• (cs) in reply to TGV

    Owwww!!! Now some newbie is gonna come here, read your comment and think: "hmmm... now that makes perfect sense and seems truly 1337"

    Maybe this guy was porting "Animal Crossing" from the DS while at work :)

  • monkeyPushButton (unregistered) in reply to TadGhostal
    TadGhostal:
    TSParent:
    ...I see people responding to TS (and TS-type symptoms) with prejudice due to lack of information...

    I prefer to respond to to everything that I lack information about irrationally and with prejudice. It's the only way to stay safe.

    You must be one of those damn humans.

  • monkeyPushButton (unregistered) in reply to luptatum
    luptatum:
    Anonymous:
    TSParent:
    Normally, I only quietly read TDWTF, but today hit a nerve. <snipped some rubbish about tourettes>
    <snipped some rubbish about tourettes being rubbish> My advice for Tourettes sufferers: just stop doing it you fucking weirdos! There, problem solved.
    Actually, its not a concious urge. You just blurt stuff out without any control of it.
    Please don't feed the trolls.
  • jay (unregistered)

    Personally, I wouldn't care what funny noises a programmer made, if he actually produced good code on schedule. If he makes them loud enough to bother other people, put him in a far corner or something. Seems to me the comment about the animal noises was irrelevant to the real issue.

    Foobar! Plugh! Frabnar hooterang!

  • RBoy (unregistered) in reply to Anonymous

    Well then, there's a lot of single most retarded spammers out there.

    Because, you know, that's one way the overseas spammers break captcha. Why bother with software solutions when labor is almost free?

  • jay (unregistered)

    But hmm, the more I think about, the more it seems to me that there's a good plan lying under all this. Invent a completely off-the-wall naming convention. Something that's completely consistent and makes perfect sense if you know the scheme, but that will be completely meaningless to anyone who doesn't. Then, assuming you can actually produce working code and that no one else tries to read your code until after you've written tons of it, you've got built in job security. Anybody can write stupid incomprehensible code that's difficult to maintain, but then the author has little advantage in maintaining it over anyone else who might try to figure it out. But if it's written in a coherent language, but one that you are the only person in the world who knows ...

    This guy's problem was that he apparently wasn't able to produce working code. He had a good plan, he just wasn't good enough to pull it off. And, of course, he blew the whole thing by giving away the glossary.

    Well, Microsoft did something like this with Hungarian Notation. But I don't think they understood it either, so it didn't really work.

  • Raven Darke (unregistered)

    This is why linguists do not make good programmers...

  • Raven Darke (unregistered)

    This is why linguists do not make good programmers...

  • jay (unregistered)

    Hey, just curious: Has anybody on this forum ever actually bought anything based on one of the spam posts? From the fact that the spammers keep doing this, SOMEBODY must be buying from them, or they wouldn't keep doing it, right?

    What particularly gets me is the spam emails I get that have a deceptive subject line intended to trick me into reading the message. I'm sure you've all gotten these, the ones with a subject of "Response to your question" or "Your password is about to expire" and then the email is an advertisement for whatever. Yes, sometimes these succeed in tricking me into reading the email. But why would I want to do business with someone when I know that the very first thing he ever said to me was a lie? If he lies to me in his advertising, why would I believe his warranty or customer service promises? How stupid do these people think I am?

  • AdT (unregistered) in reply to My village needs me
    My village needs me:
    OK, I give up, why 9 and 13?

    It's very obvious if you know how to use the three seashells.

  • Whatever (unregistered) in reply to Steve the Cynic
    Steve:
    You know, cider. Proper cider, that is, not the silly stuff they sell west of the Altantic which hasn't even been near yeast.

    What, like Strongbow? Or Hardcore? You can buy them in the grocery store in pretty much every state.

  • (cs) in reply to Severity One
    Severity One:
    Interestingly enough, the spam corrolates with the Elven theme from the article.

    But what I don't get is that, with so many Unix-based systems about, Alex insists on running this site on this rubbish Windows application that more security holes in it than the OS it runs on. Did I mention that you don't pay any license fee for any of that software?

    Some people work in "Microsoft shops" so long they start to think it's good for them and voluntarily do this at home as well. It's the programmer's version of Stockholm Syndrome.

  • My village needs me (unregistered) in reply to AdT
    AdT:
    My village needs me:
    OK, I give up, why 9 and 13?

    It's very obvious if you know how to use the three seashells.

    Demolition Man reference FTW!

