debate, as they would help eliminate other homonym problems, but might be too radical a shift for a minor version (they're more likely to get into 6.0).

    Sure you might be able to get your DVDs with English 5.1 tracks today, but in a few years time that will be obsolete.

    (Me, I'm still trying to get support for dual pronouns from v1.0 back in.)

  • (cs) in reply to Kef Schecter
    Kef Schecter:
    If you accept "it's", you must also accept, for example, "he's" (or maybe "him's") in place of "his".

    I must accept? Says who? You?

    There is no logical necessity to accept "he's" as a possessive for 'he' if one accepts "it's" as a possessive for 'it'. One mistake does not imply another.

  • Anon (unregistered) in reply to GalacticCowboy
    GalacticCowboy:
    Calm Mint:
    ...on the other nine billion computers on the planet.

    Hmm.. According to my math, that's 1.5 computers for each living human on the face of the earth. Given that my family's ratio is currently 1:1 (5 people, 5 computers), somebody owes us a couple more. I'll have to store that stat for next time my wife complains we have too many computers...

    Let's see. Physically I have 4 personal (server, media pc, desktop, laptop) and 2 more for work (desktop, laptop). The personal desktop has 3 OSes on it (2 actual, 1 in a vm) and I also have a vps server (vm on a shared hosted system somewhere). I've got a bunch more systems in pieces but I'm not going to count those. There's also various servers at work that I use which if divided by user-hours (I don't use them that often) that could add somewhere between 2 and 5 to that count.

    So my ratio is somewhere between 4:1 and 14:1 depending on how you count it. At home the number of physically running systems can reach a ratio of 5:1 or 6:1 at times (later is if I'm testing a new system).

  • (cs) in reply to FIA
    FIA:
    You should carry round a Heron instead.

    Can I at least get paid for my time?

  • Keybounce (unregistered)

    As soon as I hear that there's a nested set of files that seems to be a complete copy, my thoughts don't go to "Oh, it's a backup", but rather to "Oh, what files in the outer set are referring to files in this inner set, requiring me to update/maintain both sets", as well as testing to see if every file is an exact duplicate or not.

    Nested internal backups? Confusing. Just say no.

    As soon as I hear that there's a nested set of files that seems to be a complete copy, my thoughts go to "Oh, it's a backup", but rather don't to "Oh, what files in the outer set are referring to files in this inner set, requiring me to update/maintain both sets", as well as testing to see if every file is an exact duplicate or not.

    Nested internal backups? Confusing. Just say no.

  • CSK (unregistered) in reply to Anon
    Anon:
    GalacticCowboy:
    Calm Mint:
    ...on the other nine billion computers on the planet.

    Hmm.. According to my math, that's 1.5 computers for each living human on the face of the earth. Given that my family's ratio is currently 1:1 (5 people, 5 computers), somebody owes us a couple more. I'll have to store that stat for next time my wife complains we have too many computers...

    There's also various servers at work that I use which if divided by user-hours (I don't use them that often) that could add somewhere between 2 and 5 to that count.

    Sounds a lot like my situation. Except I have to wonder, how do Amazon cloud instances factor into that?

    On my current project, I have four Amazon EC2's that I interact with regularly, web and DB with live and staging of each. Then there's the repository server, the local dev server, my local machine, A VM on my local machine, my personal dev box running at home and a personal hosting account that I use as a sandbox. At any given moment I have 4-8 PuTTY windows, 3 browsers (Chrome, IE & FF) with dozens of tabs each, NetBeans, FileZilla, IM Chat with the customer and other devs and ThunderBird to round it off.

    I think I just went cross-eyed.

  • diaphanein (unregistered) in reply to Kef Schecter
    Kef Schecter:
    OldCoder:
    Apostrophes can also indicate possession. The "filename" belonged to "it", so this usage is correct. Or at least, in OldCoder's view.