  • Buffled (unregistered) in reply to Some Lawyer-wannabe
    Some Lawyer-wannabe:
    TSParent:
    "Making animal noises" wasn't the reason the person was fired, and I hope wasn't even one of the reasons they considered firing him.

    Employment "At-Will" means you can be fired for any reason or no reason at any time without prior notice. I'm sure they opted for latter "no reason".

    Actually, you can't be fired for "any reason". Just for "no reason".
  • fnord (unregistered) in reply to jay
    jay:
    Hey, just curious: Has anybody on this forum ever actually bought anything based on one of the spam posts? From the fact that the spammers keep doing this, SOMEBODY must be buying from them, or they wouldn't keep doing it, right?
    If the comments site is indexed by google, comment spamming might get the spammer's website a better google ranking. Well, at least that used to work a few years ago...
  • (cs) in reply to Buffled
    Buffled:
    Some Lawyer-wannabe:
    TSParent:
    "Making animal noises" wasn't the reason the person was fired, and I hope wasn't even one of the reasons they considered firing him.

    Employment "At-Will" means you can be fired for any reason or no reason at any time without prior notice. I'm sure they opted for latter "no reason".

    Actually, you can't be fired for "any reason". Just for "no reason".
    The reason cited (if any) was probably attempted codebase sabotage/"job security" antics. Doing stuff like that is a really, really good reason to can someone before they can cause you even more financial troubles.

    vvvvv hahahaha, I can't believe you're asking for the spam to be reinstated :P vvvvv

  • Neil (unregistered)

    Could someone post a copy of the spam, because it was deleted before I started reading the comments and I have no idea what everyone is talking about. :P

  • (cs) in reply to jay
    jay:
    Hey, just curious: Has anybody on this forum ever actually bought anything based on one of the spam posts? From the fact that the spammers keep doing this, SOMEBODY must be buying from them, or they wouldn't keep doing it, right?

    What particularly gets me is the spam emails I get that have a deceptive subject line intended to trick me into reading the message. I'm sure you've all gotten these, the ones with a subject of "Response to your question" or "Your password is about to expire" and then the email is an advertisement for whatever. Yes, sometimes these succeed in tricking me into reading the email. But why would I want to do business with someone when I know that the very first thing he ever said to me was a lie? If he lies to me in his advertising, why would I believe his warranty or customer service promises? How stupid do these people think I am?

    Spam is not targeted at the set of people who actually think logically about the content of emails they receive. That set of people is much smaller than its complement.

  • Stig (unregistered)

    "And yes, I have a son with TS, who not only "neighs" at times but also "paws" the air like a horse"

    This is a YouTube legend waiting to happen.

  • no comment (unregistered) in reply to Raven Darke
    Raven Darke:
    This is why linguists do not make good programmers...

    You can say that again.

  • Anonymous Organ Donor (unregistered) in reply to RBoy
    RBoy:
    Well then, there's a lot of single most retarded spammers out there.

    Because, you know, that's one way the overseas spammers break captcha. Why bother with software solutions when labor is almost free?

    Please don't call spammers retards. It's an insult to the handicapped to group them with spammers.

  • Giskard (unregistered) in reply to Richard
    Richard:
    We had a weird contractor once, oh, a decade ago. One of these guys who charged 5X what the regular code monkeys got, and wrote lots of crap that needed lots of hours from him to keep up and running. Eventually he went away, and I was left to fix (read: rewrite) one of his modules.

    Anyway, one of his habits was using 9 and 13 instead of TRUE and FALSE. I don't remember how long it took me to figure that out. <<Shudder>>

    I don't know if this makes half sense... but if 9 was false and 13 was true... then it would at least sound like something... kind of..

    9 -> nein -> no 13 (more of a stretch) -> treize -> sounds more like true

    Not saying I'd do it...

  • Mark (unregistered) in reply to My village needs me
    Richard:
    OK, I give up, why 9 and 13?

    The only difference in binary between a 9 (1001) and a 13 (1101) is the third bit. Maybe that's what he was checking. Or maybe it's because 13 is prime and 9 isn't.

  • JV (unregistered)

    With 6.6 billion people in the world, and many of them willing to work for less money per day than our Coke machine charges for a 20 ounce bottle, why is it not conceivable that people really are doing the spamming these days.

    The computers can then be used to verify the post and make automatic payment.

    (Incidentally, approximately 1/16 of the homo sapiens that ever lived are alive today.)

  • in-sapient (unregistered) in reply to JV
    JV:
    (Incidentally, approximately 1/16 of the homo sapiens that ever lived are alive today.)

    What does their sexual orientation have to do with anything?

  • Pauller (unregistered)

    The punchline actually surprised me. The way the story was going, I thought maybe the guy was watching horse porn or something instead of working. Although nowadays, that's not a WTF, that would be just another day at the office ...

  • (cs) in reply to no comment
    no comment:
    Raven Darke:
    This is why linguists do not make good programmers...

    You can say that again.

    This is why linguists do not make good programmers...

    (You asked...)

  • Kef Schecter (unregistered) in reply to My village needs me

    [quote user="My village needs me"]Anyway, one of his habits was using 9 and 13 instead of TRUE and FALSE. I don't remember how long it took me to figure that out. <<Shudder>>[/quote]OK, I give up, why 9 and 13?[/quote]

    If it were 7 and 42, or 19 and 76, you'd have asked the same thing.

    [quote user="Patrick"]captcha - conventio (n? convention? as in bad coding __?)

    does that captcha list contain "perfectionis"? that'd be really irritating.[/quote]

    The captcha words are all Latin. (Mine's "erat", which means "was".) "Conventio" is the correct Latin form of the word in the nominiative case. (I think the same applies to all other -ion words.)

    • Kef
  • cross-eyed (unregistered) in reply to MrsPost
    MrsPost:
    (You asked...)

    You must have missed the original reference - it was already posted twice.

  • EEk (unregistered)

    Chon.chin(how, twat) >> Chin.twat.chon['how'] || captcha('dignissim');

  • (cs) in reply to luptatum
    luptatum:
    Anonymous:
    TSParent:
    Normally, I only quietly read TDWTF, but today hit a nerve. <snipped some rubbish about tourettes>
    You do realise it's all in your head, don't you? Notice how you get that urge to tic, like you have to do it, otherwise something really bad will happen? You could just decide not to tic, but you feel like some terrible thing will happen if you don't. Just like OCD - you don't have to do it but you're such a fuck-up that your brain convinces you that you do. My advice for Tourettes sufferers: just stop doing it you fucking weirdos! There, problem solved.
    Actually, its not a concious urge. You just blurt stuff out without any control of it.
    With all due respect to anyone who has/deals with TS, if you could get away with faking TS, imagine the fun you'd have at meetings, or when dealing with idiots...
  • Buddy (unregistered) in reply to My village needs me
    My village needs me:
    Richard:
    ... Anyway, one of his habits was using 9 and 13 instead of TRUE and FALSE. I don't remember how long it took me to figure that out. <<Shudder>>
    OK, I give up, why 9 and 13?

    There is no "why", only "is" and "not is".

  • Kam (unregistered) in reply to Vilhelm
    Vilhelm:
    Anonymous:
    TSParent:
    Normally, I only quietly read TDWTF, but today hit a nerve. <snipped some rubbish about tourettes>
    You do realise it's all in your head, don't you? Notice how you get that urge to tic, like you have to do it, otherwise something really bad will happen? You could just decide not to tic, but you feel like some terrible thing will happen if you don't. Just like OCD - you don't have to do it but you're such a fuck-up that your brain convinces you that you do. My advice for Tourettes sufferers: just stop doing it you fucking weirdos! There, problem solved.

    That is all well and good until you actually have Tourettes. Trying to force yourself to quick having the twitches is like trying to stop breathing. Go ahead and hold your breath for a few minutes. You can't suffocate yourself by holding your breath because your choice to stop breathing gets overwhelmed by your involuntary instinct to breathe. I can choose to quit twitching, but after a few minutes, my involuntary mind takes over.

    You could stick your head in a bucket of water. That is my serious suggestion if this situation (must stop breathing) ever arises.

    The analogue here would be to give the poor chap a lollipop or something.

  • (cs)

    That dude doesn't have Tourrette's. He was just Spergin' like crazy:

    http://encyclopediadramatica.com/Spergin

  • Kevin Fairchild (unregistered)

    Awesome. Never thought I would see Yoruba words on The Daily WTF :)

  • (cs)

    Hallowed are the Ori.

  • Dave (unregistered) in reply to Giskard

    It could be habit from testing some old program where one of two buttons are pressed (like y/n inputs) since tab(9) and return(13) are both fairly large keys on opposite sides of the keyboard... Making it easy to hit them from a distance without thinking too much about it. Also there is probably some built in function to distinguish between the whitespace and characters so you could probably use a tennis ball from across the room for extreme debugging!