    I'm afraid no dictionary will agree with you. "Its" is a special possessive pronoun, just like "his" and "her". If you accept "it's", you must also accept, for example, "he's" (or maybe "him's") in place of "his".

    +1 The English language is full of exceptions. "its" being possessive is one of a very long laundry list. "i" before "e" except after "c" except in ... and ... and ... and ... blah, blah, blah.

    And another WTF with this forum software: You have validations in place, but no summary. Because a single asterisk that shows up out of scrolled view is extremely helpful.

  • diaphanein (unregistered) in reply to Lego
    Lego:
    Then you have a computer. It is quite likely you have many.

    -Lego

    Personally, I long ago stopped counting computers I have at home. After a while, it's unimpressive to count them. I count amps instead. It's also a more useful stat. For instance, I know I cannot plug another computer into my office at home, because I'm already running between 18-19 amps on a 20 amp breaker. One more and I'm hosed. Also, current in-rush presents a problem when you run that close. Have to watch the restart cycle after power outages and what not.

    On an off-topic note: You know the storm outside is bad when the top of your glass door is wet underneath of a 6-foot overhang.

  • (cs) in reply to Code Dependent
    Code Dependent:
    MrsPost:
    They still haven't figured out that people can post to it instead of going through a 'webmaster'. Luckily that's not me. Unluckily it's my husband so I still have to hear about it.
    So instead of posting like they're post to, they email Mr. Post?
    Sadly yes. But I will be sharing this with him and we'll both cry a little at how true it is.
  • (cs)

    So let's see.

    -Dude gets hired to maintain a poorly designed website. -Website has a ton of nested tables. -Dude tries to use Dreamweaver to sort it out (here's the WTF). Dreamweaver explodes. -Dude finds a CSS file and a backup copy of the site.

    I'm not sure I see the significance of that last point.

  • Beentheredonethat (unregistered) in reply to Matt
    Matt:
    The final stage of this wound up being - I just updated the navigation script and removed the x,y coordinates for rendering the drop menu. Let the damn browser decide where it should be.

    One line of script commented. Done. Boss happy.

    (bangs head, entire site is still nested in tables 757 pixels wide)

    And I'm heading back to work for my actual job of cat herding a support team thats scattered all over the world.

    Haha yes, sometimes the opposite of the old saying 'if it aint broke dont fix it' applies to html... if its broke beyond repair it aint worth fixing. Until you can get their agreement to tear up the 20K worth of site.

    This gave me a good chuckle too... been there done that, and still doing that to our main site which cost a similar figure and was done by an external design company in nice w3c-happy div layouts, but in a very non standards compliant way, and was requested to be cross browser compliant and backwards compatible with IE6.... only to find that none of the dropdowns worked. They'd used :hover on list elements.

    /facepalm

  • Mike (unregistered) in reply to diaphanein
    diaphanein:
    Kef Schecter:
    OldCoder:
    Apostrophes can also indicate possession. The "filename" belonged to "it", so this usage is correct. Or at least, in OldCoder's view.

    I'm afraid no dictionary will agree with you. "Its" is a special possessive pronoun, just like "his" and "her". If you accept "it's", you must also accept, for example, "he's" (or maybe "him's") in place of "his".

    +1 The English language is full of exceptions. "its" being possessive is one of a very long laundry list. "i" before "e" except after "c" [...]
    "or when sounding like A, as in neighgbor and weigh, and on weekends, and holidays, and all throughout May, and you'll always be wrong no matter what you say!"

    "...that's a hard rule"

  • (cs) in reply to Kef Schecter
    Kef Schecter:
    I'm afraid no dictionary will agree with you. "Its" is a special possessive pronoun, just like "his" and "her". If you accept "it's", you must also accept, for example, "he's" (or maybe "him's") in place of "his".

    Yeah? So? Whats you's point?

  • (cs) in reply to Beentheredonethat
    Beentheredonethat:
    done by an external design company in nice w3c-happy div layouts, but in a very non standards compliant way, and was requested to be cross browser compliant and backwards compatible with IE6.... only to find that none of the dropdowns worked. They'd used :hover on list elements.

    /facepalm

    Um... I'm confused, considering that :hover on non-links is standards-compliant, and that IE is just about the only browser it doesn't work with.

  • Ex-web-designer-driven-out-by-the-graphic-designers (unregistered) in reply to Crabs
    Crabs:
    My arguement is not for this abomination, but a simple table layout is often much easier to do (and read) than a mess of divs that are designed to do the same thing.

    There's your problem right there. Layout?? HTML is not a gui... The first time I browsed the web, it was command line. Mosaic was the first time I used a GUI for the web. Phones and other devices also have very limited capabilities. Oh, and don't get me started in things like aural browsers or braile pads. Again, repeating some one else's comment (who by the way clearly understands the issue at hand): "not everyone has your computer"...

    HTML is meant to mark the meaning of things (this is a paragraph, this here a title, so on). divs and spans came much later, as a way to try to give some grouping, to allow some sanity to come back.

    Never use tables for layout, never use idiotic tools, clearly thought by and meant for graphic designers to do web design, that just shows that you don't know squat...

  • Maxwell (unregistered) in reply to fourchan
    fourchan:
    A simple javascript to detect IE6 and resize the window to 800x600 would have solved the issue.

    Learn to deal!

    Ah, no.

    The problem goes the other way; detecting browsers that are not IE6 and/or a screen resolution other than 800x600.

    What would you have the script do, change the bowser's rendering engine and alter the user's screen resolution to match the site? Good luck with that, and retaining what's left of your user base.

  • v.dog (unregistered) in reply to arty
    arty:
    ?:
    TRWTF is the punchline. Or rather the lack of one. Again.

    The punchline only works at 800x600 and if you don't scroll down before joke loads.

    And it's only funny if you're using IE6.

  • JayC (unregistered) in reply to SoonerMatt
    SoonerMatt:
    eddie pasterkak:
    "Matt found a style sheet buried in an include file. It's filename? crm_useless.css."

    For a junior developer I can ignore all of the problems he encountered, that he uses dreamweaver, etc.

    My biggest problem was that it took him that long to find the style sheet. Style sheets don't get hidden it should have been the first item checked.

    Dreamweaver isn't so bad. The editor (not the designer) had some pretty good features, including searching (and replacing) tags that had certain attributes, were contained within certain tags., etc. I wish Visual Studio had that kind of functionality.

  • acsi (unregistered) in reply to Code Dependent
    Code Dependent:
    anon:
    TarquinWJ:
    Grass house throwing stones...
    Grass house? It's *glass* house.
    People who live in grass houses shouldn't throw molotov cocktails.

    We sure as hell do. We just dont do it around our own homes.

  • acsi (unregistered) in reply to Chris
    Chris:
    GalacticCowboy:
    Calm Mint:
    ...on the other nine billion computers on the planet.

    Hmm.. According to my math, that's 1.5 computers for each living human on the face of the earth. Given that my family's ratio is currently 1:1 (5 people, 5 computers), somebody owes us a couple more. I'll have to store that stat for next time my wife complains we have too many computers...

    I have 4 computers (router, game rig / workstation, laptop, media PC). I also have a G1 (Google Android phone), which is very much a computer. So, I have 5 computers just in my apartment right now, any of which might access content on any given website.

    Plus, I am also in charge of around 12 servers spread over a couple data centers (and yes, I use links2 on them occasionally). Not every "computer" is a personal computer that you sit down and use with a Windows/Mac/KDE/Gnome GUI.

    I have like 7 at home, not counting routers (1) or gaming consoles (3). Or my android (1). Or the machines I get to play with at work (1 workstation and a myriad of servers I cant keep track of without my nice list at work, mostly because they change every other week). ;)

  • iMalc (unregistered) in reply to dkf
    dkf:
    21152691 by 889038291? Nearly 19 quadrillion cells?
    Better start selecting more cells. It's going to take a while

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