    Then again WTF?!?

    captcha: "damnum" ...Seems fitting

  • (cs) in reply to Richard
    Richard:
    We had a weird contractor once, oh, a decade ago.

    Only once and a decade ago? you're lucky!!!

    Richard:
    One of these guys who charged 5X what the regular code monkeys got, and wrote lots of crap that needed lots of hours from him to keep up and running. Eventually he went away, and I was left to fix (read: rewrite) one of his modules.

    Anyway, one of his habits was using 9 and 13 instead of TRUE and FALSE. I don't remember how long it took me to figure that out. <<Shudder>>

    Hey, why should he be constrained by your 0/1 programming conventions? You were limiting his creativity!! LOL...

  • Nine And Thirteen (unregistered)

    I know that in some cultures, 9 is a very lucky number; and 13 is very unlucky. Perhaps it's as simple as that.

  • (cs) in reply to Anonymous
    Anonymous:
    Readers Digest:
    New guy made funny noises / variable names. Fired. Boss had to work weekends. NoOneElseEverNoticed.
    You're not quite getting this, are you? The joke is that you trot out the "factual description" to highlight how boring the post was and to suggest that this is simply a machination of everyone's normal working day. The problem is, today's post was actually quite amusing and showed us something that, whilst not unknown, is fairly uncommon. As such, we'd all very much appreciate it if you could just crawl back into the rotten piece of wood that you emerged from and stay there until you have something relvant to say. Thanks from all at TDWTF!

    I actually thought this was a pretty funny post, because it highlighted the here today/gone tomorrow scenario which (for whatever reason) happens so often with contractors...

  • ANonymous Cowherd (unregistered) in reply to AdT
    AdT:
    My village needs me:
    OK, I give up, why 9 and 13?

    It's very obvious if you know how to use the three seashells.

    He doesn't know how to use the three seashells! snicker

  • Scotty (unregistered) in reply to Raven Darke
    Raven Darke:
    This is why linguists do not make good programmers...

    Not even cunning ones?

  • (cs) in reply to lolwtf
    lolwtf:
    I know I use the "spirit" keyword all the time in my code. Very useful.
    Last week I was working in the programming language in which you have to bless all your objects. I can't help but feel that there's something just slightly sacrilegious about that.
  • stu (unregistered)

    So what's the problem? It's all documented!!

  • Interesting... (unregistered)

    Anyone else notice that Mark And Jake seem to have gotten butt hurt by all the criticism and buggered off? kudos for staying on track, Alex, your writing is the better, anyway...

  • (cs)

    Well, bizarre references and usage of a language hardly anyone actually knows aside...

    This actually seems like a decent shorthand, if you had a good understanding of all the terms yourself and were somehow limited in character count. All the words are shorter than the English ones.

    But in ActionScript... gah. If you must, type it out in your weirdass shorthand and do a find-replace.

  • Slicerwizard (unregistered) in reply to Interesting...
    Interesting...:
    Alex, your writing is the better, anyway...
    That ain't sayin' much.

    "...the extended hours was exactly what trying to avoid."

    We're always treated to a few of these oddities.

  • (cs) in reply to cross-eyed
    cross-eyed:
    MrsPost:
    (You asked...)

    You must have missed the original reference - it was already posted twice.

    Really? I don't think so. Whooooosh!

  • Johnson (unregistered) in reply to monkeyPushButton
    monkeyPushButton:
    luptatum:
    Anonymous:
    TSParent:
    Normally, I only quietly read TDWTF, but today hit a nerve. <snipped some rubbish about tourettes>
    <snipped some rubbish about tourettes being rubbish> My advice for Tourettes sufferers: just stop doing it you fucking weirdos! There, problem solved.
    Actually, its not a concious urge. You just blurt stuff out without any control of it.
    Please don't feed the trolls.

    Um - why not hassle the trolls, instead of the people responding? The trolls are the ones being dickheads... or instead of hassling them, why not just disable anonymous comments? You'd kill (or at least greatly reduce) the Frist-ers as well.

  • The 2-Belo (unregistered) in reply to jay
    jay:
    Personally, I wouldn't care what funny noises a programmer made, if he actually produced good code on schedule. If he makes them loud enough to bother other people, put him in a far corner or something. Seems to me the comment about the animal noises was irrelevant to the real issue.

    Foobar! Plugh! Frabnar hooterang!

    If a horse were to contract Tourette's, would you be riding it and all of a sudden it would just blurt out, "INVESTMENT PORTFOLIO!"?

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